Modern Servitude
Now for some lighter news before Xmas.
In the US there are more than 10,000 Starbucks restaurants. In the last year, the corporation sponsored facelifts for more than 1000 shops that have fallen on hard times or at least a serious dip in customers.
Of the 10,000 restaurants, 650 or 6.5% of the stores are unionized. Nearly 12,000 workers have joined the Starbucks Workers United union and many have collective agreements. Compare that to Canada, where there are 1500 Starbucks stores – and only 15 or 1% are unionized. Of course in both the US and Canada, the company drags its heels when it comes to collective bargaining. Deliberately so. If management can delay signing an agreement with the union, because employee turnover is about 50% a year, there’s a chance that a year from now a new crop of employees will dilute the strength the union has today. Then the bargaining unit could be decertified .
Four seconds to write the word “Enjoy”
In the summer of 2025, Starbucks’ corporate bosses decided the best way to draw in new customers (and keep the old ones) was to decree that all baristas had to write something personal on every coffee cup. Now, in many of the Starbucks in the US, baristas have to prepare up to 80 cups in a hour – and no smiley faces – a symbol that management sometimes rejects as not personal enough. If putting a word or two on a cup takes about 10 seconds to scrawl, signing the 80 cups takes up about 13 minutes in every hour’s work—I guess in the other 47 minutes, a barista can pour coffee and froth milk for up to 80 cups!! Just to let you know, sitting here at my desk on a piece of paper I wrote “enjoy” in four seconds, and made a smiley face in 4.8 seconds. I didn’t have to grab a cup, fit on the lid or or get out a pen. Starbucks staff were told to write nothing of a political or religious nature or pop culture signs.
Impossible.
And a sycophantic management wants to keep the staff on their toes and get return customers by getting personal with them.
In late September a customer in a Yucaipa, California store asked a Starbucks barista to write the name Charlie Kirk, the murdered right-wing activist, on the cup. Labor Notes reports,
“…the Barista declined, following policy and offered to write “Charlie” instead. The customer, who was videoing the interaction, canceled the order and left.” (Jenny Brown in Labor Notes Dec. 2025, p. 15. )
The customer posted the video to social media which led to a “barrage of threats and harassment” against the workers. At least two workers took sick leave, and one quit.
The next day Starbucks– faced with their employees’ refusal to celebrate Charlie Kirk albeit on a coffee cup – gave in to right wing pressure. The company suddenly agreed that baristas should write almost anything a customer requested, even the name Charlie Kirk. Said one barista,
“So, the cup writing policy was very strict, and it’s very disappointing that they switched the rules to cover their own skin.” Labour Notes article.
Within weeks, 70% of the workers in that one Starbucks store signed cards and filed for union certification. The bitter ending is that by the last day of September 2025, Starbucks announced it was permanently closing the store. They cited business or safety reasons. Of course, this was a lie. Starbucks closed the store to teach uppity employees a lesson.
Cheaper to live in Toronto than in Halifax
Here in Canada hundreds of thousands of workers work in low-paid service jobs. In Atlantic Canada one-third of workers earn less than $20.00 (in 2024). In NS, it’s worse – 35% of workers earned less than $20 an hour according to Statistics Canada in 2024. That represents more than 154,825 workers. Despite the twice yearly increases to the province’s minimum wage, we can see how ineffective it is.
NS’s minimum wage is $16.50 an hour. The government site points out Minimum wage
“is a basic labour standard that sets the lowest wage rate that an employer can pay to employees. All Canadian jurisdictions have a general minimum wage rate…”
About half the people in Nova Scotia earn less than the Living Wage of $29.40 an hour. The Living Wage in Halifax (for example) is even higher than Toronto’s Living Wage of $27.20 per hour. The Living Wage calculates the real cost for workers to afford basic living expenses. The CCPA’s (Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives) Living Wage campaign annually calculates the the wage in cities and provinces across Canada required to support a household of two working adults/parents and two children to live modestly in Halifax. In Halifax, the Living Wage is more than 78% greater than minimum wage!
Yet Canadian workers’ slide into the low-end service economy is not yet over. If Prime Minister Carney cuts 30,000 jobs in the civil service – more women (primarily) will end up working at Starbucks or its fast-food competitors. And those women won’t earn enough to pay for rent, daycare, food or running a car– costs calculated in the $29.40/hour living wage.
Image at the top: credit Unsplash, photograph by Marcos Figueroa (@marcusdavid), 12 Sept. 2025.