From left: Glynda Carr, president and CEO of Higher Heights for America, and L. Joy Williams, chair of the organization’s political action committee.
Photographer: Wayne Lawrence for Bloomberg BusinessweekThe New Guard: Meet the People Changing Business, Art and Politics
Increasingly influential women-led groups are upending old-world power structures.
It started with a 200-worker walkout in New York City, coordinated by labor and community groups. Ten years later, the Fight for 15 movement has become a global phenomenon, touching 300 cities and six continents. Angered by commonplace injuries like cooking and oil burns, abusive customers and unfair pay, thousands of workers have participated in protests and walkouts, helping spur change such as new legislation to get a higher minimum wage in Seattle and more political power for restaurant workers in California. “I have learned so much about my rights. I knew nothing before I joined,” says Guillermina Blancas, who’s worked in fast-food restaurants for 23 years. “The most important thing is that it’s an all-for-one kind of fight.”
“I was hurt twice last year, and this year I hurt my foot. When I told my manager, she told me to take off my sock and decided that because I didn’t break my foot, I was OK. And what happens to me happens to everyone.” —Guillermina Blancas, organizer and McDonald’s worker