Fast Food Workers Demand Better Pay and Working Conditions Amid Heat Wave and Labor Shortage

The recent heat wave is giving fast food workers more ammunition in their fight to raise the minimum wage and improve working conditions. Employees are pushing against what they claim are unsafe work environments, citing faulty air conditioning units, triple digit temperatures and record-high customer numbers as the leading contributors. 

Jack in the Box employees held a rally in Sacramento on Tuesday to demand that management take steps to guarantee a safe and healthy workplace, which includes the repair of an air conditioning unit that has been broken for weeks when temperatures reached 109 degrees. The workers filed a formal complaint with the city to alert them to conditions at the restaurant after pleas to their manager were left unanswered.

The rally also called attention back to the FAST Recovery Act, which was shelved earlier this month in the California assembly. The act called for the creation of a council, which would include fast food workers, managers, owners and franchisors, that would help set standards for things like pay, safety training and overall comfort of employees.

The FAST Recovery Act would also make it easier to hold franchisors accountable by making them joint employers of franchisees’ workers. This means that franchisors could be sued or fined the same as franchisees for violating labor regulations. Franchisors largely opposed the bill, but organizations like  Fight for $15 are pushing to bring it back to the table later this year.

In addition to the extreme heat, fast food restaurants are dealing with record customer numbers and navigating a labor shortage amid supply chain disruptions. Shifts are often short-staffed, and employees are working multiple shifts to cover the gaps, which is also frustrating customers and creating an even more difficult work environment. 

As corporations like Chipotle and McDonald’s take steps to increase their minimum wages, other companies and franchisors are expected to follow suit. Although the FAST Recovery Act is currently sidelined, workers like those at Jack in the Box are hoping to reintroduce it later this year and achieve some sort of representative council for fast food employees.