Last year, there was a wave of protests against some of the United States' top fast food chains, as workers demanded that their salaries be improved, as the industry will often offer less than minimum wages; now, McDonald's restaurants have taken a step in the right direction, as they finally increase their workers' pay.
In the past few months, a lot has happened in the field of fast food chains' wages, most notably on the part of Shake Shack; when the company went public, it was reported that a number of its managers had stock benefits and in Pennsylvania, a Chipotle was closed by workers last fall as they demanded better working conditions - but this is the first time that McDonald's restaurants do the right thing on this account.
Reuters reports that McDonald's restaurants are currently planning to raise the average pay of around 90,000 workers in the US to $10 an hour, though the majority of those working in the country's different venues won't be affected due to the fact that these are franchises and the owners make their own decisions on wages.
CNBC reports that this is roughly only 10 percent of the McDonald's restaurants locations across the country, but it might have further effect on the franchises: ideally, this move will put some heavy pressure on the owners to also increase the salaries of those working in their restaurants.
According to Business Insider, the new move means an increase to $1 more than the mandated minimum wage locally, and McDonald's restaurants don't plan to stop there; they will also be offering benefits to their employees, such as paid vacations.
McDonald's experts expect that, by 2016, things will have changed enough that the average hourly wage for employees should be higher than $10.
While the new policy for McDonald's restaurants is announced, the average wage for fast food workers in the US stands at $8.90 an hour.
