Low wages and nasty owners in the restaurant biz

December 10, 2009Jon Brooks Comments Off

ketchupAs mentioned in previous posts, fewer people eating out means less in tips for waiters and waitresses.

But in some New York restaurants, at least, the wages ain’t so hot either. From the NY State Dept. of Labor last month:

State Labor Commissioner M. Patricia Smith today announced the findings of a targeted Labor Department investigation of restaurants and cafes in the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn. On April 29, 2009, sixteen Department of Labor investigators paid surprise visits to 25 restaurants and coffee shops along Fifth and Seventh Avenues, from late afternoon to ten o’clock at night. Only two of the restaurants were found in compliance, while 23 had minimum wage, overtime, and other basic wage violations. After inspecting the 25 in Park Slope, the Department expanded the cases to include two jointly owned restaurants in adjacent neighborhoods. In total, 207 workers were underpaid more than $910,000. Some of the worst violations were for delivery employees working 60 to seventy hours per week and paid a salary of $210.00 to 275.00 per week. At one restaurant, workers were paid as little as $2.75 per hour.

Comment from the FriendsEat blog:

The exploitation of restaurant workers is by no means confined to Brooklyn. There are roughly 200 million international migrants working globally, or three percent of the world’s population; the leisure and hospitality industry accounts for eleven percent of those workers. Some 4,000 workers are currently striking in Paris, among them are Africans, Sri Lankans and Asians; many work as chefs, assistant cooks, waiters, plongeurs, and dishwashers. While most of us face economic hardships, the global economy extracts a much harsher toll on the world’s poor.

And from the blog Working in the Shadows:

First of all, how fun must that day have been for DOL investigators? I would have gladly paid $100 for the opportunity to tag along and watch the faces of bosses drop as the government demanded that they open their books and interview their workers.

The story has gotten good coverage in the media, certainly helped by the fact that the sweatshop conditions were found in Park Slope. For non-New Yorkers, Park Slope has become one of those neighborhoods that is so easy to make fun of that it’s not worth the trouble. Stereotypes of residents include: progressive to the point of parody; chock full of artists/writers/people-who-hang-out-in-coffee-shops-at-11 am; and lots of parents obsessed with the latest in child rearing techniques. In a very diverse borough, it’s also noticeably not. It’s worth mentioning that many of the most ardent critics of Park Slope are suspiciously Park Slopeish themselves. For example, I’m noticeably not diverse and before getting a real job spent a decent amount of time fighting over table space for my laptop in coffee shops.

What might get lost in the story, and in my digression into the complicated psychology that can go into Park Slope bashing, is that the problem isn’t Park Slope. The DOL could have selected restaurants on the Upper East Side, Chelsea, Chinatown or Brooklyn Heights and found similar abuses. It’s not a Park Slope problem: the problem is the endemic abuse of dishwashers and delivery workers within the restaurant industry.

Of course, wages is only one issue for those who work in restaurants. Ever hear of Crazy Restaurant Owner Syndrome? Waiter Rant discusses the topic in light of the food fight going on between Gawker and a New York restaurant owner. The battle was joined when the web site posted a leaked email tirade tha the owner sent to his employees regarding their failure to collect customer email addresses. A sampling:

“WHAT THE F*** IS WRONG WITH YOU ASSHOLES?!?!?! How many times do we have to tell you how important it is that you collect emails. Everytime we have a slow night and you make no money and you sit there bitching about how you make no money, remember its because youre f****** lazy motherf****ers. YOU SHOULD ALL BE FIRED IMMEDIATELY!!!!! ALL OF YOU, INCLUDING THE HOSTS!!!!

Waiter Rant describes these symptoms of Crazy Restaurant Owner Syndrome:

  1. Extreme narcissism to the point of sociopathy
  2. Delusions of grandeur
  3. Extreme jealousy
  4. Anger management issues
  5. Persecution complex
  6. An absolutist view of people
  7. Total lack of empathy
  8. Self-destructive behavior
  9. Control freakiness
  10. Dehumanizing staff

All in all, they may serve food, but it’s no picnic.

Posted on December 10, 2009 at 4:13 pm
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