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with over 10 million workers, the restaurant industry is one of the larg- est and fastest-growing segments of the US economy (Jayaraman 2013). One in twelve Americans currently work in the restaurant industry (Jayaraman 2013). It was one of the only segments of the economy to grow during the economic crisis of the past several years. However, the restaurant industry is also the lowest-paying employer in the United States: seven of the eleven lowest-paying jobs and the two absolute lowest-paying jobs in the United States are restaurant jobs (Bureau of Labor Statistics 2013).
The National Restaurant Association (NRA) argues that the res- taurant industry must pay as little as it does because restaurants suf- fer from uniquely razor-thin profit margins (Saltsman 2012). If res- taurants had to pay more, the association argues, they would have to close their doors. In fact, the restaurant industry nationally enjoys on average a 4 to 5 percent profit margin, compared to the 1 percent profit margin of Walmart, generally considered to be one of the most profitable companies in America (Restaurant Opportunities Center United 2012a).
The National Restaurant Association is a lobbying group that primarily represents the nation's Fortune 500 restaurant corporations (National Restaurant Association 2013). In 1996, under the leadership of Herman Cain (who would run in 2012 as a candidate for the Re- publican presidential nomination), the NRA struck a deal with Con- gress, saying that it would not oppose a modest increase in the fed- eral minimum wage as long as the minimum wage for tipped workers stayed frozen forever, at $2.13 an hour (Restaurant Opportunities Cen- ter 2012b). Thus, the wage for servers, bussers, and runners has been stuck at $2.13 for the past 22 years. This is one of the key reasons that food servers in America suffer from three times the poverty rate of the rest of the US workforce and use food stamps at double the rate (Res- taurant Opportunities Center 2012b). In a terrible irony, the people who put food on our tables cannot themselves afford to eat.
The industry's poverty wages disproportionately affect immi- grants and people of color. The industry is the largest employer of peo- ple of color and the second-largest employer of immigrants (Restaurant Opportunities Center 2013)....