Wednesday marked the third day in a row of walkouts by fast food workers around the country, protesting low wages. Workers from 80 restaurant chain sites in Detroit and Flint, Mich. walked off the job, joining workers in New York City, Chicago, St. Louis, Milwaukee and Kansas City who have carried out similar actions recently in the fight for $15 an hour and the right to form a union without retaliation.
Chains including McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Burger King and Wendy’s have seen their workers walk out in protest and solidarity, despite the fact that the corporate structure of the fast food industry in this country , as Time noted this week, “has been able to keep any sorts of unionization efforts from creeping into the workplace for decades.”
The Michigan strikes too were bolstered by similar efforts Wednesday in restaurant chains across Chicago. “Inspired by the courage and success in winning raises and other workplace victories following the first Chicago based fast-food and retail strikes of April 24, hundreds of workers from new fast-food and retail store locations in and beyond downtown Chicago will join this week’s strikes,” a release from strike organizers noted.
Writing for Salon earlier this week, Josh Eidelson recounted how the walk out efforts have intensified since they began with a short-term strike in New York last year, involving 200 restaurant workers across the city:
Over the past four months, that walkout has been followed by similar work stoppages in five other cities, and a second New York City strike roughly twice as large. Each of those strikes has been backed by the Service Employees International Union and local allies, and each has shared the same demands: a raise to $15 per hour, and the chance to form a union without intimidation by management. This week’s strikes will include five of those six cities – New York, Chicago,St. Louis, Detroit, and Milwaukee- and two new ones: Kansas City and Flint, Mich.
