According to a study released on Oct. 22 by the University of California’s Berkeley Labor Center and the University of Illinois, more than half the nation’s fast food workers rely on public aid because their wages are not sufficient to support them. Fifty-two percent of families of fast food workers receive assistance from public programs like Medicaid, food stamps, the Earned Income Tax Credit and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, the report said, at an estimated cost to taxpayers of $7 billion each year. A separate report criticized fast food giants McDonald’s, Yum! Brands, Subway, Burger King, Wendy’s, Dunkin’ Donuts, Dairy Queen, Little Caesar’s, Sonic and Domino’s for pushing their workers onto the public safety net. The National Employment Law Project said that these 10 largest fast food companies were responsible for more than half the total cost to taxpayers—about $3.8 billion a year. McDonald’s alone was responsible for $1.2 billion.
Cheap Fast Food?
Show Comments ()
1
Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.
Mike Evans
11 years 4 months ago
Now add virtually all your mall retailers and you have a snapshot of poverty stricken workers in America. They receive low minimum wages, less than full time hours, virtually no benefits and earn no pension rights. These workers can no longer claim to be in the middle class. Their employers rely upon food stamps, medicaid, unemployment insurance and housing vouchers to make up the difference while complaining bitterly about the ACA, minimum wage increases, and regulation of pension funds. This is class warfare in its ugly full presence.
The latest from america
Pope Francis' continued "gradual, slight improvement" is a sign that he is responding to the therapy he is receiving at Rome's Gemelli hospital, his doctors said.
Pope Francis had “a restful night and woke up shortly after 8 a.m.,” the Vatican said on Friday morning, March 7. It was his 22nd night in Rome’s Gemelli Hospital.
Just as Popes John Paul II’s and Benedict’s final days revealed their understandings of the papacy, Francis’ illness has revealed him once again as the world’s parish priest, suffering close to his people.
A reflection for the First Monday of Lent, by Ashley McKinless