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Not Enough: Workers Rally In Phoenix, U.S. For $15 Minimum Wage, End Of Tipping Patch 2/10/2021
PHOENIX – Blanca Collazo started working as soon as she could.
She was approved for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, at 16. She then was hired as a hostess at the Old Spaghetti Factory restaurant to help her family with bills and to save for college tuition.
She worked long shifts after school for $10 an hour. She saved enough to attend college after she graduated, but the pandemic forced Collazo, 19, to step back from school so she could earn enough to survive.
On Monday, Collazo and a handful of fellow organizers in Phoenix joined like-minded activists around the country who rallied to raise the minimum wage and lower the reliance on tips. More than 1.6 million workers, mainly in the restaurant industry, are paid a minimum wage in the U.S. as low as $7.25 on the federal level and, more recently in Arizona, $12.15 an hour.
For these tipped workers, $15 minimum wage is a matter of COVID-19 survival
Many making subminimum wage don t earn enough to qualify for unemployment. During the pandemic, 6 million restaurant workers were left behind. Some tell their stories below.
Saru Jayaraman, Chantel St. Laurent, Alyson Martinez-Diaz, John Michael Alvarez, Haley Holland and Dominique Brown
Opinion contributors
Introduction by Saru Jayaraman
Biden’s initial decision (he has since said that the wage hike might not make it into the final package) demonstrates his understanding that the economy cannot recover after one of the most devastating pandemics in the nation s history unless millions of low-wage workers are able to recover.
Leaders in Arizona labor organizations joined a nationwide rally Monday to establish a $15 minimum federal wage and get rid of tipping. President Joe Biden added the measure in an economic stimulus plan to relieve the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic.