THE GREASE
TRAP
The public relations department at KFC turned down a request for an interview with Novak.
In a brief email, Rick Maynard, a
spokesman for the company, said,
“We are proud that the franchise
system of KFC restaurants provides employment and opportunities for career advancement to
thousands of workers in the New
York City area.”
After three months as a shift
supervisor, Barrera wasn’t buying the career advancement story
anymore. Despite his increased
responsibilities, he still hadn’t
received the raise his boss had
promised. And whenever he
brought it up with management,
they just told him to be patient,
he says. In February, Barrera
handed the key to his manager
and said he wanted to return to a
less stressful job at the cash register. He says the manager called
him selfish and insisted that moving ahead takes time.
“That’s how it works in the fastfood industry,” Barrera said. “You
have to just wait your turn. But
that turn may never come.”
WALKING OUT
The myth of American opportunity has never quite measured up to
HUFFINGTON
05.12.13
the reality, but some economists
say it’s harder for poor Americans
to get ahead now than at any other time since World War II.
“Since about the mid- to late1970s, what economic growth
we’ve had has not been broadly
shared,” said Isabel Sawhill, an
economist at the Brookings Institution. “People with lots of education have done well, people at the
very top of the income distribution range have done extraordinarily well, people in the middle
have basically treaded water, and
people at the bottom have seen
their real wages — inflationcorrected wages — fall. And then
came the recession in 2008 and
things got much worse.”
Tsedeye Gebreselassie, a labor
attorney at the National Employment Law Project in New York,
acknowledged that the restaurant industry is “probably telling
the truth” about most managers
starting out in the kitchen or behind the cash register. The problem, she said, is that nearly all
restaurant workers do non-managerial “front-line” jobs like cooking and serving.
“Yes, there’s opportunity for
advancement,” she said. “But
there are only so many managers.”
The Bureau of Labor Statistics
projects that by 2020, the number
of food preparation jobs at fast-