Waffle House Employees Want Fair Wages, Less Risk To Their Very Lives

They would also like to not be charged for meals they don't eat!

Dec 04, 2023

waffle house with cars parked out front — Wikimedia Commons

Last month, a group of Waffle House workers from across the South went down to the breakfast food chain’s corporate headquarters near Atlanta in order to drop off a total of 13,000 signed petitions from workers demanding $25 an hour, 24/7 security, and an end to “mandatory meal deductions.” Waffle House then threw out all of those petitions, because of course they did.

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“Mandatory meal deductions?! What are those?” Glad you asked! The company automatically deducts payment for meals during shifts — from the paychecks of workers they only pay $2-3 an hour — whether or not they actually eat a meal while there. Even if they can’t eat a meal because they can’t take a long enough break to do so.

I have worked in multiple restaurants and have absolutely never heard of this practice before. It’s not even clear why they would do that, given that shift meals are tax deductible anyway.

You may also be wondering why they need 24/7 security at a diner. It is because people actually go to Waffle House in order to start fights and throw things at servers in hopes of going viral and getting their 15 minutes of fame.

Via Truthout:

Beyond building a marketing strategy around caring for desperate customers, Waffle House also profits off of its online persona as an attraction for viral violence. “A lot of people have seen videos of Waffle House fights, and people think that they can get their 15 minutes of fame. But we’re just trying to work,” [Waffle House employee Gerald] Green told Truthout. Pauletta Dillard, a 20-year Waffle House server, further illustrated the violence she’s endured while working at the chain. “Customers get drunk and try to fight us. I’ve had sugar bowls & napkin holders thrown at me,” Dillard said in a USSW media advisory.

And that is not even the only way that working at Waffle House is a threat to one’s life and safety. The chain is apparently very proud of staying open no matter what, even during very dangerous hurricanes.

During a rally in Atlanta, Green stressed that while the Waffle House Index is often laughed at by some and even adopted by other stores, it terrifies workers. “During [Hurricane Irma], Waffle House actually asked me to go out to Food Lion to get paper towels, and it was thundering. It was lightning. It was downpouring … the power was out.” Green told rallygoers. “They asked me to get right back on the grill the second I got back to the store.”

Sure, there are risks to any job, but when I worked at Mel’s Diner, the worst things I had to do were marry ketchups and listen to weird counter dudes tell me all about how the moon landing was faked while staring at my chest. No one made me go out in the middle of a literal hurricane to buy paper towels. They also did not make me come into work right after a coworker was murdered in cold blood (because that didn’t happen).

Green says his own transition into organizing was a direct result of the corporate greed he encountered early in his career at Waffle House. In fact, after learning his friend and Waffle House co-worker Jesse Hall was shot and killed during an attempted armed robbery, Green and his team were called into work as if nothing had happened.
“That kind of made me realize that the corporate office, and not my manager, was the problem. They determined that we needed to keep the store open no matter what, but someone just died — someone I worked with,” Green said.

If you were wondering why they are asking for $25 an hour when you first started reading this, I’m just going to assume you’ve figured that out by now. That is hazard pay.

Green is a member of the Union of Southern Service Workers, which started as an offshoot of the Fight For $15 movement meant to encourage service workers to unionize. However, because there’s so much turnover in that industry, it’s been difficult to get that going. The USSW has been instrumental in organizing workers at Waffle Houses across the South to make these demands.

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Breakfast foods are important and waffles are one of our most precious national resources, but they are not worth risking anyone’s life over, and I cannot believe that is even a thing I have to type out.

If you agree and want to support the Waffle House employees, you can sign the petition over on the USSW site.

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