Cafeteria workers at Intel rally over low wages

Close to 100 Intel cafeteria workers and supporters held a rally outside of the chip maker's headquarters in Santa Clara, Calif. Wednesday afternoon to highlight the growing inability of low-wage workers to survive in an area where rents are rising to stratospheric heights.

“Here in the economy in Silicon Valley, we struggle. I’m a single mom of two children. I had to move in with my ex-mother-in-law because I can’t afford to rent my own apartment,” said Nahima Aguiniga, 35.

She works full time putting out coffee, washing dishes, mopping and running a cash register for Guckenheimer Enterprises, the food service company that Intel subcontracts its catering out to.

“We work at a multi-million dollar company which can’t treat us fairly and give us the wages we deserve to be able to live here in the Bay area,” Aguiniga said.

“Intel should be held responsible. The same way they are able to give pay their employees a sufficient amount of money to live here, we should also make enough to be able to live here,” she said.

The workers are being organized by Unite Here, a food service workers union based in New York City.

Unite Here’s Local 19 surveyed 30 of Guckenheimer's employees at Intel and found the median wage was $14.50 an hour, said Jessica Choy, an organizer.

That works out to about $30,000 a year. That’s not enough to afford a two-bedroom apartment in San Mateo County, where the median cost is $2,884 a month, or $34,600 a year, according to the San Jose Mercury News.

“People are facing the same rent and housing crisis that tech workers are facing, they can’t afford to live here with these wages. They’re coming to work every day and serving food to tech employees and then being confronted with the crazy inequality in the Bay area,” Choy said.

Two weeks ago the cafeteria workers delivered a petition to their bosses asking for a fair process to form a union.

However Intel is changing its food service provider and the new provider has not yet been named, so the process will have to begin again once that happens, Choy said.

Intel said that because it contracts out its food service operations it is not appropriate for the company to be involved in the question of whether or not the workers desire union representation.

"The issue in question exists between our supplier and its employees.  We respect the legal right of workers to decide whether or not they choose to be represented by a union, but we are not a party to that process," said Intel spokesman John Kyte.

On Wednesday community leaders, members of other unions and contract tech workers came out in support of the cafeteria workers.

Aguiniga also finds it galling to be singled out by her badge color at Intel. Contract workers get green badges, staffers get blue.

“We have to pay for coffee and soda. The blue badges, they get free snacks. We help sustain Intel just like the tech workers do, but we don’t get those perks.”