December 14, 2015

Governor Andrew M. Cuomo

633 Third Avenue

New York City, NY 10017

Governor Cuomo:

On behalf of our New York membership, and of the over 271,000 tipped restaurant workers

Statewide, I would like to applaud you for your recent announcement of the Mario Cuomo

Campaign for Economic Justice, and your support of an all-industry fair wage in New York State.

Our members are servers, hosts and hostesses, runners, bussers and expediters. Hard working

mothers, fathers, students, caretakers and caregivers who ensure a positive experience during a

good meal that is the vital backbone to the New York State restaurant industry.

Nationally the restaurant industry includes 6 of the 10 lowest paying jobs in the country. In New

York State, tipped restaurant workers – 54 percent of whom are women – are more likely to receive

food stamps and live in poverty than the state average working population. Currently, 16 percent

of tipped restaurant workers are on food stamps, and 18.5 percent live at or below the poverty line.

25 percent of tipped restaurant workers have children to support. Food stamp assistance to tipped

workers in New York State costs New York State taxpayers over $72 million annually.

Since a living base wage is not guaranteed, women in our industry are forced to depend on tips;

they frequently have to put up with sexual harassment from customers, co-workers, and

management. The Equal Economic Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has targeted the restaurant

industry nationally as the single largest source of sexual harassment charges filed by women with

a rate five times higher than any other industry.

Additionally, although employers are legally required to “top off” a tipped worker’s pay when tips

don’t add up to at least the minimum wage, enforcement nationwide is so lax and disorganized

that wage theft has reached epidemic levels. A federal review of employment records from 2010-

2012 indicated that almost 84% of approximately 9,000 full-service restaurants had committed

wage and hour violations. These violations involved 82,000 workers and included 1,170 incidents

of improperly calculated wages for tipped workers, which resulted in approximately $5.5 million

in back pay.

We greatly appreciate the efforts of you and your wage board to increase the tipped minimum

wage and for shining a light on the flawed system of cash wages and tip credits, but we believe it

does not go far enough. Within the recommendations by the wage board was an agreement to

review whether or not the system of cash wages and tip credits should be eliminated. We believe

the elimination of this tiered system and the implementation of one true minimum wage for all

industries is the only way to ensure that all employees across the state of New York are paid a fair

living wage. This will ensure a better quality of life for our workers while also saving the state

millions of taxpayer-funded public assistance dollars.

We thank you for continuing to be a leader on this critical issue, and we look forward to lending

our voice to the Mario Cuomo Campaign for Economic Justice.

Sincerely,

Saru Jayaraman

Co-Founder & Co-Director

Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC United)

CC: Counselor Alphonso David