CT advocates: 70% of female restaurant workers are harassed. They’re training them to fight back

Sexual harassment is a pervasive threat in the restaurant industry, impacting seven out of every 10 female workers, according to research from advocacy groups.

The Connecticut state Capitol is not a typical venue for a self-defense class, but on Wednesday current and former restaurant staff partnered with an instructor from F.I.T.E. Fit to raise awareness about the problem and send a message that “We Are Not On The Menu.”

The demonstration was full of smiles and laughs but it was inspired by a very serious issue — more than 70% of female restaurant workers have experienced sexual harassment on the job, according to research by One Fair Wage and the University of California Berkeley Food Labor Research Center.

Advocates say the problem is amplified by the existence of a “subminimum” wage, which they said forces staff to endure inappropriate behavior to get tips.

According to the report, 76% of tipped workers reported experiences with sexual harassment compared to 52% of their nontipped colleagues.

Grace McGovern, an organizer for One Fair Wage in Massachusetts and Connecticut, said that as a bartender in Boston, it is not uncommon to hear customers comment on her body or speculate about the number of romantic partners she has had.

“Especially in places where you’re serving alcohol, you get into a rhythm of having regulars and knowing who’s going to tip well. And if someone’s known for tipping well, they can get away with being creepy,” McGovern said. “I have coworkers who are freshly 18 and 19 and the regulars are 60-year-old men and they’re saying disgusting things to these girls.”

“In severe cases, the customer might be asked to leave, but usually it’s just the employee who is asked to grin and bear it,” McGovern added.

While McGovern said that customers are often the main perpetrators of harassment in the restaurant industry, coworkers and management can cause problems, too.

Approximately 48% of the tipped workers surveyed in the report said they had been sexually harassed by a customer. Roughly 46% said they were harassed by a coworker.

McGovern described these experiences as “infuriating.”

“As someone who’s been a woman my whole life, it’s nothing new. It’s just the fact that as a server and as someone who is paid to wait on these people, for whatever reason, these people feel emboldened or feel entitled to act out because they’re like, ‘Oh, their job is to serve me,’ ” McGovern said. “They feel safer being the creepy people that they are.”

In Connecticut tipped service workers earn the state minimum wage of $15.69 an hour through a combination of base wages and tips. Under current law, the tipped wage is $6.38 for wait staff and $8.23 for bartenders. If staff do not make enough tips to reach the state minimum, employers are required by law to pay a tip credit to make up the difference.

An estimated 69% of the 70,000 tipped workers in Connecticut are women.

McGovern and other advocates from One Fair Wage said that the current wage structure can put restaurant staff in unsafe positions.

“You have to put up with a lot more disrespect, harassment and just poor behavior when you are counting on customers to pay your wages,” McGovern said. “Not having the stability, not having the consistency of at least a minimum wage despite consistent hours is really frankly dangerous.”

McGovern said studies have shown that workers in states with a subminimum wage were twice as likely to report experiences with sexual harassment than workers in states that pay restaurant workers the full minimum wage in addition to tips.

Lucia Nuñez Del Prado, a freshman at the University of New Haven, said she considers herself “lucky.”

When Nuñez Del Prado waitressed at a diner two summers ago, she said her coworkers and bosses would protect her from the male patrons who would pry for her phone number, ask her out on dates, and talk to her in a “gross way.”

Nuñez Del Prado also earned tips on top of the minimum wage — a luxury that was out of reach even to her mother.

“You have more stability in your life,” Nuñez Del Prado said, explaining how the guarantee of a minimum wage reassured her that she could make ends meet at home while her mom struggled to find stable work.

Nuñez Del Prado’s mother Tamara, a community organizer in New Haven, said that during her time as a kitchen assistant and cleaner, she earned the subminimum payment even though she earned no tips.

Tamara Nuñez Del Prado and other organizers said this type of exploitation is common for back-of-house workers who do not understand the state’s wage requirements.

“If you don’t know the legal jargon, if you don’t know to ask for a contract, if you don’t know to go in and calculate your hours with every paycheck, it’s very easy to see wage theft happen in those instances,” McGovern said, explaining how “immigrants and people of color” are disproportionately at risk.

As a trans woman, Tamara Nuñez Del Prado said that she is also more susceptible to sexual harassment. During her time in the restaurant industry, Tamara Nuñez Del Prado said she was harassed by her manager. On other occasions, she said her boss threatened to call U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement on her.

The Nuñez Del Prados said they came to the Capitol Wednesday because they want all workers to have access to economically stable and safe jobs.

If Senate Bill 221 passes the General Assembly, the law would gradually phase out the Connecticut tip credit. Between July 1, 2024, and July 1, 2027, employers must scale up the hourly wage for bartenders, hotel and restaurant staff annually until it equals the state minimum wage.

The proposal awaits a vote in the Senate after passing the Labor Committee in an 8 to 4 vote.

Scott Dolch, the president and CEO of the Connecticut Restaurant Association said eliminating the tipped wage is not in the best interest of restaurants and workers.

Dolch said that data from cities like Washington D.C. have shown that when tip wages are raised or eliminated, revenues decrease, servers leave the industry, and restaurants close down.

“Those stats alone are what scares me,” Dolch said.

Dolch explained that without the tip credit, restaurant owners are forced to either raise prices or implement service charges — which can reduce or eliminate the tips customers leave.

According to Dolch, a survey of 446 Connecticut servers and bartenders revealed that 91% had earned more than $20 per hour and 61% earned more than $30 per hour. Additionally, 96% of respondents said they were in favor of the current wage structure.

“Servers and bartenders in our state are not asking for this,” Dolch said. “The One Fair Wage Group is up there and saying that it needs to happen … But understand that the industry is not asking for it.”