Workers in several low-wage industries in Hartford went on strike Tuesday, as part of a coordinated protest across the country. Fast-food, security, janitorial, homecare, and child care workers all took part in the day of action.
As in the past, they’re calling for a $15-an-hour minimum wage, and for the right to unionize.
32BJ of the Service Employees International Union, one of the organizers, billed the event as a day of mass civil disobedience by working Americans across the service economy.
The union and the workers also continued to speak out against what they see as a extremist agenda being crafted by the incoming Trump administration.
Yvonne Rodriguez works at a Dunkin Donuts in Hartford, at $9.60 an hour. She’s a single mother of four children, and said she often cannot meet all of her bills each month.
"Especially this month coming up in December," she said. "It's the worst month for me ever. I have to sit down and pay my rent, pay my bills, and do Christmas."
Rodriguez said she’s deeply concerned about what the change in government might mean for minimum wage workers.
"It's very scary to just think about that - we're going to have an elected president that wants to take away our living situation," she said. "It's very hurtful. It's frustrating."
Workers held demonstrations and protests in the city throughout the day.
They rallied at the state capitol to call on lawmakers to fund the Care 4 Kids program. The movement claims the deficit facing the program threatens to leave over 4,000 underpaid families without the child care they need to get to work.
The demonstrators also planned to block traffic outside a McDonald's on Washington Street, in an effort to provoke arrests.
