Great news!! Gavin Newsom, who is trying to end the oil and agriculture industries in California, is being successful in ending the fast food industry.
“The Employment Policies Institute survey reported some devastating responses by the California fast-food restaurant owners:
- 98% say the $20 minimum wage law applies to their limited-service restaurant.
- 41% say the minimum wage law will cost their restaurants $100,000-$200,000 per restaurant.
Additionally:
- 98% California fast-food restaurants said they raised menu prices.
- 89% reduced employee hours.
- 73% limited employee shifts or overtime.
- 70% reduced staff or consolidated positions.
“The governor and his administration are touting their policy, but any well-meaning economist would never. This undermines the reasons people own their own businesses.”
Guess Newsom wants us to pay $300 a meal at the French Laundry.
Over 5,400 CA Jobs Lost Since $20 Fast Food Wage Hike, Debunking Newsom’s Claims
‘This isn’t corporate greed – they just want to stay in business’
By Katy Grimes, California Globe, 9/23/24 https://californiaglobe.com/articles/over-5400-ca-jobs-lost-since-20-fast-food-wage-hike-debunking-newsoms-claims/
Six months since Gov. Gavin Newsom’s $20 per-hour fast food restaurant minimum wage law went into effect, California’s fast food industry job loss is now down a net 5,416 jobs since January. Companies were already sounding alarms about the new 25% wage hike in Assembly Bill 1228’s $20 fast food minimum wage, even before implementation.
But just before the new BLS numbers could drop, Gov. Newsom rushed out an op-ed for Fox News claiming “this modest law” was being mischaracterized by “conservatives and their enablers in the media.”
Pot, meet kettle.
The Globe spoke with economist Rebekah Paxton, the research director at the Employment Policies Institute. She said the wage increase was a 25% hit, and can increase every year. Yet Newsom claims this is something businesses can overcome.
Paxton also told the Globe that the BLS’s fresh jobs data show that this is the worst fast food job growth rate since the Great Recession.
And, “California’s neighboring states do not have this fast food job loss problem: Nevada and Oregon (neighbor states for which data is available on the fast food industry) both show net fast food job gains over the same period.”
But backing up a bit, less than 3 months after Gov. Newsom’s $20 per-hour fast food restaurant minimum wage went into effect, a survey reported that 74% of California fast-food restaurant owners said “there is an increase in the likelihood of shutting their restaurants down – an increasingly real concept as restaurants continue to shutter,” the Daily Mail reported.
“Recent reporting from Business Insider showed how this is already happening, with customer foot traffic around California’s fast food restaurants considerably down.”
With so much statewide and national press critical of Gov. Newsom’s devastating 25% wage hike in fast food, the Newsom administration had a trusty media friend run cover for them. The Los Angeles Times’ Michael Hiltzik obediently authored a column claiming, “The fast-food industry claims the California minimum wage law is costing jobs. Its numbers are fake.”
No, the numbers aren’t fake – the Newsom administration manipulated data, gaslighting everyone about the job losses and business closures, claiming there were job increases. The LA Times mixed data up using data from 2023 to show that fast-food employment is up. “The wage hike took place Apr 1 2024. That’s not even math. That’s just being able to read a calendar,” California Policy Center’s Will Swaim retorted.
As the Globe reported in June and July, Some fast-food restaurants have had to lay off staff completely. A June article gave details:
Some stores outright closed. Most notable, however, has been the massive amount of layoffs. Already, over 1,200 Pizza Hut drivers have had announced lay-offs, with drivers to be replaced by services such as DoorDash and Uber Eats in the coming months. Many other chains are currently also looking into doing the same for deliveries.
In early June, the Globe reported that Rubio’s Coastal Grill, a Carlsbad-based Mexican food restaurant chain with over 200 stores nationwide, announced that 48 stores in California would close over one weekend because of a large number of rising costs, including employee wages. According to Rubio’s, a total of 48 “underperforming” stores will be closing throughout the state. Half of the closures are to be in the Los Angeles area, with 11 closing in Northern California and the rest in the San Diego area.
The latest Bureau of Labor Statistics’s report came out two days after Newsom’s Fox op-ed.
Paxton said that EPI’s recent survey shows that business owners predict even more hardship into 2025, with 93% saying they will need to raise prices even further and 89% saying they will need to lay off staff or reduce hours well into next year.
She also pointed out that while economists prefer seasonally revised data, even though both non-seasonal data and seasonally-revised data show a decline in fast food jobs.
“California is down more than 5,400 jobs, net loss,” Paxton said. “This is a simple subtraction problem. And it doesn’t even include workers’ schedules revised for fewer hours, lack of or less overtime – a lot of numbers aren’t included in this data.”
Rebekah Paxton continued on the subject:
“The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ own revised data shows what’s happening on the ground: California’s fast food industry is losing jobs as a result of AB 1228. Newsom’s ‘What’s good for workers is good for business’ catchphrase is wrong on both accounts–he only needs to talk to laid off employees and priced-out residents to see the truth. The Governor and the Fast Food Council have an obligation to correct course and save fast food jobs before it is too late.”
Newsom claimed in his op–ed, “It [the minimum wage law] was used as a scapegoat for businesses declaring bankruptcy, firing workers and more.”
“This law, statewide wage increases and added regulations make it very hard to run a business in California,” Paxton said. “Newsom’s using this law as a scapegoat.”
“This is a very messy implementation of this law.”
We discussed the messy Panera Bread exemption to the minimum wage increase, and how including exemptions to the wage hike is an admission that the law is bad.
The Employment Policies Institute survey reported some devastating responses by the California fast-food restaurant owners:
- 98% say the $20 minimum wage law applies to their limited-service restaurant.
- 41% say the minimum wage law will cost their restaurants $100,000-$200,000 per restaurant.
Additionally:
- 98% California fast-food restaurants said they raised menu prices.
- 89% reduced employee hours.
- 73% limited employee shifts or overtime.
- 70% reduced staff or consolidated positions.
“The governor and his administration are touting their policy, but any well-meaning economist would never. This undermines the reasons people own their own businesses.”
Paxton continued: “Fast Food franchisers aren’t raking in profits – most are running one or a couple of operations. This isn’t corporate greed – they just want to stay in business.”
Good for Gavin. Less fast food workers, less fast foo restaurants. Less fast food restaurants, less fossil fuel vehicles on the streets. Less fossil fuel vehicles on the streets, cleaner air. The added benefit is less fast food restaurants, less fat people in California.
You cannot trust a democrat politician to tell the truth.
A democrat politician will say whatever the party line demands they say, no matter what is true or false.
Democrats have a long history of making false statements to get media exposure and when proven a lie, will quietly admit they were wrong and blame it on someone else.