Fast food chains find a way around $20 minimum wage: Get rid of the workers
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Washington Times ^
| April 24, 2024
In response to recent minimum wage increases in California, fast food restaurants across the state are shifting to automation to get rid of wage-earning humans. The
move to making customers place orders at digital kiosks alleviates what owners say is the financial strain of rising labor costs after the minimum wage for the state’s fast food workers increased on April 1 from $16 to $20 per hour. Harsh Ghai, a Burger King franchise owner who manages 140 outlets along the West Coast, is leading the transition to automation. He plans to introduce digital kiosks across all his restaurants within months...
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California Employees Arrive At Restaurant Only To Discover Closure Due To Newsom’s $20 Minimum Wage
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State of the Union ^
| 4/21 | Evelyn Thomas
In California, a Foster’s Freeze location closed and laid off its workers due to a new $20 per hour minimum wage that took effect April 1st. The
wage increase was mandated by Governor Gavin Newsom under a law raising the fast food minimum wage by 25% to $20 an hour. The assistant manager said the owner could no longer afford the higher salaries. Some employees initially thought it was an April Fool’s joke. Prior reports indicated many California restaurants had already begun layoffs anticipating the wage hike. While economists debate the impacts of minimum wage increases, the restaurant industry is...
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Study: Democrat-Run California’s Fast Food Prices Jumped Seven Percent Prior to $20 Minimum Wage
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Breitbart ^
| 04/19/2024 | AMY FURR
Fast food prices in Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) California jumped during the six-month period before the Democrat-run state mandated a $20 minimum wage in the industry, according to a study. Prices
rose seven percent during that time, the New York Post reported on Friday, citing a study from Datassential. “California registered the highest rate of menu price inflation in the country in the period leading up to April 1 — when the minimum wage increase from $16 an hour to $20 an hour went into effect,” the outlet said in reference to the study.
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How California fast food restaurants raised menu prices in response to $20 minimum wage
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New York Post ^
| April 16, 2024 | Ariel Zilber
California-based fast food restaurants have hiked the price of menu items by as much as 8% in response to the $20-an-hour minimum wage law that went into effect April 1. .... A typical Chicken Burrito from a California Chipotle will now cost $10.25, while the average price of a Steak Burrito will
set you back $12. ... Wendy’s also instituted substantial price hikes on staple menu items
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Labor group demands California's $20 minimum wage for fast food workers extend to all sectors
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FOX Business ^
| April 11, 2024 | Bradford Betz
The law has stoked a flurry of warnings from restaurant owners and industry insiders that the consumers will bear the cost of the minimum wage increase ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A fair wage advocacy group is demanding that California’s new $20 minimum wage law for fast food workers be extended to all sectors to help
working-class people who are struggling with the state's high cost of living. FOX Business spoke with Saru Jayaraman, president of One Fair Wage, to discuss what she described as the skyrocketing levels of home insecurity and food insecurity post-pandemic. Fast food workers winning a $20 minimum wage, she...
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McDonald's $25 Deal Angers Customers, Shows Damage California's $20 Minimum Wage Is Doing to Fast-Food Industry
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Western Journal ^
| 4-11-24 | Samantha Chang
The runaway inflation raging under Joe Biden’s failed presidency has gotten so bad that some Americans are being priced out of eating at McDonald’s. Exacerbating the situation in California is the new $20-an-hour minimum wage, which has forced many fast food chains — once considered an affordable meal option — to anger
customers by hiking prices. This is the second time in three months the Golden State has raised its minimum wage. In January, the state increased the minimum wage to $16 an hour from $11. A TikTok user lamented that she had paid more than $25 for a 40-piece...
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California's minimum wage hike blamed for Fosters Freeze store closing down — worker laments she'd rather have the old wage because 'now we don't have a job'
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AP MoneyWise ^
| April 5, 2024 | Jing Pan
A Fosters Freeze outlet in Lemoore shut down on Monday — the same day the new minimum wage kicked in — and its workers are now out of a job. Monica
Navarro, former assistant general manager of that Fosters Freeze location, told Fox Business that she and her former colleagues would prefer the old wage over being unemployed. “From the people that I spoke to, my employees, we would have rather stayed at the wage that we did have before, just because now we don't have a job,” she said. She also observed the impacts of the new minimum wage...
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California's $20 Minimum Wage Costing Jobs [semi-satire]
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Semi-News/Semi-Satire ^
| 7 April 2024 | John Semmens
Democrats' belief that raising the minimum wage for fast food employers would benefit them is being undermined by businesses closing down and/or laying off portions of their labor force. Loren
Wright, owner of a Fosters Freeze franchise in Lemoore, said "my employees told me they'd rather have a job at the old wage than be laid off, but the new law doesn't give us that option. Gov. Newsom's restaurant does have that option." Newsom hastened to point out that "I'm only one of the owners of the PlumpJack Cafe. The law exempted this kind of restaurant from the required minimum...
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Burger King, In-N-Out and other chain locations in California raise prices after minimum wage increase: report
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Fox Business ^
| 4/05/24 | Jeffrey Clark
Prices for burgers, fries and other fast food items have increased at various restaurant chains across California, according to a recent report. A
New York Post investigation revealed that some fast food chains in the Los Angeles area raised prices on April 1, after new California statewide legislation went into effect Monday enforcing a $20 minimum wage for restaurants that have at least 60 locations nationwide, except those that make and sell their own bread. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed the legislation, AB 1228, into law in September. In addition to the pay raises, it also establishes a "Fast Food Council,"...
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California fast food workers stunned as restaurant closes without warning over $20 minimum wage: ‘Only the beginning’
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New York Post ^
| April 4, 2024 | Kristen Altus
Another California small business and its workers have seemingly suffered at the hands of the state’s newly enacted $20 minimum wage. ... When making their way to work Monday morning, Navarro and her team learned upon arrival that the restaurant owner had made the decision to close its doors for good. The
owner, Loren Wright, told local Fox affiliate KMPH that this was the “last thing” they wanted to do, but knew by Friday night the business likely wouldn’t be able to absorb the wage hike and didn’t “want to ruin their Easter Sunday.” The new California statewide legislation went...
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Lemoore Foster's Freeze shuts down as CA minimum wage rises
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KSPN-Fresno ^
| 4/2/24 | KSPN-Fresno
Monday, as California's minimum wage for fast food workers rose to $20 an hour, the Foster's Freeze in Lemoore permanently closed.
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California’s $20 fast food minimum wage balloons menu prices — with some chains increasing costs by nearly $2
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NY Post ^
| 04/02/2024 | Genevieve Wong and Steve Nelson
You’ll be dropping a lot of dollar on that Whopper. Menu prices at fast food chains across California have increased, as a new law went into effect requiring them to pay a $20-an-hour minimum wage to workers from Monday. The Post checked menus at several restaurants in the Los Angeles area to
see if the costs are already being passed onto consumers — with mixed results. The biggest leap on was at a Burger King, where a Texas Double Whopper meal cost $15.09 on March 29, but surged to $16.89 on April 1, a price whopping increase of $1.80 for...
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New $20 minimum wage for fast food workers in California starts Monday. Here's what to know
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KCRA-TV3 ^
| Apr 1, 2024 | Terry Chea, Adam Beam
LIVERMORE, Calif. — Most fast food workers in California will be paid at least $20 an hour beginning Monday when a new law is scheduled to kick in giving more financial security to an historically low-paying profession while threatening to raise prices in a state already known for its high cost of
living. Democrats in the state Legislature passed the law last year in part as an acknowledgement that many of the more than 500,000 people who work in fast food restaurants are not teenagers earning some spending money, but adults working to support their families. That includes immigrants like...
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The Results of Commiefornia’s New $20 Fast Food Minimum Wage Are in and Legislators Are Already Trying to Undo the Damage
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Citizen Watch Report ^
| April 1, 2024 1:32 | Staff
Thousands of jobs have already been eliminated by California’s law to raise the minimum wage to $20 for restaurant workers, which goes into effect April 1. For
eight years, Michael Ojeda delivered food for a Pizza Hut in Ontario, California, using the income he received to support his family. In December, the 29-year-old received a letter from the pizza franchise informing him that his employment was being terminated in February. The news shook him. “Pizza Hut was my career for nearly a decade and with little to no notice it was taken away,” Ojeda said, whose story was recently highlighted...
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New $20 minimum wage for fast food workers in California set to start Monday
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ABC News ^
| March 30, 2024 | TERRY CHEA Associated Press and ADAM BEAM Associated Press
LIVERMORE, Calif. -- Most fast food workers in California will be paid at least $20 an hour beginning Monday when a new law is scheduled to kick in giving more financial security to an historically low-paying profession while threatening to raise prices in a state already known for its high cost of
living. Democrats in the state Legislature passed the law last year in part as an acknowledgement that many of the more than 500,000 people who work in fast food restaurants are not teenagers earning some spending money, but adults working to support their families. That includes immigrants like...
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Calif. fast-food chains slash workers as $20-an-hour minimum wage looms
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NYPost ^
| 3/25/24 | Shannon Thaler
California restaurants are reportedly laying off staff and reducing hours for other team members in an effort to cut costs ahead of a California state law taking effect on April 1 that will raise fast-foot workers’ hourly wage to $20. In
the months leading up to the wage mandate, California eateries, particularly pizza joints, have established a plan to cut jobs, according to state records obtained by The Wall Street Journal. Pizza Hut and Round Table Pizza — a Menlo Park, Calif.-founded chain of 400 pizza parlors, mostly on the West Coast — have said they plan to lay off...
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‘Unaffordable’: California McDonald’s Franchisee Slams Gavin Newsom’s $20 Fast Food Minimum Wage Bill
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Breitbart ^
| 03/21/2024 | OLIVIA RONDEAU
A major California McDonald’s franchisee is speaking out against Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D-CA) new minimum wage law that will force fast food businesses to pay workers at least $20 per hour, saying menu items would become “unaffordable” if scaled to the increased wages. Kerri
Harper-Howie, a Los Angeles-based franchisee who owns 21 McDonald’s locations across the state with her sister, says her profits will tank while trying to keep up with the guidelines from the California Fast Food Council, which Newsom created in 2023.
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New $20 minimum wage law in California set to take effect, but people notice an ‘obscure’ exemption
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American Thinker ^
| 02/29/2024 | Olivia Murray
Talk about fortuitous! In a strange turn of events, one of Gavin Newsom’s biggest donors hits the jackpot, and when the state-mandated $20 minimum wage for certain fast-food workers takes effect in April, this lucky duck employer won’t be subject to complying with the increase, thanks to an “obscure” exemption in the
statute. Here’s the story, from Fox News yesterday:A major donor to Democratic California Gov. Gavin Newsom is expected to reap the benefit of an obscure exemption to the state’s new $20 minimum wage regulations for the fast food industry that will allow some of his restaurants to continue...
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Why Is Panera Exempted From California's New Minimum Wage Law?
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Reason ^
| 2-28-24 | ERIC BOEHM
When fast food restaurants across California have to start paying workers $20 per hour on April 1, one major chain will be exempted from the mandate—and it just so happens to have a connection to a longtime friend and donor to Gov. Gavin Newsom. Panera Bread is poised to get a boost
from a bizarre clause in the fast-food minimum wage law that exempts "chains that bake bread and sell it as a standalone item," Bloomberg reports, adding that "Newsom pushed for that break, according to people familiar with the matter." That exemption stands to benefit Greg Flynn, owner and...
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Ballot measures on ranked choice repeal, minimum wage increase likely to go before Alaska voters
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Anchorage Daily News ^
| 2/27/24 | Iris Samuels
Two citizen-backed initiatives will likely appear on the general election ballot in November, including one seeking to repeal Alaska’s voting system, state election officials said Tuesday. After a monthlong review, the state Division of Elections made the initial assessment that groups had gathered enough signatures to place two questions on the ballot:
Voters will be asked to indicate whether they support Alaska’s current ranked choice voting and open primary system; and whether they support provisions mandating paid sick leave for many Alaska workers and increasing the state’s minimum wage. The initiative opposing ranked choice voting was organized by allies of...
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