On April 1, California raised the minimum wage for large fast food restaurant franchises to $20 an hour. This law will threaten seven hundred thousand jobs by destroying the state’s food franchising business; however, there is one notable fast food franchise exempted from this minimum wage hike: Panera.Greg Flynn is the second-largest Panera franchisee in the world, but he is also known for his close relationship with California governor Gavin Newsom. This relationship stretches back to their high school years and presently takes the form of support and donations to Newsom’s political campaigns. With this close relationship well-documented, it is clear that there is more to this exception, as a recent article by Bloomberg speculates.When pressed on this exemption by a number of California
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