Nationwide fast-food workers are protesting, with the help of union organizers, for higher wages on Thursday.
The restaurant industry has shot back that this campaign merely is "part of an ongoing effort to replace fact with fiction while ignoring simple truths," reports the Los Angeles Times.
Fast-food workers in the town of Florence outside of Los Angeles were seen protesting outside of a McDonald's bright and early. The group were repeatedly chanting the phrase: "Keep your burgers, keep your fries, make our wages supersized."
The protests aim to try and lift the minimum wage of workers up to $15 an hour, up from about $8 that many at the Florence location said they were making. The National Council of Chain Restaurants disputes that most fast-food workers make minimum wage. Executive Director Rob Green calls it a fallacy, stating that aside from part-time employees and teens, most employees make above the "starting wage."
According to USA Today, there were protests witnessed in Washington and New York. Those in Washington were chanting, "Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way, it's no fun, to survive, on low low low low pay."
A protester in New York, Tyeisha Batts, said that she was making only $7.25 an hour working for Burger King for several months. Batts noted that while management had not punished workers for protesting, those who were late for scheduled shifts on Thursday would not be allowed to work for the day.
Michigan Restaurant Association VP of government affairs Justin Winslow echoed the general thoughts of the fast-food industry saying, "Fifteen dollars an hour is not a reasonable approach."