Increase your minimum wage to $ 15

Senator Bernie Sanders on Thursday called McDonald's to follow Amazon and Disney, and to pay their restaurant workers at least $ 15 at the hour.

@SenSanders: If Amazon and Disney can pay $ 15 an hour, McDonald 's can too, who made $ 5.1 billion in profits last year. My message to McDonald's CEO, Steve Easterbrook: No one in the United States, especially those who work for a profitable company like McDonald's, should live in poverty.

Sanders said that many McDonald's employees needed help from the government's nutrition assistance program, known as the Food, Medicaid and Dwelling Tickets. to survive.

"If McDonald's can afford to give $ 7.7 billion to its shareholders, it can afford to pay $ 15 an hour to all of its employees," writes Sanders in his letter.

Last month, Sanders introduced a bill called Bezos Act, which would tax companies every dollar that their low-wage workers receive in health care benefits or food vouchers.

Earlier this week, Amazon announced plans to raise the minimum wage for its American workers, a decision rented by Sanders.

His criticism of McDonald's is not new. In 2015, he called on McDonald's to raise his minimum wage to $ 15 an hour, when the company announced that it would pay a dollar more than the minimum wage required. Sanders is currently doubling its position due to recent salary increases from other large companies.

"Our commitment to the communities we serve includes the opportunity for restaurant employees to succeed at McDonald's and beyond with world-class training and education programs to help them." to acquire the skills needed for today's workforce, "said a spokeswoman for McDonald's about Sanders comments. .

In an email, she called employee benefits that go beyond wages paid into programs such as tuition assistance to help employees earn a degree in school. secondary and higher education. McDonald's has allocated $ 150 million over five years to such programs. However, the spokesperson did not address wages specifically.

Sanders said that he thought that if McDonald's raised the minimum wage, that would set the example for the whole fast food industry.

"By 2018, no one in the United States, especially people working for a profitable business like McDonald's, should live in poverty," he wrote in the letter.

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