Ring of Fire has been covering the efforts to fight for fair wages for labor. It’s an ongoing fight. Recently, workers have been going on strike across the Midwest in protest of the wage and labor practices of McDonald’s.
The protests now span several states and have expanded to include more fast-food businesses. McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Popeye’s, and Long John Silver’s are all targets of the new-wage movement. The picketers are demanding that these establishments offer a wage of $15 per hour, which in many cases is double what they are being paid now.
Late last month, McDonald’s was in the spotlight amid other strikes and walkouts taking place. At that time they were the result of unfair and extreme labor practices. An Employee of a Manhattan McDonald’s fainted after being forced to continue working in the restaurant’s kitchen. The air conditioning unit had broken earlier and temperatures spiked to 110 degrees fahrenheit.
You know where people can make a living wage? Australia.
In Australia, according to the Atlantic, minimum wage is already $14.50/hr. and many employees in the McDonald’s chain were making better than that already.
So what gives? Why do employees in Australia get to make $14.50/hr. while Americans are left with $7.25/hr.? That’s the sort of question many of the employees in these industries want to have answered and it seems that, until they get that answer, they’re just as happy waiting in the sun outside of McDonald’s as they would have been inside working for $7.25/hr.
Joshua is a writer and researcher with Ring of Fire. Follow him on Twitter @Joshual33.
