Day of Wage Protests Includes Home Care and Fast Food Workers

Home care workers joined employees of fast food restaurants and other low-wage workers in nationwide protests for higher wages on December 4.

The demonstrations, many of which included fast food and airport workers walking off the job, took place in approximately 190 cities, Forbes reported.

Chanting slogans such as “Low pay is not OK,” protestors demanded a raise of the minimum wage to $15 an hour, the Guardian reported.

Home care workers and consumers joined the striking protesters in solidarity in many cities, including Minneapolis and Cleveland, where home care consumer Shirley Thompson lives.

Thompson, who receives daily care from home health aide Jasmin Almodovar, told the Plain Dealer:

I really just don’t think it’s fair that these agencies don’t pay these girls enough. I don’t know what the quality of life would be for me if I didn’t have Jasmin’s help on a daily basis. That $15 will be enough to keep them a little bit above the poverty level, but it is really not enough for what they do.

The demonstrations are part of an effort which began in 2012 to demand higher wages for fast food workers. The scope of the movement has since expanded to include low-wage workers of all kinds.

Terrance Wise, a fast food worker in Kansas City, Mo., told the New York Times that the $15/hour goal can be achieved if “all types of low-wage workers [get] involved.

“We have to build a movement for all low-wage workers,” continued Wise, whose fiancée is a home care aide.

— by Matthew Ozga