For about two decades, Bartolome Perez has worked at a McDonald’s in Los Angeles, where he now makes a wage of $10.75 for each of the 25 to 30 hours a week he works.
That is barely enough to pay his family’s $1,000 monthly rent, $220 car payment and $200 food costs, according to the resident of South Central Los Angeles.
Perez, 42, plans to join other fast-food workers and their supporters in a nationwide day of protest and walkouts Thursday to demand a wage of $15 an hour and the right to organize a union without retaliation.
“It was not easy to take that decision because we’re always thinking they’re going to get rid of us, but, in 20 years, this is the first time there’s a movement in favor of the workers like me,” said Perez, a native of El Salvador, who spoke through a translator. “In 20 years, it’s the first time that fast-food workers have the chance to voice their demands and if nobody goes to the streets how is it going to happen?”
This is the first time the Los Angeles area will be included in such protests, which started in November in New York and have spread to other cities in subsequent union calls to action.
The Service Employees International Union, known as SEIU, is leading the fast-food worker protests.
SEIU is calling on fast-food workers across the Los Angeles area to join in protests at large chain restaurant locations including at three McDonald’s. The main protest is scheduled for 10 a.m. Thursday at the McDonald’s at 1007 N. Western Ave. in Los Angeles. Union leaders have not released the locations of the other two fast-food restaurants.
