Minimum-wage fast food and retail workers from eight cities, who have staged previous walkouts this year, are calling for an official national day of strikes for Aug. 29, after receiving encouragement from area groups.
According to the Washington Post, workers who have held one-day walkouts in cities such as New York, St. Louis and Detroit, are calling for immediate change. This time around workers have the support of local community groups and national unions and say they have received pledges of support from workers in dozens of cities across the country.
Fast-food and retail workers from stores such as Macy's, Dollar Tree and Sears, who have also received pledges of support on Facebook and through websites of local organizing groups.
Workers are calling for an increase in pay of $15 an hour and the right to form a union. According to recent NELP projections, the median hourly wage for fast-food cooks, cashiers and other crew members is $8.94 per hour.
According to the Post, the planned August walkout is expected to touch 35 or more cities and involve thousands of workers. Last month, over 500 workers walked off their jobs at fast food restaurants in New York City.
Workers at restaurants such as McDonald's, Wendy's and KFC, argued that they were being forced to work in unreasonable conditions. In July, a crew of McDonald's employees walked off their job, after a worker collapsed from stifling heat. Workers claimed they were being forced to work without air conditioning "amid record-high temperatures."
According to the Post, the strikes have moved across the country and are drawing attention to a fast-growing segment of the workforce that until recently had shown no reason to organize expect for proposes of increase income. The walkouts have not led to widespread changes, but some workers say they have gotten small pay increases and better hours in the wake of previous strikes.
"The top executives in these companies make huge salaries, and the corporations make record profits every year," said Terrance Wise, 34, a father of three who earns $9.30 an hour at Burger King in Kansas City, Mo., where he has worked for eight years, according to the Washington.
He has a second job at Pizza Hut that pays him $7.47 an hour. "How about them cutting a little off the top? CEOs are taking home millions, and many workers are struggling."
Wise, who has been working with Kansas City organizers since January and has participated in one walkout, said he has helped sign up scores of workers who plan to join the nationwide job action.
According to the Post, President Barack Obama has called on Congress to increase the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $9 a hour. A recent Public Religion Research Institute survey found that nearly three of four Americans favored raising the minimum wage to $10.
The Economic Policy Institute, a liberal research group, says that roughly eight out of 10 workers in the country earning minimum wage are 20 or older and that half of them work 40 hours a week.