Today, McDonald's employees and other fast food workers around the world are demonstrating to defend their right for decent working conditions.
In Brussels, S&D MEPs joined forces with labour unions including EPSU (European Federation of Public Service Union) to call on the EU to support living wages and to investigate the wage policy and low tax payments in this sector. They gave their support to the campaign #Fightfor15.
German MEP Jutta Steinruck, S&D Group spokesperson on employment and social affairs, stated:
"Companies like McDonald's are amongst the largest employers in the world. But their business practices often include an unholy alliance of very low wages and very low tax payments. As social dumping and precarious working conditions are not limited to the fast food sector, we as the S&D Group are fighting for sustainable jobs in all domains.
"The EU has instruments to investigate bad corporate conduct and means to promote social responsibility. It is high time the Commission uses them."
Note to the editors:
Today in the United States, fast food workers are holding the largest-ever strike to hit the industry, with a 200-city walk out. This is to demonstrate against the fact that more than half of McDonald's workers cannot live on their wages and remain dependent on public assistance for basic expenditures like food or rent.
In a recent statement, McDonald's had announced a small pay raise for the few workers in stores directly controlled by the holding company, but not for the 90% of employees in restaurants run by franchisees. A 2013 report by the National Employment Law Project found that McDonald's low wages cost taxpayers more than USD 1 billion a year.
