Progressive News, Opinion, and Analysis
The RI House of Representatives floor debate on the tipped minimum wage featuring Representatives Joseph Shekarchi, Doreen Costa, Patricia Morgan, Aaron Regunberg, Michael Chippendale, Antonio Giarrusso, Teresa Tanzi and John DeSimone.
Featuring such classic lines as, “I’m a great tipper. I’m sure all of you are great tripper.” and “Percents don’t change!”
1. Carried cases of beer for myself,three high, through a crowd.
2. Cleaned for an entire shift: snow storm.
3. I claim all my tips. No one will give you an apartment or credit if you don’t show income.
4. Forced to “close the bar” and to pay the sitter for overnight hours. I finish the day up about 30 dollars. This was my “money shift”.
5. Served the manager drinks while I do his job.
6. Moved full kegs. Many, many full kegs and Co2 canisters (they’re as tall as I am).
7. I listen to people when they’re sad, which happens a lot when people rely on alcohol to manage their stress and emotions. Listening and empathizing is often part of the job.
8. Inventoried and processed liquor orders.
9. Restocked an entire bar. Every shift.
10. “Cashed out” an entire waitstaff. Most shifts. Not in my job description.
11. Accepted Crumpled up money thrown over the bar onto the floor as a tip.
12. Customer says he’s a “producer”. Asks me to turn around and see my “rear” in not so polite terms before he orders. I neither do nor say anything.
13. Manager brags about running a “brothel / escort service” in college. I do nothing.
14. Busy day at the bar. Customer grabs drinks over the fruit tray, smashing it. I get gashes across my knuckles and bleed everywhere. No one asks if I am okay. I tape them and keep working.
15. I cut off a customer who has arrived drunk from another venue. He pees on the “service area” of the bar.
16. Man grabs my arm, I twist away and scowl, but otherwise do nothing.
17. Owner grabs me forcefully by the back of the neck to show me where a switch is. I don’t tell him that’s not my part of my job. I do nothing.
18. Owner splits up my tips. Strangely, I leave with less than when I counted it two hours before. When I make a fuss, they cut my shifts.
19. Manager tells me I’ll get a great recommendation if I quit. I do not sign the paper he hands me, knowing I might need unemployment. My son is about 2 years old.
20. I close the bar by myself, at 3 AM. I put the cash in the safe, and set the alarm. Every shift. No extra pay.
21. There are many rubber floor mats here. They are all very heavy and about 6’ by 3’. I carry all of them, covered in filth, to the kitchen, where I clean them myself. Every shift.
22. I tear my rotator cuff setting up the bar. An accident. I do nothing. I don’t have health insurance. It still hurts occasionally, years later.
23. You can still smoke in bars. I clean stacks of ashtrays, some with gum. There are maybe thirty of them.
24. I roll silverware. Enough to fill about a dozen shoeboxes.
25. I pay a sitter ten dollars an hour, so when I get to work, I’m already at least sixty dollars in the hole.
26. On my feet all night. I close the bar at 3 am and get up to feed my son at 6 a.m.
27. When people say “You’re too smart for this job. Why don’t you go back to school?”, I think, “What makes you think I haven’t?” but say nothing.
28. I memorize customers drink orders on the fly. I’m pretty good. I can remember groups of about 8-10 at a time, depending on how busy it is.
29. Manager tells me I had a really great sales day. Like, the best of the past few weeks. Feeling good, but don’t get a raise or bonus.
30. The “Service Bar” tape is going crazy. I make pitchers of margaritas hand over fist for hours. The servers only tip us out maybe 10-15 dollars a piece. They make 2.89 an hour too. We have to tip out barbacks 15-20% to keep them happy. We tip out the bussers and expediters as well. Tips are stretched thin.
31. I run Keno slips. No one tips me on those unless they win, which is not frequent. It makes a lot of money for the bar, as I understand. It’s time consuming and makes me no money and takes away from my service.
32. I wash dishes. A lot of dishes. I scrub lipstick from glasses.
33. I wear a uniform that is sexually degrading. It’s a “referee” outfit that says “#69” on it. I make good money here, so I do it anyway, even though it embarrasses me. I can’t bend over without exposing my underwear. This is a new “uniform” and wasn’t what I signed up for.
34. Senior bartender tells me I’m shit, and I cry. I don’t know what to do. People are yelling at me. I’m only 19. Women (and servers in general) are forced to be competitive in this environment.
35. I get burned expediting food. It’s my own fault, I think. Even though the manager practically threw the plate at me.
36. Underage waitress comes into the restaurant and is physically and verbally abusive to me, because she is drunk. I complain. She’s friendly with management. They make her a bartender. I have to find another job; this is ridiculous.
37. I book the shows, and live bands for the nights I work. It brings in a little crowd on an otherwise dead night. I get no extra pay for this.
38. I listen to my boss, the owner, talk about how upset they are about their personal life even though it’s really inappropriate.
39. I make “bar food”. We have a mini-fryer and a pizza oven. I’m a bartender-cook now, I guess. Maybe we’ll make more tips. I hope. We get no extra pay.
40. Every week, I do a “deep clean” on my slow shift. I pull out the keg coolers and mop and sweep behind them, I take out every single beer from every cooler behind the bar. Clean every shelf. Anything that can be touched by human hands, I spray cleaner on. It helps pass the time. No one comes here when it rains, except for a few friends. I will break even today.
41. I slice bags upon bags of lemons and limes for the bartender following me. It takes a long time. We help each other out.
42. I come into work, even though I’m really sick. My manager says it’s my job to cover my shifts.
43. I pick up an extra shift, Yay! The manager just phoned me. Someone just called out. I guess in some special cases the manager will find shift covers.
44. We’re open every day, rain or shine. Everything is closed in the “blizzard”, I’ll walk the two miles, I like hiking and snow. Maybe it’ll be fun, even though I won’t make any money.
45. I have an abusive relationship with a co-worker. I get fired a few months after asserting that I feel threatened. He does not.
46. There is a refrigerator for condiments that needs restocking. I refill ramekins of mayonnaise, and other sides. It takes me about 20 minutes. One of my many chores. Part of the job is helping out. The servers need these things ready for the next shift.
47. I refuse to wear a t-shirt that says “Check Out My Rack”. That’s not a funny joke to me. I’m getting tired of this.
48. I’m not receptive to a customer’s vulgar come-on. He calls me a “dyke”, and I walk away, otherwise doing nothing.
49. Customer says, “How much for a smile?” I squeeze out a grin even though it’s the tenth time I’ve heard that this week, and it’s not funny anymore. It makes me feel dirty. I’m not smiling because I had to push my way through a crowd to get to you. I am 20.
50. I get a really big tip. I’m psyched, because we were overstaffed this week, and rent is almost due.
51. Customer repeatedly orders a “Smirnoff and Vodka”. I try and clarify because that’s not an actual drink order and customer calls me a “(expletive) idiot”. I brush it off.
52. Not a lot of tips because I’m working a “techno night” where everyone is high on “party drugs” and drinks 5 dollar bottled water all night. I restock the cases of water.
53. I get fired for refusing to work a show in conflict with my personal beliefs against racism and homophobia. The owner says it’s a “no-show” even though I told him far in advance.
54. Not trying to insult me, a customer says, “You must love this job. It’s so easy.” People who have never done it don’t really know what it’s like, or how little they have to pay us. I wish it was just chatting and being friendly; that would be great.
55. I keep a few babysitters, and family members on “standby” for childcare. I don’t know what my schedule is going to be, and I can’t say no to a shift, or I get a warning or suspension. Say no multiple times, and you get fired. I can’t afford that.
56. I buy my own uniforms.
57. I hide my superior’s drug use.
58. I memorize the daily specials, and push for extra sales. We have meetings about “up-selling”, and I’m generally pretty good at it.
59. I make just enough money to still qualify for SNAP, or food stamps, because the cost of living is so high in the city of Providence. My rent consumes about 70% -90% of my income, sometimes more, in the years I live here. I borrow money. I get roommates. My family helps me. What do other people do to get by?
60. I can’t afford a car. I walk to work. Providence is a great walking city.
61. My co-workers and I hang out after work. We vent and swap stories. Camaraderie really seems to get us through tougher shifts.
62. I set up sound equipment for the music tonight. I do not get extra pay.
63. I work well into my pregnancy. The comments about my body (some from superiors) really upset me and I say nothing.
64. I have morning sickness, and run to the bathroom frequently during my shift. Not sure if I’ll make any money tonight. Not sure what I’m supposed to do.
65. I think about one of my favorite elementary school teachers. She waited tables on the weekend, and was a lovely, intelligent woman. I think about her especially when people say things like “Stupid people are stuck waiting tables”, or when people insult my intelligence for being a server.
66. I carry 16 gallons of orange juice down two flights of stairs.
67. Stood on a ladder and dusted cobwebs. I am in my ninth month of pregnancy.
68. A dishwasher quit mid shift so I washed all the dishes in the restaurant.
No extra pay.
69. I worked for 55 hours in one week and was only paid for 39.5 hours because my boss didn’t want to pay time and a half (it would have still only been $4.36 an hour before taxes).
70. A coworker sexually harassed me in front of a crowd of people.
71. I was called a “retard”.
72. I was called a “cunt”.
73. I was told to “(expletive) off”.
74. Served a patron who had his penis out of his pants during moments of his
meal.
75. I worked holidays, my child’s birthday, my birthday, and every
mother’s day.
76. I was sexually harassed and propositioned by friends of my superiors.
77. I was told if I didn’t like it to “get a real job” when I asked for more
than 2.89 an hour.
77. Since becoming an advocate, I’ve been told by strangers that poor people like
me should just die.
78. The air conditioning breaks at work. It’s over 90 degrees in here.
79. No lunch break, ever.
80. I pulled a muscle while lifting a heavy bus bucket. Kept working.
81. Slipped on butter and smashed my face into the tile floor. Finished my shift with a bloody nose.
82. Came into work to cover someone else while having contractions from pregnancy.
83. Turned down unsolicited dates, while smiling, and still doing my job.
84. Wouldn’t let patrons in after close. Got called a “bitch” for doing my job.
85. Been a full-time student and made the Dean’s List. People still assume I’m lazy and uneducated.
86. Cleaned a rotting mouse out of a sticky trap behind my bar. Got told, “Clean it yourself.”
87. Got left drugs as a tip. I don’t do drugs.
88. I was forced to pay for tabs that were walked out on, even though I was told not to take credit cards as collateral on lunch shifts.
89. Had a drink thrown at me by a customer who had had enough to drink and was cut off.
90. Broke up a fight. Held a towel over the bleeding man’s forehead.
91. Used my personal time to promote for the business that employed me.
92. Too busy to take a break, and we’re not allowed to eat behind the bar, so I eat my food cold at close to last call. I got here at 11 AM, so I’m desperately hungry.
93. Spent my own money at the business that employs me. I’m a customer, too.
94. During the lunch shift, a customer (a doctor) says, “See, a girl like her is good girlfriend material.. busy and grateful. Wouldn’t get in the way of the wife.” Like I wasn’t even in the room. I did nothing.
95. Re-organized the walk-in and made sure nothing was past code or spoiled.
96. Didn’t fake sick to get out of work, but couldn’t get time off for being sick even if I was. I try to never miss work.
97. I don’t like karaoke. But when I worked a karaoke night, I did it anyway to give the customers a good laugh.
98. Danced with one of my customers on his birthday. We have become good friends, and we both like jazz.
99. Struggled to pay my bills. Though I’m thankful for my customers, I wish they knew how their tip really pays my hourly wage for my boss.
100. A family member died this week. I go to work and tell no one how upset I am. We’re supposed to “keep that shit at home”.
101. I met a lot of wonderful people, hard-workers, and friends at work. I think we deserve to make at least minimum wage. But we don’t. Our labor is paid $2.89 an hour.
Restaurant workers, joined by faith leaders and and other supporters, marched in the drizzling rain from the Gloria Dei Lutheran Church to the State House to demand an increase in the tipped minimum wage, the first such increase in 20 years. The tipped minimum wage in Rhode Island is $2.89, as opposed to the regular minimum wage of $9. It is expected that the General Assembly will raise the regular minimum wage to $9.60 in this session, though even $9.60 is a far cry from a living wage, estimated to be about $12 per hour.
The effort to raise the tipped minimum wage has been led by Restaurant Opportunities Center RI. A bill introduced by Representative Aaron Regunberg in the House and Senator Gayle Goldin in the Senate seeks to raise the tipped minimum wage every year until it reaches parity with the regular minimum wage. That bill is not expected to pass this year, though Regunberg is hopeful that a $1.00 increase in the tipped minimum wage can be negotiated.
U.S. Labor Secretary Tom Perez came out in strong support for both raising the minimum wage and for eliminating the tipped minimum wage during a press Q&A at the end of his visit to Gold International Machinery with state Senator Gayle Goldin and US Representative David Cicilline on Friday afternoon. The Secretary was enthusiastic about the economic benefits of raising the minimum wage for both workers and the economy.
“I was recently in Seattle on the first day of the effective date of the new minimum wage in Seattle,” said Perez, “the person who stood right next to me, in addition to the mayor that day, was the head of the Seattle Restaurant Association.”
According to Perez, Seattle “has had the highest minimum wage in the country over the last twelve years, and they have no tipped credit.” He added, “If the opponents were correct, then every time you fly to Seattle, you ought to bring a bagged lunch, because all the restaurants should be going out of business.”
Perez also talked about raising the regular minimum wage, saying that while he and President Obama, “don’t pretend to know what the best wage is for the city of Seattle or the state of Rhode Island… we applaud efforts to go as high as possible.”
The secretary added that “as a result of the low minimum wages across the country we’ve seen a consumption deprived recovery in many circles.”
“When you raise the minimum wage, guess what happens?” asked Perez, “If you’re a restaurant, people have more money to spend. When you raise wages, guess what happens? The economy gets better. We consume more things from manufacturers so places like Gold [International Machinery], they see their business go up.”
Here in Rhode Island there are General Assembly bills currently before the Senate and the House to gradually eliminate the tipped minimum wage. There are also bills to raise the regular minimum wage from $9 to $10.10. At hearings held to discuss the bills, representatives from the Rhode Island Hospitality Association, including Chairman Bob Bacon, have opposed any increases in the minimum wage with questionable economics and threats of robots.
Governor Gina Raimondo, who Labor Secretary Perez seemed to like quite a bit based on comments he made earlier in the day, has called on the General Assembly to raise the minimum wage to $10.10. She has yet to publicly support the elimination of the tipped minimum wage.
Rhode Islanders who want to see both the regular and tipped minimum wage increased by the General Assembly this year should take note of those businesses and business associations that oppose raising the wage and consider spending their money at businesses that truly have the best interests of their employees at heart. It’s all too easy for business owners to say, “I love my employees.” It is harder and more significant for business owners to truly advocate for the economic well being of their employees.
Deborah Norman has owned and operated restaurants in Rhode Island for over 38 years. Currently she owns Rue De L’Espoir on Hope St. and Rue Bis on South St., both in Providence. She has 30 employees between the two restaurants. Norman spoke before the Senate Committee on Labor in support of increasing the tipped minimum wage, an effort opposed by the Rhode Island Hospitality Association and other business lobbying groups.
“While I can only speak for myself and my two restaurants,” said Norman, “it’s difficult for me to imagine that my experience is so abnormal as to be incomparable to that of many other restaurants in our state.”
“An increase in the sub-minimum wage would benefit women, men, families and the economy as a whole,” said Norman, “I wanted to reach out personally as a restaurant owner and explain why I am confident that my restaurants could absorb a reasonable rate increase without a negative impact to my business.”
Norman agreed that an increase done too quickly and too steeply might have disastrous effects, but an “incremental but significant change” could be dealt with. “For example, if Rhode Island were to raise the tipped minimum wage by $1 per year, for three consecutive years… my restaurants would have no problem adapting.” Norman did not think the slight price increase and minor menu “tweaking” she would do to accommodate the change would be noticed by her customers.
“In my opinion,” said Norman, “the biggest difference would be that 20,000 workers in our state would have more money in their pockets, putting them in a better position to actually come out and eat in the restaurants they may even work in.”
“By legally raising the tipped minimum wage across the board, no single business would have to worry about being at a competitive disadvantage.” This is significant, said Norman, because she already pays many of her workers at rates above the tipped minimum wage. She does this because she wants to be fair to her employees, but it puts her restaurant at a competitive disadvantage “because I know that competing restaurants might not act similarly. Raising the sub minimum wage would provide an even playing field.”
At recent State House hearings on raising the minimum wage and eliminating the tipped minimum wage, restaurant owners, beginning with Bob Bacon of Gregg’s Restaurants, (who is also the president of RIHA, the Rhode Island Hospitality Association) have repeatedly brought up the specter of automation replacing low wage workers if labor costs are raised. Raising the wage, say entrepreneurs, will price minimum wage workers out of the market, and these robots are being developed now.
Following this argument to its inevitable conclusion, workers should realize that unless they are prepared to always sell their labor at rates below the price of a robot, they will be unemployable. As the price of such technology falls, workers should expect to have their wages slashed accordingly. It’s not just workers in restaurants who will be replaced, but taxi cab drivers, long haul truckers and soldiers. According to NBC News, even skilled workers like pharmacists and supposedly skilled workers like writers may find themselves displaced. In fact, one study estimates that 47% of jobs are at risk of being lost to robots.
I suppose that in the face of this threat we could fight for our jobs, selling our labor ever cheaper, exhausting ourselves in John Henry-like feats of frenzied work that demonstrate our indefatigable spirit even as our hearts explode in glorious exertion…
Or we can flip the script.
Whenever a new robot is developed, the owner simply lays off a bunch of workers, presses the “on” button and relaxes as the profits roll in. This allows the entrepreneur to enjoy a steady stream of income as the unemployed workers struggle to survive.
As more and more robots come online, less and less people will be employed. Eventually, even skilled robot mechanics will lose their jobs as robots will be able to repair each other. The humans of this world will be divided into those who own the robots and those who are starving to death. I think this is what Paul Krugman meant by “uncomfortable implications” when he discussed the future of robotics.
The problem with this scenario should be obvious. As this transition to the robo-centric world of tomorrow develops, there will be less and less people able to afford to buy the many things the robots are making. Long before we get to the point where the 1% of the 1% own the entire world and an army of robots to do their bidding, the economy will have collapsed.
No one will be able to afford to eat at Gregg’s.
So what’s the answer? Robert Reich suggests that it “may be that a redistribution of income and wealth from the rich owners of breakthrough technologies to the rest of us becomes the only means of making the future economy work.”
We already subsidize the restaurant industry with our taxes. Mike Araujo of ROC United RI says that “tipped workers in Rhode Island currently receive $638,325 in food stamps every month.” That’s because the wages the restaurants pay to these workers are too low, and as more workers are replaced by robots and become unemployed, we’ll need to expand our social safety net. To do that we’ll have to tax the owners of the robots.
In light of this logic, our best bet is to get on with this now. We need a progressive income tax structure to increase taxes on the top earners in our state. We need to strengthen and increase, not eliminate, the estate tax. We need to tax capital gains and we need a transaction tax on all stock trades. I’m sure there’s a lot more good tax policy ideas I’m missing, but for the problem of robots and automation in particular, we need a robot tax.
In the future predicted by the leaders of the Rhode Island Hospitality Association, there will be fewer and fewer people able to pay taxes or in any way participate in the economic system of our state. Robots, however, will be productive and very taxable. Instead of allowing a system where workers strive ever harder for less, we need to impose an automation tax on industries that replace workers with robots.
A large coalition to raise the tipped minimum wage was launched at the State House with a press conference and public testimony on House Bill 5364. Representative Aaron Regunberg introduced the bill that would gradually increase the the minimum wage from $2.89 to match the regular minimum wage by 2020. Senator Gayle Goldin introduced matching legislation on the Senate side. There has been no increase in the tipped minimum wage in nearly 20 years.
ROC United RI (Restaurant Opportunities Center) launched “One Fair Wage Rhode Island,” an impressive coalition of community, labor, faith business and women’s organizations that includes the Women’s Fund of Rhode Island, RI-NOW, NAACP-Providence Branch, Farm Fresh Rhode Island, the Economic Progress Institute, the Bell Street Chapel, Rhode Island AFL-CIO, the Coalition of Labor Union Women, Rhode Island Jobs with Justice, Fuerza Laboral, NEARI, United Service and Allied Workers of Rhode Island, Planned Parenthood of Southern New England and Unite Here Local 217.
Many restaurant patrons are unaware that their tip is not simply a “thank you” for great service, said Senator Goldin, “It’s paying your server’s base salary, and nobody’s base salary should entirely depend on a customer’s mood.”
More than just being an issue of fairness, this is an issue of impacting “women’s economic security,” says Women’s Fund Executive Director Jenn Steinfeld. “Nearly three in four Rhode Island tipped workers are women, one-third are mothers, and more than half of these are single mothers.” Steinfeld says that eliminating the tipped minimum wage will “help address the gender pay gap.”
Being dependent on tips for their salary makes servers more vulnerable to sexual harassment, since telling a customer that their advances or flirting is unwelcome puts the server at risk of losing a tip. A recent report from the national ROC United found that, “Women living off tips in states with a $2.13 an hour tipped minimum wage are twice as likely to experience sexually harassment than women in states that pay the full minimum wage to all workers. In fact, all workers in $2.13 states, including men, reported higher rates of sexual harassment, indicating that the sub-minimum wage perpetuates a culture of sexual harassment.” It’s in response to this atmosphere of sexual harassment that ROC United has launched its “Not on the Menu” campaign.
There is also good economic sense in raising the tipped minimum wage, maintains Mike Araujo, of ROC United RI. “”Raising the subminimum wage will have an important stimulative effect for Rhode Island. When tipped workers earn more, that money goes right back into the local economy.” ROC United estimates raising the wage will pump $64 million into the state’s economy. Further, tipped workers in Rhode Island currently receive $638,325 in food stamps every month, which means that taxpayers are effectively subsidizing the restaurant industry through social welfare programs.
After the press conference there was a heaing on Regunberg’s bill in the House Labor Committee. Though over 150 people signed up to testify, on both sides of the issue, in the end only 25 people could endure the four hour hearing waiting for their turn to speak. Those speaking against raising the tipped minimum wage were mostly members of the Rhode Island Hospitality Association (RIHA), a business lobbying group that routinely opposes any legislation that might raise the minimum wage or improve the ability of workers to collect money lost to wage theft. Many of the RIHA members wore small golden pineapple pins.
“The states that have eliminated completely their subminimum wage,” said Representative Regunberg describing the economic impact of his bill, “have as high or higher industry and job growth rates as subminimum wage states.”
Bill Kitsilis, of Angelo’s Palace Pizza sees no reason to raise the tipped minimum wage, and said, “My tipped employees… are some of the highest paid employees in my business.” He thinks $2.89 is fine, since that’s what he predicated his business model on. Comparisons with other states are not valid, Kitsilis maintains, because other states have much, much stronger economies.
Representative Antonio Giarrusso asked about employee turnover. Kitsilis feels that turnover only happens when people aren’t making money, and he also says that there are a lot of people hiring right now, making it difficult to find workers. An odd statement, considering Rhode Island’s unemployment rate.
The issue of “side work” came up, that is, the work servers do for a restaurant, at $2.89 an hour, that doesn’t earn the server tips. Side work is an old way of getting work done in a restaurant on the cheap, and is completely legal. Raising the subminimum would eliminate this disparity. Kitsilis said that such work “tends to be… a small percentage of what they do, most of the time…”
Representative Teresa Tanzi has worked in the restaurant industry for 14 years. “In those 14 years I have worked at dozens of restaurants, somewhere around 45 restaurants, I would say. And in all those restaurants, one has paid me according to the law.” For fear of retaliation, she could never confront management about this. “I’m well aware that they are breaking the law, but there is nothing I can do. I am relying on my manager and the owner of that restaurant for my employment.”
The Department of Labor surveyed 9000 restaurants over two years and found that 84 percent of them violate the law.
When Chairperson Joseph Shekarchi pushed back against Tanzi’s experience, saying that he doesn’t see the connection between low wages and harassment and abuse of servers, drawing on his experience as a bartender, Tanzi stuck to her guns and pointed out that the experience of women working as servers and men working as bartenders are very different. “It does happen and it’s a daily occurrence. If someone touches you, or if you’re waiting on a table and it’s a party of ten and that’s all the money you’re going to make tonight, and they want to be fresh with you in some way shape or form… I refer to it as a ‘golf clap’ in my vernacular. Whenever someone says something that’s ‘funny,’ you’re waiting on someone and they something that isn’t funny, you have to laugh. If someone touches you inappropriately, what are you going to say? There’s very little recourse as a server that you have.”
Rep Giarrusso’s solution for “any woman or anybody getting sexually harassed” is that “they should hit somebody with a nine iron.” Maybe he’ll introduce legislation to that effect.
“The truth is, 60 percent of restaurant workers in Rhode Island are over the age of 24 and 32 percent of all of Rhode Island’s restaurant workers are parents.”
“I feel that the current wage devalues me as an employee,” says Daniel Burke. Burke explained how the days and hours he is making good money from tips are averaged with the days and hours he’s performing other tasks at the restaurant. As long as he averages minimum wage with the money provided by customers, the restaurant can get away with paying him $2.89 an hour. Of course, Representative Giarusso thinks that Burke should take this issue up with his employer because, “I would, that’s for sure.”
As a 31 year old mother explains that her bartender job requires her to perform duties that are not directly related to serving customers. Therefore no tips can be expected and the restaurant gets away with paying employees $2.89 an hour for work that any other business in the state would have to pay at least minimum wage to accomplish. Again, Representative Giarrusso misses the point, thinking that the issue of side work isn’t related to this. As long as there is a two-tiered wage system, restaurant managers and owners will have an incentive to make workers do untipped work at the lower wage, rather than pay the server properly.
ROC United RI’s Mike Araujo finally explains that “those extra tasks,” that is side work, are “built into the job.” Side work, prep and cleaning averages out to about 3 or 4 hours a day, which is “effectively unpaid labor.” This profitable industry is built on the backs of primarily underpaid women.
Araujo may have summed up the night best when he said, “This issue speaks to how we believe society should be shaped. Do we believe that our citizens deserve equal treatment and deserve full equality, or do we believe that there is a second tier that women, increasingly, belong to?”
“Moving into a restaurant that paid over the minimum wage had such a tangible benefit…”
“When we talk about this issue we can’t escape the fact that this is a women’s issue… forcing a worker to rely on tips for any portion of their base wage significantly increases their chances of experiencing sexual harassment.”
Once again, Representative Giarrausso claims that “I don’t really understand the connection to sexual harassment… If someone’s a jackass, for lack of a better word… I mean, I don’t promote sexual harassment. I think those people should be tied up and jailed and never come out.” Giarrusso claims he “can’t draw the parallel” between low pay and sexual harassment.
But Giarrusso tips his hand as he grins and asks, “Is there an acceptable level of sexual harassment depending on how much you’re getting paid?” This is simply a variation of the line, variously ascribed to George Bernard Shaw or Winston Churchill, “We know what you are, we’re just haggling over the price.”
In response to testimony quoting FDR, Rep. Giarrusso maintains that “there is data that shows that every time minimum wage goes up, so does unemployment.” The US Department of Labor dispels that myth at the top of its page on the minimum wage. Giarrusso also brings up the specter of automation, as is done now whenever minimum wage increases are discussed. I deal with the automation argument here.
Joe Fortune, speaking below, wrote about his experience speaking before the committee on his own blog here.
Notice the pineapple pin. RIHA is in the house. This man is a CPA who specializes in hospitality. I am willing to bet he makes more than $2.89 an hour plus tips.
John Elkhay owns Ten Prime Steak & Sushi, Rick’s Roadhouse, XO Café, Luxe Burger Bar, and Harry’s Bar & Burger, as well as Veritas Catering. “Unlike the people who testified before me,” says Elkhay, “I actually live and work in Rhode Island.” I guess he wasn’t listening to the experiences of the four speakers who do live and work in Rhode Island. After telling the committee about how many employees he has and how much money they all make, he throws them under the bus, saying, “They don’t claim all their tips, by the way. That’s a sneaky little secret.”
“Don’t say that in this building,” says Representative Giarrusso, trying to make light of the comment.
Elkhay doesn’t blink. “Yeah, well, it’s the truth.”
“Who is here, in the industry, saying there is a problem?” asks Chris Tarro, owner of Siena Restaurant Group, answering “I don’t think there is a problem.”
“Don’t take my word for it,” he continues. Rather, he recommends going out to dinner and asking a server. But, “don’t ask if they want a raise, everyone would like one.”
Tarro thinks that the kind of retaliation employees face for stepping up to complain about their working conditions is somehow equivalent to the reaction of potential customers when they hear about the ways restaurants pay their employees and the ways in which many restaurants exploit their employees. “When I testified last time here,” says Tarro, “I got emails, I was on progressive blogs… there’s a penalty to us coming here.”
“I would like to give a nice big golf clap to Representative Tanzi and to anyone else who is trying to distract you from the issue at hand…” is as much as this sarcastic restaurant owner could say before being stopped by Chairperson Shekarchi, who advised not going after those who previously testified.
“I don’t want character assassination,” said Shekarchi, “It doesn’t help your cause.”
“I would suggest to you that twenty years… twenty years without a raise… I don’t think there’s anybody in this room that’s going to work for anybody for twenty years without a raise.”
Kristin Dart, speaking for Planned Parenthood, said that when women are paid more, they are better able to pay for essential medical care.”If I have to choose between food on my table and my annual health exam, I’m going to put food on the table.”
Speaking of her own experience as a server, she said that she was regularly told by her bosses that sexual harassment was “part of the job. If you want to make tips, then you have to be ‘nice’ to customers.”
Amy Barclay owns Simpatico in Jamestown. She’s worked her way up from being a server, pregnant with twins making $4500 a week to owning her own place. She says, “This isn’t a gender issue. This isn’t a Planned Parenthood issue, this is a performance issue.” Barclay says, “I was great staff. I still am.”
Barclay has 15 core employees and 60 in season. “They beg for their jobs back,” she says, “and they should.”
Having worked in California, where there is no tipped minimum wage, and now working in Providence, Avi maintains that in California the restaurant industry is booming and that people in the restaurants out there have a greater feeling of teamwork. “It should be the employers responsibility to pay their employees, and not to pass that on to the customers.”
Ray Desmarais, of 99 Restaurants, sounded like he was blaming victims for for their harassment when he said, “For anyone to be harassed in the restaurant business, shame on them for allowing it. Leave and come work for me. Cause I’m a good guy and I’ll treat you well.”
Senator Joshua Miller says, “…there hasn’t been a minimum wage bill I didn’t love, until today, until this bill.” Miller feels this bill takes “important revenue away from some of my most valued staff.” He owns three restaurants with over 80 servers. Senator Miller, like Representative Giarrusso, sees no relationship between low wages and sexual harassment.
Justin Kelley said that “it’s time to raise the wage” in Rhode Island. Business models change, says Kelley, citing out the end of slavery, child labor and the eight hour day as examples. Compared to those changes, raising the subminimum wage should be easy.
“I think it’s a human rights issue,” says this restaurant worker from Olneyville, “I don’t care if your male or female, that minimum wage needs to come up.”
Bob Bacon is the owner of Gregg’s Restaurants and the president of the Rhode Island Hospitality Association. He frequently visits the State House to testify against bills that might increase a worker’s wage or strengthen a worker’s ability to not have their wages stolen. Bacon feels that the Department of Labor is doing a terrific job enforcing labor laws, and no new laws are needed. Servers make a “self-reported” average of $12.12 an hour, says Bacon.
Sam Bell, president of the Rhode Island Progressive Democrats, explained President Obama‘s support for increasing the minimum wage and for increasing the tipped minimum wage. “Raising the full minimum wage and the tipped minimum wage will help reduce poverty among women and families as well as make progress towards closing the gender pay gap.”
“Considering a tipped minimum wage increase… would cost ten percent of our current sales.” This begs the question: Is the entire profitability of the restaurant industry dependent on paying servers subminimum wage? Do restaurant profits come solely from underpaying staff? How do restaurants remain profitable in California, where there is no tipped minimum wage?
She finishes the evening’s testimony with, “we’re seeing servers being replaced right now with technology all over the world.”
As I’ve said before: technology like that is coming no matter what we pay our employees. The questions we need to be asking in the face of new technologies are bigger than minimum wage increases, such questions go to the heart of our economic system, and whether it’s sustainable in the long term.
At the State House hearing for the wage theft bill and for the bill to raise the minimum wage we heard a lot from members and leaders of the Rhode Island Hospitality Association. At the wage theft bill hearing the room was packed with restaurant owners pleading poverty and assuring legislators that their waitstaff are well cared for, and even loved.
Most of the restaurant owners were from the kind of high end, casual fine dining establishments where stories of well paid waitstaff might actually be something akin to the truth. But as Mike Araujo, of ROC United RI pointed out, “The average tipped worker does not make $20 an hour.”
“We are not all high end restaurants,” he said. “We are mostly Denny’s, we are mostly diner service. So to say that ‘my people do well’ or ‘I love my people’ might be true, but we have to love all the people who work in the industry.”
In Rhode Island, servers are supposed to make $2.89 an hour, plus tips. By law, if a server doesn’t make enough in tips to reach $9 an hour, the restaurant is supposed to make up the difference.
In general there are two kinds of restaurants; corporate chains like Denny’s or Chili’s, and owner operated diners and restaurants. The chain restaurants are governed in large part by strict rules and regulations that come from the top. These restaurants are national or multinational in nature and don’t often run afoul of local laws. They operate in California, where there is no tipped minimum wage, as well as in New England, where Rhode Island has the lowest tipped minimum wage. The tipped minimum wage is $7.25 in Connecticut and $3 in Massachusetts. New York just raised theirs to $7.50.
Non-chain restaurants have more leeway in paying their employees, because they can often pay under the table. There is no corporate chain of command tracking every cent that comes in and goes out of the store. This isn’t to say that all owner operators violate the law, but the practice is common enough that some servers I’ve spoken to have told me that they have never worked in a restaurant that didn’t pay some or all of its employees at least partly under the table.
I recently spoke to two servers at two different restaurants about the tipped minimum wage and their experiences working as servers in Rhode Island. One server works at a chain restaurant here in Providence, the other works at an owner operated restaurant in Warwick. Both spoke to me under the condition of anonymity, so as to not suffer any blowback at work. Some details of their stories have been obscured as well, to avoid identifying them accidentally.
Debbie is a single mom working at an owner operated restaurant. She has three kids. She’s worked for tips all her life. “This is how we survive,” she said. “We do all right. I’m pretty good at what I do most of the time.”
Chris is in her mid-fifties and has been working for tips as a server for over 30 years. She works for a well known corporate chain restaurant. “When I first started waitressing [the tipped minimum wage] was $1.50 or $1.59, so it’s gone up, but not for 20 years. It’s crazy.”
The experiences of the women are similar, and they make about the same amount of money, but there are big differences between working at an owner operated restaurant and working for a corporate chain.
“We make all our money on tips,” says Debbie, “At the end of the week I get a paycheck, and it’s usually nothing, or a dollar, because of taxes. We get taxed on our tips and we get taxed on the $2.89.”
Chris has the same experience in her corporate store. “Some of my co-workers have a pile of $2 and $3 checks. Why bother cashing them? Or if they do, they cash them once a year for $80.”
Both work hard. “I work my ass off in here six days a week,” says Debbie, “I work like 45, 50 hours a week.” Chris works Monday through Friday. They both work the day shift.
I ask them about overtime.
“I probably shouldn’t say this,” says Debbie, “but the owner pays me for 40 hours and then I get the rest in cash. Time and a half has never happened. Every restaurant I’ve ever worked at that’s how it always was. You get paid for 40 hours and then everything else is overtime, not on a paycheck. Time and a half on $2.89 is meaningless anyway, because we’re talking about less than $4.50. It’s not like my tips are going to be time and a half.”
Chris sees this as a problem. “Corporate restaurants have to do the right thing,” she says, “But these [owner operated] restaurants, they can get away with not paying $2.89 or overtime.”
She said she knows someone who was injured and couldn’t collect disability because “so much of her work was off the books she didn’t qualify. I have friends that are working at some of these little places that aren’t making out. One girl got laid off and was told, ‘You can’t collect. You were working under the table.’ How are you suppose to deal with that?”
Working at an owner operated restaurant can bring other problems as well. “We don’t get time and half for holidays, we don’t get paid vacations,” says Debbie, “If I take a vacation I lose out. I pay for the vacation and I don’t get paid to work. My kids are like, ‘You don’t even get time off,’ and I’m like no, I don’t.
“You don’t get sick pay, you don’t get- I can’t even call in sick! There’s no one else to work. I open the store. Who’s going to answer the phone at 5 o’clock in the morning? If I’m sick, you’re not going to answer your phone, you know? You’re going to be sleeping.”
The recent snow has interfered with their pay as well. “It’s difficult sometimes, on a slow snow day, sure,” says Chris, “We didn’t get any customer tips until almost one in the afternoon and we’re thinking, ‘We’re not going to get anybody today.’”
So when it’s slow like that, does the restaurant make up the money as the law requires?
“They’re supposed to punch you in [with more money] when you make less than minimum,” says Chris, “but they average the week.”
Debbie agrees, telling me, “We don’t ever not make minimum wage, so the restaurant never has to make it up. On any given day we might not make any money, but the restaurant is allowed to average it out over the week.”
Debbie is worried about raising the tipped minimum wage. She worries that, “if they raise the minimum wage to $9 an hour people aren’t going to tip us, and if we made only $9 an hour we wouldn’t make what we would just living off tips. We make more than that in tips.”
Chris isn’t convinced. “People don’t know what we make. In the restaurant people are telling me, ‘I didn’t know you made this! I saw on the news they’re trying to raise your rates. I didn’t know you made only $2.89.’ If they already thought you were making more and they’re tipping you whatever they do, why would they lower it when you actually make that amount?”
Debbie has an ‘aha’ moment. “Yeah, you’re right. If you don’t know what I make, and you’re assuming that I’m making minimum wage when you tip me, then why would you not tip me?”
I point out that the minimum wage in Connecticut for tipped workers is $7.25, and nobody seems to be tipping less there.
“Really?” says Debbie, surprised, “I didn’t know they made more in Connecticut. Damn. It’s like right there.”
Chris isn’t surprised. She knows people who went to Connecticut to make more money. “A couple of girls who live on the line transferred to Connecticut, but I live too far,” she says. Transferring wasn’t hard, because the corporate restaurant chain has units in every state.
Both servers mentioned that working at a higher end restaurant in Providence might bring in more money. “I would have loved to have gone to Federal Hill,” says Chris, “but I don’t see myself, at my age, going there, working at some fancy restaurant.”
But both women also had heard stories that worried them.
“I had a friend who worked at a nice, upscale restaurant in Providence,” said Debbie, “and she worked Friday and Saturday night and made a lot of money, but for every good shift you got there you had to take a crappy shift on a Tuesday afternoon or something. On a Monday-Tuesday lunch, she might make $3. But she still had to pay to park, and she had to pay for her gas because she doesn’t live in Providence. So she’d drive to Providence, pay to park, drive home and leave negative basically.”
“One girl I know applied at a very nice place on Federal Hill as a cocktail waitress,” says Chris, “She didn’t take the job because they told her you don’t make a pay, you just work for tips and all of you pool your tips at the end of the night.”
So they don’t pay the cocktail waitresses anything?
Chris nodded. “She never took the job. I told her that’s not right. She was asked, ‘You want taxes taken out? You want to go through all of that?’
“I have friends who worked on Federal Hill. A lot of them get paid under the table. The [owners] should have to do the right thing, but that’s what they don’t want to do. Corporate restaurants have to pay you the right wages. They have so many restaurants, and they pay different amounts everywhere they’re set up, but you’d think the corporate restaurants would want these other restaurants to pay employees on the books so that they could compete better.”
So, I ask, are you two living the high life?
“I see people working to get $15 an hour at McDonald’s but we don’t make that,” Debbie says, shaking her head. “Every so often we may make that, but not all the time.”
“I don’t live the high life, God no,” says Chris.
