California fast-food workers launch new union: 'They have to listen to us'

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/feb/09/california-fast-food-workers-new-union

Move builds on victory in late 2023 to boost pay of more than half a million workers in sector to $20 an hour


Fast-food workers march by the California state capitol in Sacramento in support of a bill to provide increased power to fast-food workers in August 2022. Photograph: Rich Pedroncelli/AP

Michael Sainato
@msainat1
Fri 9 Feb 2024 12.00 EST

Hundreds of fast-food workers met in Los Angeles on Friday to kick off the launch of the California Fast Food Workers Union, a statewide union aimed at organizing cooks and cashiers at fast-food companies across the state.

The new union comes in the wake of a victory at the end of 2023 to boost pay for California’s more than 500,000-strong fast-food workforce to $20 an hour.

Fast-food workers with the Service Employees International Union’s Fight for $15 and a Union movement led a legislative effort to get a bill passed in California to raise minimum wages for workers in the fast-food industry and create a fast-food sector council with worker representation in September 2022.

The fast-food industry responded by blocking the measure from going into effect by gathering signatures for a 2024 ballot initiative to repeal the law. A settlement was reached between labor and industry groups in September 2023 to avoid what was anticipated to be a very expensive, hotly contested ballot measure in November 2024.

FULL story at link above.