Fast-food workers strike across country, arrests made

[Jazzy]

Fast-food workers who say they aren't lovin' their wages are striking today in 150 cities to gain support for earning $15 an hour.

The workers, organized under the "Fight for 15" banner, said they are taking a page from civil-rights leaders such as Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks, tapping into peaceful civil disobedience tactics to heighten the protest's impact. Home-health aides also joined the demonstrations, indicating the push for higher wages is spreading to other low-wage occupations.

While some may be sympathetic to their pleas, the protest also drew responses from police in many cities, with arrests reported in Detroit, Chicago and New York.

Protesters blocked a street in Chicago, forcing police to reroute traffic, according to a CBS News report. After one car leaving a McDonald's (MCD) drive-through wasn't allowed to pass, police arrested at least four demonstrators.

Today's strikes intensify a two-year-old movement that's been picking up strength, with fast-food workers arguing that their low pay makes it difficult to cover even basic necessities.

"We are barely getting by," Ken Blackman, a Popeye's cook, told CBS MoneyWatch before the strikes. He said the most amount he'd ever taken home in his paycheck was $260. "If we work hard, we shouldn't have to struggle. There are millions of us working hard who are struggling."

Blackman, 23, said he makes $7.25 an hour, pay that matches the federal minimum wage. But that barely allows him to cover his basic expenses, such as food and housing, and leaves little left over for anything else. He planned to strike in Milwaukee, where he works, today.

"We've got kids we have to take care of, and it's really depressing when you can't buy the proper shoes you need for your kids," he noted. His son is 8 and just started third grade, he added.

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Do you think fast-food workers should be earning $15 an hour? Why / Why not?

 

[Evil Eye]

Paying the people who handle your food more than minimum wage might be nice... but $15/h is quite a lot of money for a job that isn't all that physically or mentally demanding. They don't even need to be able to add and subtract.