Influential voices in food movement seek better worker wages

San Francisco Chronicle / SFGate.com ^ | Updated 10:01 pm, Tuesday, December 24, 2013 | Joe Garofoli

[thecodont]

Since he wrote "Fast Food Nation" more than a decade ago, muckraking author Eric Schlosser has noticed a sympathy gap in the food movement that he helped foster. Some foodies seem to care more about the treatment of the animals they eat than the workers who prepare and serve them.

"It's not all foodies by any means," Schlosser said. "But the food movement can get sidetracked into wealthy, upper-middle-class people caring about food as status, caring about food as pleasure. I'm a huge supporter of animal welfare, but the compassion for the abuse of animals is so much more excessive, I think, than for low-wage workers in this country."

That is changing, as interest in the plight of low-wage restaurant workers is becoming part of the national conversation - from President Obama calling for a higher minimum wage, to one-day strikes by fast-food workers this month in 100 U.S. cities, to Pope Francis denouncing the wage inequality in a world where CEOs of fast-food chains are making 1,200 times as much as line cooks.

Supporting workers Now, some of the most influential voices in the food movement - including Monterey resident Schlosser, best-selling author Michael Pollan and pioneering Berkeley chef Alice Waters - are chiming in.

They are connecting the dots between different camps in the food movement by saying it's impossible to care about eating sustainably produced food when food service workers are not making sustainable wages.

[thecodont]

Agreed. That’s a lot of stupid in one sentence.

[Smokin' Joe]

food....movement. I sure there is an alimentary connection somewhere.

If this is how they think, I don't think I want whatever it is they are having.

[Tijeras_Slim]

Thanks, it slipped my mind.