Low-Wage Workers Shame Greedy Restaurant Chains in Massive Protest

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http://www.alternet.org/activism/low-wage-workers-shame-greedy-restaurant-chains-massive-protest


Darrin Browder, a restaurant worker from New Orleans, at Monday's economic justice protest in Washington, D.C.
Photo Credit: Mara Kardas-Nelson


Hundreds of low-income workers from around the country demanding better wages, benefits and an end to corporate greed blocked traffic in Washington on Monday morning to start of a day of protests, marches and lobbying Congress for economic justice.

The protesters marched along main thoroughfare Pennsylvania Avenue as they headed towards the Capitol, blocking traffic for several minutes at a time at busy locations along the Mall. The activists were in Washington, D.C., for the Rising Voices for A New Economy conference, organized by National People’s Action and the National Domestic Workers Alliance. Their coalition included groups like Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC United), which is using the day to launch a new shaming campaign against the corporate restaurant industry and its national lobbying group, The National Restaurant Association. NRA members are also in Washington for their annual convention and congressional lobbying day.

“It’s a shame that people get paid $2.13 an hour—that’s 213 pennies more than a slave was making an hour, and I come from a slave state,” said Darrin Browder, a New Orleans ROC organizer who held a sign saying “One Fair Wage,” to protest the 22-year-old federal minimum wage for tipped workers. “We’re the wealthiest country in the world. The problem is the whole economy itself. Poor people fuel the economy because wealthy people don’t spend anything.”

Browder said he came to Washington “because this is where change happens. We can’t do this anywhere else. We tried raising the minimum wage in Louisiana and it didn’t even leave [the legislative] committee… We want the federal government telling our state how it’s done.”

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1. They need shamed. nt