Need to Know: 3 questions for California's $20 an hour fast food wage (2024)

FAQs

Do restaurants have to pay $20 an hour in California? ›

CALIFORNIA, USA — Say you work at a fast food restaurant or coffee shop that bears the name of a national chain. Under California law, you're entitled to be paid at least $20 an hour starting Monday. Say you work at one of those stores, inside a grocery store. The grocery store, your employer, is exempt under the law.

Starting April 1, 2024, all “fast food restaurant employees” who are covered by the new law must be paid at least $20.00 per hour.

The new law, signed by Governor Gavin Newsom last fall, requires that fast-food chains with 60 or more locations nationwide pay their workers at least $20 an hour. The means the state's 553,000 fast-food workers will earn more than the state's $16 minimum wage for all other industries.

With California's new $20-per-hour minimum wage for fast food workers set to take effect on April 1, 2024, the California Department of Industrial Relations (DIR) has updated its guidance regarding the new minimum wage law's impact on exempt managers and which employers and employees are covered.

"That's for a single adults with no children. If we look at an adult with one child, the MIT living wage calculator is about $45 an hour, so even this $20 per hour is far below what MIT suggests for a living wage," Leigh said.

Employees who report for their regular shift and work less than half of their scheduled shift must be paid at least half of their scheduled hours—never less than 2 hours or more than 4 hours. (If they work more than four hours, pay them their actual time, of course).

“In the most basic sense, the statewide minimum wage is much higher than a 'poverty wage. ' At the same time, the state's high housing costs make it extremely difficult for many low-wage workers to make ends meet,” according to the report.

There are some employees who are exempt from the minimum wage law, such as outside salespersons, individuals who are the parent, spouse, or child of the employer, and apprentices regularly indentured under the State Division of Apprenticeship Standards.

Governor Gavin Newsom signed the historic California Food Safety Act (CFSA) into law on October 7, 2023, which bans four specific potentially toxic food additives from being sold in products anywhere in the state.

What is the lunchtime law in California? ›

Meal Break Obligations In California. You cannot employ someone for a work period of more than five hours without providing an unpaid, off-duty meal period of at least 30 minutes. The first meal period must be provided no later than the end of the employee's fifth hour of work.

Locations that serve mostly drinks are also subject to this law so long as they meet the aforementioned criteria, meaning Starbucks locations in California are also required to pay a minimum wage of $20.

SAN FRANCISCO (KRON) — A new law in California is increasing minimum wage for fast food restaurant employees starting on April 1. Starting April 1, all fast food restaurant employees who are covered under the law, AB 1228, must be paid at least $20 per hour.

As of Apr. 1, 2024, fast food workers in California will earn a $20 minimum wage, an increase from $16 an hour. The rate increase will impact about half a million workers at restaurant chains with 60 or more locations across the state, including McDonald's, KFC, Subway, and Starbucks, among others.

In most states, employers are allowed to pay employees below minimum wage with the understanding that they will make up the difference in tips. This is not the case in California. In California, restaurant workers are entitled to the full minimum wage for every hour worked.