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dontmeantobepoliticalbut · 1 year

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For many cooks, waiters and bartenders, it is an annoying entrance fee to the food-service business: Before starting a new job, they pay around $15 to a company called ServSafe for an online class in food safety.

That course is basic, with lessons like “bathe daily” and “strawberries aren’t supposed to be white and fuzzy, that’s mold.” In four of the largest states, this kind of training is required by law, and it is taken by workers nationwide.

But in taking the class, the workers — largely unbeknown to them — are also helping to fund a nationwide lobbying campaign to keep their own wages from increasing.

The company they are paying, ServSafe, doubles as a fund-raising arm of the National Restaurant Association — the largest lobbying group for the food-service industry, claiming to represent more than 500,000 restaurant businesses. The association has spent decades fighting increases to the minimum wage at the federal and state levels, as well as the subminimum wage paid to tipped workers like waiters.

The federal minimum wage has risen just once since 1996, to $7.25 from $5.15, while the minimum hourly wage for tipped workers has been $2.13 since 1991. Minimums are higher in many states, but still below what labor groups consider a living wage.

For years, the restaurant association and its affiliates have used ServSafe to create an arrangement with few parallels in Washington, where labor unwittingly helps to pay for management’s lobbying. First, in 2007, the restaurant owners took control of a training business. Then they helped lobby states to mandate the kind of training they already provided — producing a flood of paying customers.

More than 3.6 million workers have taken this training, providing about $25 million in revenue to the restaurant industry’s lobbying arm since 2010. That was more than the National Restaurant Association spent on lobbying in the same period, according to filings with the Internal Revenue Service.

That $25 million represented about 2% of the National Restaurant Association’s total revenues over that same period, but more than half of the amount its members paid in dues. Most industry groups are much more reliant on big-dollar donors or membership support to meet their expenses. Most of the association’s revenues come from trade shows and other classes.

Tax-law experts say this arrangement, which has helped fuel a resurgence in the political influence of restaurants, appears legal.

But activists for raising minimum wages — and even some restaurant owners — say the arrangement is hidden from the workers it relies on.

“I’m sitting up here working hard, paying this money so that I can work this job, so I can provide for my family,” said Mysheka Ronquillo, 40, a line cook who works at a Carl’s Jr. hamburger restaurant and at a private school cafeteria in Westchester, Calif. “And I’m giving y’all money so y’all can go against me?”

Ms. Ronquillo is also a labor organizer in California. She said that she had taken the class every three years, as required, and that she never knew ServSafe funded the other side of that fight.

As workers have become more aware of how their payments to ServSafe are used, something of a backlash is developing. Looking ahead to coming battles over minimum wages in as many as nine states run by Democrats, including New York, Saru Jayaraman of the labor-advocacy group One Fair Wage said she was encouraging workers to avoid ServSafe.

“We’ll be telling them to use any possible alternatives,” Ms. Jayaraman said.

The kind of class that these workers pay for, called “food handler” training, is offered by ServSafe or its affiliates in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. But an online database maintained by the National Restaurant Association show the vast majority of its classes are taken in four large states where food-handler classes are mandatory for most workers: Texas, California, Illinois and Florida.

Other companies also offer this training. But restaurant industry veterans say that ServSafe is the dominant force in the market — to the point that some restaurant owners said they did not realize there were alternatives.

“ServSafe is very much the Kleenex” of the industry — a brand that defines the business, said Nick Eastwood, who runs a competitor called Always Food Safe. “We believe they’ve got at least 70%+ of the market. Maybe higher.”

The president of the National Restaurant Association, Michelle Korsmo, declined to be interviewed. In a written statement, she said the group had sought to protect both public health and the financial health of the industry.

“The association’s advocacy work keeps restaurants open; it keeps workers employed, it finds pathways for worker opportunity, and it keeps our communities healthy,” Ms. Korsmo wrote. Her group declined to say how much of the training market it captures.

As money flowed in from the National Restaurant Association’s training programs, its overall spending on politics and lobbying more than doubled from 2007 to 2021, tax filings show. The national association donated to Democrats, Republicans and conservative-leaning think tanks, and sent hundreds of thousands of dollars to state restaurant associations to beef up their lobbying.

During the Clinton and Obama administrations, the association was a major force in limiting employer-provided health care benefits. And though pressure from liberal groups has grown and workers’ wages have fallen for decades when adjusted for inflation, the group helped assemble enough bipartisan opposition to scuttle a bill in 2021 to raise the federal minimum wage for all workers to $15 per hour over five years.

The association had also won a series of battles over state-level wage minimums, though its fortunes reversed last year. Both the District of Columbia and Michigan moved to eliminate the “tip credit” system — where restaurants are allowed to pay waiters a salary below the minimum wage, on the expectation that tips from customers will make up the rest. That was the first time any state had eliminated the tip-credit system in more than 10 years.

Legally, the National Restaurant Association and its state-level affiliates are a species of nonprofit called a “business league,” with more freedom to lobby than a traditional charity.

Since the 1960s, their lobbying has focused heavily on the minimum wage — arguing that labor-intensive operations like restaurants, which employ more workers at or near the minimum wage than any other industry, could be put out of business by any significant increase in employee costs.

Fifteen years ago, they had just lost a battle in that fight.

Over the association’s objections, Congress had raised the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour. Former board members said they were searching for a new source of revenue — without asking members to pay more in dues.

“That’s when the decision was contemplated, of buying the ServSafe program,” said Burton “Skip” Sack, a former chairman of the association’s board. “Because it was profitable.”

At the time, the ServSafe program was run by a charity affiliated with the restaurant association. The association bought the operation, transforming it into an indirect fund-raising vehicle.

After that, state restaurant associations in California, Texas and Illinois lobbied for changes in state law.

Previously, those states had required food-safety training for restaurant managers, which typically was paid for by restaurants themselves. After the association’s takeover of ServSafe, lobbying records show, the state affiliates pushed for a broader and less-common type of mandate, covering all food “handlers” like cooks, waiters, bartenders and those who bus tables.

The three state legislatures agreed, in lopsided votes.

In written statements, the state restaurant associations said they were not trying to raise money. Instead, they said they worked with other groups seeking to reduce food-borne disease.

“This law was happening with or without our participation in the process,” said the president of the California Restaurant Association, Jot Condie. California legislative records show his association was the sponsor of the bill that imposed the mandate.

ServSafe soon had waves of new customers, which in turn generated more money for the association and its lobbying efforts. Today, Florida, California, Texas, Illinois and Utah all have similar requirements. John Bluemke, a senior vice president for sales at ServSafe from 2002 to 2010, said there was little need to pursue mandates in smaller states: “Once you did the big states, who cares about Nebraska?”

“If you’ve got a million people going through that thing, do the math,” Mr. Bluemke said. The National Restaurant Association does not release figures about the cost of offering food-handler classes, but Mr. Bluemke said that — because they are generally offered online — the costs are low and the profits high.

“We always said the first course costs you a million dollars,” Mr. Bluemke said, for making the video. “And the rest are free.”

When managers take mandatory training, restaurant veterans say, the employer usually pays. But state websites say that restaurant employees should expect to pay for these classes themselves, and restaurant workers interviewed by The New York Times said that was their experience.

The restaurant association notes that some employers have covered the costs of getting certified and that employees are given lower rates in certain circumstances. So not all 3.6 million workers paid $15 each.

“The N.R.A. is different from most traditional trade associations in our business model,” Dawn Sweeney, the National Restaurant Association’s chief executive at the time, wrote to members in 2014 — reminding them of what a good deal they had.

Business leagues, which are tax-exempt, are generally allowed to run a for-profit business, as long as it advances the common interest of their broader trade. The National Restaurant Association contends that its business cleanly fits this standard.

“The rules the I.R.S. has passed are not always clear as to what is and is not allowed,” said Anna Massoglia, an investigations manager at OpenSecrets, a nonpartisan group that tracks the flow of money in politics. “This makes it easier for groups to exploit that lack of clarity. I’m not familiar with another group that has done it to this scale.”

The Internal Revenue Service declined to comment, citing taxpayer-privacy rules.

For restaurant workers, there is little clue that money paid to ServSafe supports lobbying — much less lobbying that tries to keep workers’ pay low. The only hint is a line on ServSafe’s website, saying it “reinvests proceeds from programs back into the industry.”

Even some members of the restaurant association — the beneficiaries of this arrangement — said they did not know how it worked.

Johnny Martinez, a Georgia restaurateur, said he supports a $15 minimum wage and pays at least that much in a state where it is still $7.25 per hour. And he describes his association membership as “the price of entry” for navigating the industry, “even though I disagree with them on a lot of things.”

But he expressed frustration upon discovering the connections between ServSafe and lobbying efforts, saying “it feels very wrong” to him.

“This is a certification that’s also wrapped up inside of a lobbyist,” Mr. Martinez said. “It is weird that the tests that they require the workers to pay for are being run by the same company that’s fighting to make sure those people don’t make more money.”

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lesbiansandgayssupporttheminers · 2 years

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Last night, the TUC started a campaign for a £15 minimum wage for all workers.

Because that's the wage you now need to survive in Britain.

For a long time in the UK, the benefits system has subsided people on low incomes, meaning companies can get away with paying too little. But what we really need is fair pay.

#uk politics #fight for 15 #tuc #minimum wage #raise the minimum wage

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scandalousscarlet83 · 7 months

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#boy math #memes #funny tweets #raise the minimum wage #pay a living wage #down with capitalism

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21stcenturyophelia · 1 year

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If you want people to give a fuck about their jobs, you have to pay them enough to give a fuck.

#girlblogging #raise the minimum wage #living wage #anti work

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musings-of-a-baguette · 1 year

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MINIMUM wage is the lowest possible salary that is still legal. It is insufficient to live off of.

LIVING wage is the lowest possible salary that you can still live off of. It only provides enough money for necessities (food, housing, etc.).

THRIVING wage is double the living wage. It allows you to have enough money so that 50% of it goes to necessities, 30% goes to leisure spending, and 20% goes to savings.

We don’t need a living wage. We need a thriving wage. Because a living wage doesn’t allow you to live; it allows you to survive.

#liberal #politics #commentary/opinion #minimum wage #living wage #capitalist hell #capitalism #anti capitalism #eat the fucking rich #eat the rich #raise the minimum wage

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ziggy-solarecreator · 1 year

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#fuck the rick #fuck ceos #fuck capitalism #raise the minimum wage

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iww-gnv · 3 months

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ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Tipped workers lobbied Maryland lawmakers Thursday to help them get a raise. They want legislators to pass a bill extending the state's $15 minimum wage to service workers who currently earn just $3.63 per hour. They would also earn tips.

#news #us news #maryland news #annapolis md #uspol #us pol #minimum wage #raise the minimum wage

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dontmean2bepoliticalbut · 1 year

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#us politics #twitter #tweet #2023 #nina turner #raise the minimum wage #minimum wage #living wage #wages #wage gap #affordable housing #cost of living #service workers #retail workers #service industry #food service industry #janitorial services

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justsokaela · 1 month

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There is just something so ethereally magical and special about early mornings alone

I'm driving through the dark along abandoned small town suburban main road, past darkened strip malls and empty traffic light intersections. I've had a nice upper body workout, a relaxing massage chair + Calm meditation session, I'm sipping my boba milk tea protein drink...a hot shower and comfy baggy clothes for the drive home... I'm winding down the roads, no cars on the road except for lone travelers and 3rd shifts heading home...passing a family of deer near the local horse farm. I slow down, roll down my window and greet them. I'm energized, but relaxed. Lo-fi hip hop chill beats play on my Spotify playlist, via a Bluetooth radio setup connected to my phone, the sunrise is still hiding beyond the horizon. I'm high, free, relaxed, accomplished.

I arrive in my room, greeted ecstatically by Zero who was burrowed under the blankets on my bed as usual. It's not freezing cold out anymore, so a little sweater on Zero and a light jacket is enough for us to go for a short walk around the neighborhood. I'd forgotten how much I missed morning walks before work with him, even though he comes to work with me every day now.

When we get back home, I make a warm cup of tea, get changed and dressed for work, do my hair and makeup, and then get back into bed to snuggle with Zero under the covers for a power nap.

When we get up, I feel well rested and ready for the day. Zero hops into the car and looks proudly from his perch between the driver and passenger seat as we head in to work. I arrive on time, I log in, check the emails and reports to catch up, and then make us our breakfasts. It's warm with a little space heater under my desk and a puppy dog in my lap, and just some paperwork to do this morning on the computer. If this job paid me 8$ per hour more, I would probably be content. I could probably give up my dream of law school and a masters degree, and focus all my energy on doing things I like and having fun and just living... At least I have all this free time at work and a healthy work-life balance. I can survive off the bare minimum if I have to, for a little while.

#millennial misery #getting my life together #early girly #productivity #happiness #self care #early morning #morning person #coffee and gossip #raise the minimum wage #work life balance #actually autistic #I am that girl #that girl

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unterwaesche · 2 months

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Had an even hotter take on that McDonald's post but it turned out the OP blocked me for being pretty and also objectively correct so

Anyone else remember that Fight for 15 shit? And we were like "Hey, that's going to make shit way more expensive"

And they were like, "Psh, nonsense :) So maybe a Big Mac will be a few cents more :) employers are hoarding the profits that employees make for them anyway :)"

Then some cities bumped their minimum wage to $15 an hour, and a bunch of the big-name fast food joints not in those places bumped their starting pay to $12 an hour, so at least a full $4 more, wholly artificially, because something something paying employees less than the profit they generate?

And they were like, "See :) the prices didn't jump after all you nutjobs :) everyone can do this :)" after a few months of this, when nobody had had to renew their supplier contracts yet?

And now this,

Hot on the heels of an artificial wage boost and printing more money than God has in a single year as a practice run for UBI, which they insist would also be good, as a testament to the compromise of raising prices but only to a certain degree and letting the quality take a hit to keep the prices from going up more, as dollar menus have all but disappeared, as food prices start going up and the only econ major in government thinks inflation is price gouging so you know they're not teaching these college kids right...

And still they manage to blame capitalism.

#capitalism #socialism #raise the minimum wage

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dontmeantobepoliticalbut · 10 months

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Pennsylvania’s Democratic-controlled House of Representatives approved a measure by a close vote Tuesday that would raise the minimum wage to $15 by 2026, fulfilling a long-held party campaign plank that has run up against Republican legislative majorities for years.

The bill passed 103-100 with all but one Democrat voting for it and two Republicans joining them. But it has an uncertain future in the Republican-controlled Senate as lawmakers and Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro increasingly focus on budget legislation ahead of the July 1 start of the new fiscal year.

Pennsylvania’s minimum wage is set at the federal minimum of $7.25, and last increased in 2009.

The measure would gradually increase the minimum wage to $15 by changing from $7.25 to $11 in its first year, then to $13 in 2025 and finally to $15 in 2026. The bill ties future increases to inflation, which sponsors say mirrors action taken by 15 other states.

The legislation would also increase the tipped wage to 60% of the minimum wage from the current $2.83 an hour. The movement comes after Democrats won a House majority for the first time in a dozen years, albeit by one seat.

It’s been a yearslong effort for Democrats, who have campaigned on increasing the minimum wage nationally.

Rep. Justin Fleming, a Dauphin County Democrat, said it was one of his priorities as a candidate. He recalled working for a former Democratic governor when the Legislature last increased the minimum wage.

“If you had told me that it would be 14 years before this body would take another stab to raise the minimum wage, I simply wouldn’t have believed it,” he said. “Passing this bill will keep workers who live close to our borders here in the state and patronizing Pennsylvania businesses.”

Republicans emphasized concerns for small businesses and rising costs associated with raising the wage.

“I cannot support a bill that would put a local family restaurant out of business and, along with it, the many employees who make a living at their three locations,” said Rep. Katie Klunk, a York County Republican.

For some Democrats, the effort didn’t extend far enough.

“An African proverb says, ‘When elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers,’” said Dauphin County Democratic Rep. Patty Kim. “Even if we raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour, the grass still suffers. I support this bill because this is a piece to a larger puzzle that will help working families.”

Shapiro campaigned last year for a $15 minimum wage and, in his first budget address, he asked for the increase. Republican opposition stymied efforts by former Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf through his eight years in office to raise the minimum wage.

Wolf imposed higher wage requirements on companies getting loans, grants or tax breaks from the state government through an executive order in 2021. He did the same to state contractors in 2016.

All told, 30 other states and Washington, D.C., have raised the minimum wage above the federal minimum, including some Republican-controlled states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Every neighbor of Pennsylvania also has raised the minimum wage, although Ohio’s law exempts lower-earning businesses and employees under 16.

June is budget month in Pennsylvania’s Legislature and often a time for deal-making on pet policy priorities between governors and top lawmakers.

Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman, R-Indiana, said last week that his caucus would wait for the House to pass a minimum wage bill to consider it. However, he said, “$15 an hour is not a practical number” for Republicans in that chamber to consider.

In a deal with Wolf in 2019, the Senate agreed to raise Pennsylvania’s minimum wage in four steps to $9.50 in 2022, but the House’s Republican majority blocked it.

#us politics #news #the associated press #2023 #pennsylvania #minimum wage #raise the minimum wage #$15 minimum wage #Gov. Josh Shapiro #Pennsylvania legislature #Justin Fleming #Katie Klunk #Patty Kim #Tom Wolf #National Conference of State Legislatures #Joe Pittman

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battleangel · 6 months

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Who Cares About a Bunch of Dead Black & Brown People?

"Canadian wildfires" from this summer, if you remember them, were a "100 wildfires that started simultaneously in Canada". Yeah, okay.

Yet, if you recall, all the videos on the news and social media were of the smoke that completely filled and covered the sky on the east coast of the U.S. like a literal alien attack movie, like ID4.

People on social media reported seeing mushroom clouds and bombs being tested in NYC.

This is because the government was testing alien weaponry including bombs.

Right after the "Canadian wildfires", a former CIA director admitted in a Congressional hearing that "non-human remains" aka alien remains had been found by the government for years.

During this time this past summer, record levels of air pollution and toxicity were reported on the east coast as well as record humidity.

Yes, due to climate change but also due to government testing of confiscated alien weaponry and bombs that polluted the air and created unheard of levels of humidity.

Climate change has been known for decades and yet nothing real has been done about capitalism which drives every aspect of climate change, from the destruction of the rainforest by fast food conglomerates, to greenhouse gas emissions fueled by the auto industry, factory farming practices responsible for ethane from animal feces which is a huge climate change contributor plus all the millions of gallons of water required, drilling for oil, oil spills, oceanic pollution from non-biodegradable trash that ends up in the ocean, endless Amazon warehouses, endless SHEIN & Amazon landfills, air conditioning house at 70 degrees at all times, endless cars clogging the highway all rushing to nowhere to sit in traffic to waste the day away inside in a building wasting your life away for a paycheck & benefits, emitting pollutants out of your exhaust pipe smoke smog killing the environment depleting the ozone layer creating smog difficult to breathe, dirty machines belching smoke and gas on concrete highways to hell.

Yet noone does anything about rampant overconsumption, wastefulness, mindless spending, mindless buying, keeping up with the joneses, wasting money at IKEA, buying furniture to impress guests that never even come over, consumerism, materialism, oversized portions of food at restaurants, fast fashion worn today thrown in a landfill tomorrow, private jets killing the environment flying to nowhere for nothing, drones delivering Amazon packages that nobody needed in a day much less an hour and nobody does anything but to demand Amazon Prime deliveries in half an hour and Elon Musk is colonizing Mars and Bezos is flying rich wypipo to the moon.

This weekend, IGN via Bloomberg reported 50k year old zombie viruses being released due to climate change causing Siberian glaciers to melt.

Government wants disabled, immunocompromised, elderly, lower income black and brown people gone. As many as possible.

Whoever else dies is just collateral damage.

Why?

Because by 2030, white people will become the minority in the US if current birthing trends continue and they will be replaced with blacks and hispanics making up the majority as their birth rates are much higher than white peoples especially amongst hispanics.

The elites are using the government to do whatever it can to reduce and delay this trend before white people become the minority in the US.

The government also wants to reduce Medicaid and Medicare enrollment as well as the money spent on these programs and what better way to do that than weaponizing viruses (COVID & 50k year old "zombie" viruses) via policies to kill off lower income food service, fast food and big box retail employees, people living in inner cities, disabled and the elderly, the majority of whom are black and hispanic?

Look at Beyonces and Taylor Swifts concerts over the summer, all the crowds and unmasking despite an increase in COVID cases, mutated COVID cases and long COVID cases with severe health consequences including extended hospitalizations and lung damage.

Why did noone care that this COVID resurgence was happening alongside the Eras and Renaissance tours with literally over a million people in attendance, extremely large crowds gathering with a real chance of concert attendees infecting one other?

Because, as we saw with George Floyd and the temporary black squares on Instagram, once the performative virtue signaling stage of COVID was over, nobody gave a fuck anymore and the elites know most people dont really gaf about poor, disabled, elderly black & brown people so the new COVID mantra became "stay tf inside if youre vulnerable, I aint wearing a mask to Eras or Renaissance cuz I look tew cute".

They correctly surmised people were o-v-a-h it and most had been summoned back to their wage slave 9 to 5 life of drudgery so they knew people wouldnt complain about the concerts as they had already done their "say her name Breonna Taylor" performative virtue signalling bullshit and now they wanted to shake their dreads to Slayonce and Taylor.

Who cares about a bunch of dead poor, disabled, elderly black & brown people anyway?

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