New analysis from the Employment Policies Institute of quarterly data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics revealed that California has lost as many as 16,000 jobs since the state’s $20 fast food minimum wage law was signed in September 2023. (The state is down nearly 14,000 jobs since the law officially took effect in April 2024.) The data includes mandatory reporting from all fast food establishments and covers the first six months since the implementation of the law:
In short, the QCEW shows -16,161 fast food jobs lost (-2.8% decrease) from September 2023-September 2024 (i.e. from the month the law was signed through one year later). Alternatively, if you measure from April 2024 when the law took effect, the state is down 13,986 fast-food jobs.
Compare that to industry employment growth the prior year (September 2022-2023), not under the $20 wage law, which was 12,996 fast food jobs added (+2.3% increase).
Even controlling for COVID impacts, the pre-COVID, pre-$20 wage fast food industry growth trend was also positive: from September 2018 to September 2019, California added 10,756 fast food jobs (a +2.0% increase). In fact, there have been no year-over-year job losses in the last decade or more barring COVID-related losses in 2020.
The California Fast Food Council should take heed of this unprecedented decline before following unions’ lead to implement another increase to the fast food industry’s required minimum wage.