The Fight for 15 campaign, a three-year-old nationwide labor movement seeking wage hikes at low-paying fast-food restaurants, launched a one-day strike on Tuesday, November 10, in 270 US cities – its largest demonstration to date, according to organizers.
11 November 2015
Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko told R-Sport that he’s planning to meet President Vladimir Putin to discuss the results of the WADA investigation.
10 November 2015
Hospital workers have joined with fast-food workers to demand higher wages in Boston.
Protesters have gathered in front of the Los Angeles City Hall.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced that he would make $15 an hour the minimum wage for all state workers.
The hourly rate will be gradually increased until New York state workers are paid at least $15 hourly in 2018.
“I believe that if you work hard and work full time, you should not be condemned to live in poverty,” the governor said, adding that “families nationwide continue to be left behind by an insufficient minimum wage. And it’s time that changed.”
Protesters are gearing up on the West Coast.
Bernie Sanders doubled down on his support for the Fight for 15 campaign at a rally in Washington, DC.
"Thank you all for coming out and standing up for justice, standing up for dignity, and for saying loudly and clearly that people in this country that work 40 hours a week deserve a living wage," he said, addressing a crowd in the rain while holding an umbrella.
Some supporting the movement rallied against restrictions on food stamps, while others pointed out a $15 an hour minimum wage is in fact needed to get rid of the need for food stamps.
Pro-abortion figures such as NARAL and Planned Parenthood have thrown their support behind the seemingly unrelated issue of a $15 dollar minimum wage, claiming that their causes go hand-in-hand.
Critics have pointed out that such a sharp increase for low-skill jobs will result in those jobs being replaced by machines. Many fast-food companies have already implemented automated ordering systems in some restaurants.
Support for workers has been given by college students at universities across the country.
The power of the bloc of voters who make less than $15 an hour didn't go unnoticed by politicians. Democratic presidential front runners Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton made tweet on Tuesday morning expressing their support for the Fight for 15 campaign.
In addition to a rally in Brooklyn, striking New York City workers assembled in Harlem, tying income equality to racial and immigrant justice.
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders spoke at a Fight for 15 rally in Washington, DC, on Tuesday, saying "people in this country who work 40 hours a week deserve a living wage," a sentiment shared by supporters across the movement.
Fight for 15 activists in the Midwest, including St. Louis and Minneapolis, are out en force to strike for better pay.
Though fast-food workers have become a major working bloc in the Fight for 15 movement, others, including childcare workers and delivery drivers, are striking as well.
Protesters in Boston disrupt lunch at Burger King
Protesters in the US get support from across the globe.
McDonald's workers in Korea showed solidarity with Fight for 15 strikers in the US, indicating that awareness of the movement has become global.
Rainy weather doesn't stop demonstrators from rallying outside fast-food chains in the Big Apple.
More cities in western US states have hit the streets to push for wage hikes. McDonald's on the world famous Las Vegas Strip is a target for activists in Sin City.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio spoke at a Fight for 15 rally in Brooklyn early Tuesday. The mayor has advocated for a $15 per hour minimum wage in his city, saying it is an "organic minimum" wage that has come from grassroots activism.
Mayor Bill Peduto, of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, announced this morning that the city would eventually boost to $15/hour its wage for city workers and contractors.
Early morning protest in New York
The Fight for 15 one-day strike kicked off early this morning, as workers, many of them in the service industry, turned out in major US cities like New York and Chicago, and beyond. Fight for 15 said in a statement that workers paid less than $15 an hour as “a voting bloc that can no longer be ignored.”