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Burger King: You Can’t Have It Your Way |
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Across Florida and around the country, members of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) and the Student/Farmworker Alliance (SFA) are hitting the streets for two months to mobilize workers and consumers to call on Burger King fast-food chain to improve farm workers’ wages and working conditions.
The first leg of the tour in Florida wrapped up last week. For nine days, farm workers from southwest Florida, represented by the CIW, toured union halls, churches and campuses across Florida explaining why they are fighting for justice at Burger King. CIW and SFA members will tour other areas to educate consumers building up to a national mobilization in Miami on Nov. 30 to coincide with Burger King’s annual meeting.
The three-day event will include a nine-mile march to Burger King headquarters for a rally on Nov. 30, followed by a Concert for Fair Food on Dec. 1 and activities with Miami-area faith communities on Dec. 2. Click here for more information on the rally and march.
In April, the farm workers won a groundbreaking agreement with fast-food giant McDonald’s to improve wages and working conditions in the fields that supply the world’s largest restaurant chain with its tomatoes.
The McDonald’s agreement builds and expands upon an earlier agreement won by the CIW and its allies after a four-year boycott of Taco Bell, part of the giant restaurant company Yum! Brands Inc., and sets a clear path to real rights and decent pay for farm workers.
Miami-based Burger King, the world’s second-largest burger chain, has rejected working with the CIW to improve farm worker wages and conditions. Burger King still refuses to agree to the principles signed onto by Yum! and McDonald’s. Rather than pay tomato workers a decent wage and improve working conditions, Burger King claims it’s not possible to institute those same principles in their supply chain.
In a statement announcing the Nov. 30 march and rally, CIW says:
In the wake of the Yum Brands and McDonald’s agreements, we stand on the threshold of a more modern, more humane agricultural industry in Florida. Facing this historic opportunity, Burger King seems to have chosen business as usual over progress, continued exploitation over justice. It is time for Burger King to seize the moment and stand with Florida’s tomato pickers in their fight for fundamental human rights in the fields. It is time for the student and youth movement in solidarity with the CIW to step it up.
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Burger King’s reason for existence is to provide the maximum possible return to its investors by delivering good products at low prices to consumers (that is, to us). It’s not to drive up its suppliers’ costs. The suppliers have not put a gun to anyone’s head to force them to work for wages or under conditions they consider unsatisfactory. It’s voluntary on all sides. Mind your own business.
I think that Burger King is a greedy employer who exploits employees and couldn’t care less about the farmworkers who supply their produce. We should go to McDonalds
I ALWAYS DRIVE BY THE “GOLDEN ARCHES” LOOKING FOR A BURGER KING. IF BURGER KING CAN NOT AGREE TO AN AGREEMENT TO IMPROVE THE WORKING CONDITIONS/WAGES OF THE WORKERS THAT PROVIDE THERE BASIC SUPPIES, THEN MAYBE I WILL START EATING “BIG MAC’S”!!!!!
“It’s all voluntary”???? Where on Earth are you from Mhinnov? Unless one is wealthy one has to work to live, it’s called “wage slavery” by-the-way.
This is a union website, we support worker’s right to organize and fight for better wages, working conditions and a say on the job. Employers do not have the right to pay slave wages! They do not have the right to screw their workers!
Those of us in the working class have to stand together! As the tried and true union saying says, “an injury to one is an injury to all!”
I support the CIW and there efforts to improve their lives!
Correct MHinnov, there is no gun to their heads, just like were not forced to eat where all they care about is the bottom line, or investors, and not the employees or customers?? My business is voluntary, and I don’t mind if for the next four years I boycott them! When thousand’s other’s do the same , and their return drops , then maybe the’ll realize this is 2007!!
To SMW and other commentators, you are certainly free to buy what Burger King offers, or not, for any reason you choose. It does seem a bit odd, however, that you would want to gang up on them for the purpose of increasing their costs, so that they’ll have to raise the price you’ll have to pay, if you’d like to have one of their burgers.
To David O’Malley - this discussion was not about Burger King’s treatment of its own employees, but about the wages and working conditions of tomato pickers working for Burger King’s suppliers. Unless those tomato pickers have been rounded up and put to work by force, (which no one has alleged), they must be working voluntarily. Picking tomatos at the wages and under the conditions offered by the farmers must be their best alternative, work that they themselves have chosen, or they’d be doing something else. Don’t screw it up for them! Trying to make farmers pay them more will force the farmers to hire fewer of them, use more mechanization, and force people to do other work that they preferred not to do, in favor of tomato picking. Think this stuff through - there are always unintended consequences!
To the PUNK that goes by the name of MHinnor. A holes like you think they know what’s right for people. I just happen to know a unlucky few that have no other chose but to work at places like Burger King. How dare you saying that they chose to work at Burger King. If you where half as smart as you think you are. You would know that there are people in this country that that for one reason or another have to work at unstilled jobs. The The Union is just trying to see to it that they get a fair shake. If your not union stay off this sight. I would love to have this discusion with you face to face.
It’s called responsibility. Yes, Burger King has a responsibility to the investors and also to the consumers for providing a good product at a ‘reasonable’ price. The price does not have to be as low as possible. However, it also has a responsibility in dealing with its suppliers. It’s like a company that knowingly buys inferior or dangerous raw goods to make its products. It works for the laborers, too. A company has a responsibility to make sure the raw goods, in this case, the farm products are manufactured, farmed, by workers who are not basically doing ’slave labor’. Can they buy from any market they want? Sure. Is it the right thing to do? I’ll go to McDonald’s, or Taco Bell, knowing that my dollar is helping the economy on more than one level.
Larry Johnson, your letter could violate the Commenting Guidelines for this web site: “No foul, discriminatory, defamatory, libelous or threatening language.” But the editors posted it anyway; their call. Like you, they too can see from my comments that I’m not a union sympathizer, but they have chosen to post my comments anyway. Maybe they think exposure to an alternate viewpoint could benefit union members more than just more repetitions of the same old union mantra of injured entitlement to each other? I’d rather not have a discussion with you face to face, who needs to be called names, probably in a loud voice, accompanied by physical threats? You’ve played to the general stereotype of the union lout.
Yes, there are many people in this country whose marketable job skills command only low wages, “for one reason or another” (a vague excuse for the poor choices many have made all their lives). Raise the wage costs for a particular employer through a labor boycott, or for all employers through a minimum wage law, and you just reduce those workers’ choices even more, by making it harder for them to find work. Wages and benefits are a cost of production; raise the cost, and the employer has to change something if he wants to stay in business. If he raises the price of his product or service too much, his customers would just go elsewhere - and he’d have to lay off all his employees. But even if he could and did raise prices a bit, he’d sell fewer of his products or services (basic supply and demand), and need fewer employees to produce them. Or if he couldn’t raise prices at all, he’d have to cut costs, mainly by finding ways to get the work done with fewer employees. So the price of higher wages and benefits for some unskilled workers is layoffs and fewer alternative job choices for other similar workers, less production and thus a lower standard of living for all, on average. How does our society as whole gain from that?
No one should work for “slave wages’. Perhaps some people have a choice in the job they end up doing, but not everyone is so lucky. If all farm workers received at least minimum wage, Burger King would still have a choice as to what suppliers it chooses to go with, and guess what, Burger King would still turn a profit, and you know their CEOs, no matter what, aren’t going to lose a thing. Pricing products too low because employees are paid too low is very bad for business and the economy. When the lowest paid employees can afford to have a decent life and pay for the things they need, everyone benefits. These low wage earners will have more spending power which does improve the economy on all levels. Don’t kid yourself into thinking that farm laborer wages and working conditions do not affect all of us in some way. Would that ALL FARM WORKERS can strike; then you shall see what ends up on supermarket shelves.
In response to remarks by: MHinnov
“Mind your own business.” The protection of workers and the establishment of dignity and respect in the workplace are the business of Unions…or haven’t you heard? The reason for the existence of Burger King, or any other business, is to balance profits between investors and employees. It’s called Corporate Responsibility…or haven’t you heard? It’s not always, all about the investors.
The employees are the consumers (that is, the us) that need to purchase health care, clothing, housing, education, and food (from sources other than Burger King). For Burger King to turn a blind eye to the obvious abuses that its suppliers apply to their workers is unconscionable! Burger King has an obligation to the communities in which they operate to provide a decent workplace for their employees and to require their suppliers to do the same.
The wit you demonstrated upon Larry won’t work so well on me. The supply side Reganomics you advocate was denounced best as “voodoo-economics” by Bush, Sr. during the Republican Primaries of 1980. It nearly cost him getting chosen for the Vice Presidency, and inevitably, the Presidency. It took 2 terms for Clinton to straighten out 12 years of Republican economic screw-ups to prove Reganomics wrong; running his 1992 campaign on the slogan, “It’s the economy, stupid!” I suppose you would consider that as foul, discriminatory, defamatory, etc. as well.
Are you interested in raising society’s standard of living or reducing it? How can Burger King claim that it wants to be a good corporate citizen; then turn its back on the poor, hard working people, upon whose backs their profits are built? Are you familiar with the word hypocrisy? I bet you are! Is it asking too much to share the profits with those who make the profits possible?
How is it McDonalds is capable of doing something to reward hard work that Burger King can’t; or rather, won‘t? Mind you, I’m not talking about a charity; you know, when you give something away and get nothing in return. I talking about giving to something that will give you something back. Increased morale, higher productivity, brand loyal customer base, etc. are excellent ways of achieving higher profits for investors, as well. There are more ways to increase your bottom line than narrowly focusing on supply costs.
The exploitation of human beings for profit simply because they are exploitable is morally wrong. I’m happy that you have been privileged enough to have been provided opportunities and the educational skills to take advantage of those opportunities, but these workers didn’t get the same chances in life that you have so obviously received. They are making the best of the situations they have been dealt, just like me.
Has the love of money corrupted the compassion of your heart? Greed has that effect on many men who would otherwise be counted as good, but have given in to the root of all that is evil. Greed is very subtle at first, but little by little it will dominate your judgment and ability to reason and create a stumbling block for wisdom. I’m certain that Satan could articulate as sound a position for his logic as you have done for yours; but that still doesn’t justify his actions, nor would it yours. What have the investors of Burger King profited if they gain the whole world only to lose their souls?
Are you planning to install a luggage rack on your hearse?
Responding to Union Friend: In a way, I agree with you that “no one should work for slave wages.” An employer can only hire and keep a worker, in the long run, so long as the worker contributes more to revenue or to expense reduction than he costs. If the worker contributes so little to revenue or expense reduction that anything more than “slave wages” would make him more costly than his contibution, his work is really about worthless. This may not be his fault, by the way - his employer’s product or service may simply have become obsolete or gone out of fashion, and nobody wants it anymore. No matter how hard or skillfully the worker works, his work just isn’t worth anything any more. He should indeed quit and find something more valuable to do instead.
Also, it isn’t necessarily true that increasing the wages of low wage earners will improve the economy - it depends on how it’s done. If their productivity is increased, along with sales of their employer’s product, and the employer raises wages to keep his workforce and perhaps even to attract new workers away from other employments or out of unemployment, indeed the economy will be stronger. But if the low wage earners simply receive transfers of income from others, nothing is added to the economy by their spending it - it would have been spent anyway by the people whose money was taken, or it may have been saved and invested by them to produce more of something that people want to buy.
To Fraternal Order: Your remarks are thoughtful and well expressed, and a pleasure to read, in contrast to many others in this blog - though I disagree with most of what you say. For example, it is NOT true that “The reason for the existence of Burger King, or any other business, is to balance profits between investors and employees.” Nobody risks his capital and his best efforts to establish and run a business in order to employ someone and share profits with them (unless it’s the owner’s son or daughter). The employees are just a means to an end, not the end itself. Conversely, of course, no employee goes to work for a business for the purpose of enriching its owners. Both have their selfish ends, and both use the other and their own skills and resources to try to achieve their ends. As long as neither uses coercion or fraud against the other, and keeps his promises, this is as it should be. A highly profitable business is good for both of them, of course, but in different ways.
I agree with you that “The exploitation of human beings for profit simply because they are exploitable is morally wrong”. But I wonder how you define “exploitation”. My dictionary defines it as “Using meanly for one’s own own gain or advantage”. I agree that it’s morally wrong to be gratuitously mean. But offering someone a job, even at “slave wages”, is not a mean thing to do, unless one has also somehow eliminated all the other alternatives otherwise available to the person. For example, if I set up a “sweatshop” to sew shirts in some dirt-poor part of southern Mexico and offer $5 a day for assembling 100 of them in a 12-hour day of work, and people take the jobs on those terms because those are the best jobs available to them, I have not “exploited” anyone. I have done them a kindness. And if I then get rich by offering those shirts in America for $100 each, and actually selling them at that price, I haven’t robbed anyone or exploited anyone. I’ve provided shirts to people in the USA who thought the shirts were worth at least $100 to them. I have added value to the lives of my workers in my “sweatshop” and I have added value to the lives of my customers in America. I have not been mean or exploited anyone. Don’t you agree?
To MHinnov
I would like to apologize. I was very angry after I read your article. Things are not so good in the USA anymore with all our Blue collar jobs going overseas. I believe that in the long run this will have a devastating effect on our economy.
To Larry Johnson:
Apology accepted. Now let’s think of ways to raise the productivity, incomes and wealth of the bottom 20% of wage earners in this country, whose wages have not grown in real terms in 20 years, and maybe have shrunk. It is important to do that.
To MHinnov:
Thank you for the kind words, but flattery will get you nowhere in regard to arguing the merits of your viewpoint. It seems as though you’re never going to “get it.” The plight of the common worker is one that entails concepts beyond your comprehension. I’m afraid I’ve got too many other things to do besides liberating your ignorance. So, I expect this will be my last attempt to enlighten you. Though as you might attempt to draw me back in, I simply find your comments to be quite boring.
The word “exploitation” as I utilized it was in the sense of misuse. A quick check of your thesaurus will yield associated words such as: abuse, mistreatment, and manipulation. I am concerned that you would only qualify something as morally wrong when an UNCERTAIN level of meanness is achieved. I say uncertain because who is to correctly apply a fair measure of judgment in gauging how much meanness is required to rise to a gratuitous level. By what standard is one to judge, that which is considered gratuitous? Would say outsourcing American jobs to third world nations that have: no minimum wage laws, no overtime laws, no child labor laws, no equal work/equal pay for women, minorities, or the disabled, no OSHA workplace protections, no EPA workplace or environmental protections, no wage and hour law enforcement, no unemployment benefits, no workers compensation provisions, no Social Security benefits, no right to join or form a labor union, etc.; rise to what should be considered as a gratuitous level of meanness? Would that meet your requirement for one who has “eliminated all the other alternatives otherwise available to a person” by providing corporations a legal means to bypass moral obligations to their employees, their investors, their Country, and their God.
Do I, as an investor, not have the right to demand the company in whom I invest to act in a morally responsible way to their employees and to encourage their suppliers to do likewise? As a consumer, what is wrong with avoiding patronizing businesses that insist upon engaging in such irresponsible business practices and organizing myself with others in a concerted effort? As an American citizen, what is wrong with demanding that American Companies, that have enjoyed the military protection that I and my fathers before me provided to them, give a little something back to me other than a paycheck…like respect and dignity? Are they not operating their businesses within the confines of the borders of the United Sates of America? Should they feel comfortable operating elsewhere; then, let them do it without the aid of the international reach of the United States’ Armed Forces. Let the Corporations be burdened with the operational expense of providing their own international security instead of relying upon the American workers, volunteer armed forces, and taxpayers to subsidize security for their private enterprises and the profits for their investors.
Because of the fore-mentioned reasons I must stringently disagree with you assumption that: “The reason for the existence of Burger King, or any other business, is to balance profits between investors and employees” as NOT true. I will admit that I should have qualified the statement by clarifying “any other AMERICAN (U.S. or U.S. territory) business.” Moreover; allow me to revise the statement entirely: The reason for the existence of Burger King, or any other U.S. or U.S. territory owned, operated, or invested business, is to balance their profits between the investors and the U.S. citizens that they employ. Better?!?
Am I starting to bug ya? Well I don’t mean to bug ya! Because if I am, I’m sure you’ll have some more clever little comments to post; and if I’m not, then, I expect to never hear any more from you.
To Larry Johnson:
MHinnov suggests teaming up for brainstorming ways to increase productivity. Now who’s playing to the general stereotype of the MANAGEMENT lout? You and I both know that as productivity has increased over the years the only incomes and wealth that has risen to match are those of the top-heavy upper management. Who is this guy trying to fool? I suppose only himself. It was very big of you to offer an apology. Freedom of speech is a beautiful thing, though. It’s been said that free speech should never be used irresponsibly. A frequent example used to demonstrate this point; is that, it’s not ok to yell “FIRE” in a crowded theater. Well, that’s true…unless there really is a fire. In that case, it’s not only ok, but it’s a dereliction of a good citizen’s duty not to warn others of the danger. In my estimation, you warned others quite well with your initial analysis of MHinnov. You were absolutely dead on with your original psychological profile of this guy. MHinnov is not worthy of urinating upon even if he were on fire from the self-same crowded theater. His demonstrated attitude is “every man for himself.” I’d say let him put his own self out. You reap what you sow.