So I’m watching the evening news and on comes a piece on California’s new law raising the minimum wage for fast food workers to $20 an hour. Within ten seconds of the opening, the reporter begins his interview with a McDonald’s franchisee complaining about how this hurts “family businesses” like hers. People like her are not giant corporations, she cried! They are just hard working Americans like you and me! Now they will have to raise McPrices on their McFastFood, the subtext here was thick and heavy on the “otherness” of the overpaid fast food workers who were to blame, not the hard working franchisee owners.
Hey I get it. I worked managing fast food to get through college. Its hard hot stinky work. Clean out a deep fryer and that smell just stays with you. And I’m sure McDonald’s franchisees work very hard and go through rigorous training and all. But the media coverage made me curious.
Below are some figures from McDonald’s franchises and those who own them that don’t add up to franchisees being average workaday Americans:
For ONE McDonald’s franchise:
The franchise fee for a McDonald's franchise is $45,000.
A minimum of $500,000 liquid capital is required.
A total average investment of $1,345,000 dollars is required.
The average McDonald's franchise has a annual profit of $185,000 a year.
The average franchisee own 8 McDonald's locations, or a total profit of $1,480,000 a year.
Once again the media want to tell us to believe the people working for poverty wages are the ones to blame and the average McDonald’s franchisee with an average annual profit of $1,480,000 is the one being punished by paying a living wage.
The media coverage on this is skewed and disgraceful.
Additional info as this sits on the rec list:
As pointed out in the comments, looking to McDonald’s in Denmark adds more perspective on just how out of touch American McDonald’s franchisees claims of having to raise prices are and how out of step America is for working people:
The Average McDonald’s worker in Denmark:
— Earns between $20-22 an hour
— Gets six weeks paid vacation
— Gets extra pay for holidays and seniority
— Workers over 20 years old qualify for a pension plan
The cost of a Big Mac in Denmark according to the NYT is $0.27 cents more than in America.
The cost of a Big Mac in Denmark according to the Economist is $0.76 cents less than in America.
