California fast food workers now earn $20 per hour. Franchisees are responding by cutting hours.
When California’s minimum wage increase went into effect in April, fast food workers across the state went from making $16 to $20 overnight
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Lawrence Cheng, whose family owns seven Wendy’s locations south of Los Angeles, took orders at the register on a recent day and emptied steaming hot baskets of French fries and chicken nuggets, salting them with a flourish.
Cheng used to have nearly a dozen employees on the afternoon shift at his Fountain Valley location in Orange County. Now he only schedules seven for each shift as he scrambles to absorb a dramatic jump in labor costs after a new California law boosted the hourly wage for fast food workers on April 1 from $16 to $20 an hour.
“We kind of just cut where we can,” he said. “I schedule one less person, and then I come in for that time that I didn’t schedule and I work that hour.”
Cheng hopes the summer when business is traditionally brisk with students out of school and families traveling or spending more time eating out will bring a better profit that can cover the added costs.
