Willie Jack Degel claims he would pay a fair wage if the government didn’t tell him to, but that doesn’t actually appear to be true. Steakhouse owner Degel, who you probably don’t recognize from his very-staged reality show, joined Fox & Friends Monday morning to complain about minimum wage mandates and millennial work ethics–but not before he insulted his clientele for being cheap and uninformed.
”If I try to raise prices, I’m doing less guests and they’re getting insulted and they’re not coming. They’re not educated, they don’t understand what’s happening.”
The former Food Network star also blames his staff for pursuing college degrees and not being enthusiastic servants.
“They used to be servants. When I first opened years ago, people took great pride in being a servant. Today, they have a more sense of entitlement… the younger people, they’re not used to working. They’re starting later. They’re going to school, and then they don’t want to work.”
Degel also laments that he was forced to eliminate the busboy role from his restaurants two years ago, when the minimum hourly wage went from $5 to $7.50.
Some context: Another Degel chain, Uncle Jack’s Meat House, charges $14.95 for a child’s portion of eggs and bacon, while Uncle Jack’s Steakhouse charges $7 for baked potatoes (add another eight bucks if you want it loaded!).
Later in the segment, Brian Kilmeade tries to save Degel from himself, by saying that it’s not that Degel refuses to pay employees fairly! It’s just that the government shouldn’t be forcing him to pay them!
”So you’re saying, ‘I’ll pay what the market demands, but you can’t force me to pay somebody more than I can afford.’”
”The government regulations...the minimum wage increases...have taken two million dollars out of my pocket. So I’m not making money anymore, I’m making belief.”
(Degel doesn’t take the lifesaver, so instead, Ainsley Earhardt asks him to share steak-making lessons after the show, where every time he rants about the employees he doesn’t want to pay, he’s reminded to bring the hosts steak next time he visits.)
This isn’t a new complaint and blame shift for Degel, who supports tiered minimum wages based on annual profits. He blames politicians for trying to exploit the industry through regulations and minimum wage standards, and even finds a way to blame expense account regulations at financial firms for ruining the restaurant biz—because nobody wines and dines their clients anymore, you see?
His frequent Fox News appearances and ableist rants on trade blogs make it clear his profits rely heavily on paying low wages, instead of innovation.
The restaurant industry is being attacked and over-regulated. All of the forced labor increases and minimum wage increases were spearheaded by a bunch of politicians, lawyers, and other morons who have never created a job in their lives. It’s killing the industry.
Actually, not paying workers a fair wage is common practice in Degel’s world. He’s been sued for wage theft by hundreds of employees.
Approximately 239 (Uncle Jack’s Steakhouse) restaurant workers who worked between September 2002 and September 2008 at the New York City and Queens restaurants are expected to benefit from the ($900,000) settlement. The lawsuit, which was filed in 2008 by captains, waiters, runners, bussers, and bartenders, alleged that the restaurants failed to pay them at the legally required minimum wage, routinely shaved their hours when they worked over 40 hours and refused to pay them overtime wages for hours worked over 40, misappropriated gratuities belonging to the waitstaff, failed to pay spread of hours pay when the employees’ workdays exceeded ten hours, and refused to pay for employee uniforms or laundering of such uniforms.
He’s also been sued by his maid, again, for wage theft.
The owner of Uncle Jack’s Steakhouse is being sued by his former housekeeper, who charges he cheated her out of wages for cleaning his posh Long Island homes.
Ana Jiminez claims she was paid only $400 to $500 in cash despite working 70 hours a week for William (Willie) Degel and his wife, according to the suit filed in Brooklyn Federal Court.
He’s also being sued by Madison Square Garden for not honoring their partnership. And as the New Yorker points out, Degel has something special in common with Donald Trump, who has dined at his restaurants:
It’s pure coincidence, probably, that in the early nineties, when Trump was stiffing his bankers for hundreds of millions, Degel did six months in federal prison for conspiracy to commit credit-card fraud.
Truly, where does Fox News find these people?