Restaurants Violating Labor Laws, Study Says

A Koreatown labor advocacy group released a survey Wednesday, alleging that neighborhood restaurant owners routinely violate minimum-wage laws and other legal safeguards for the approximately 2,000 workers who prepare food, serve, wash dishes and clean at hundreds of eating establishments.

Other labor advocates said the survey of Koreatown--a popular destination for customers seeking an ethnic-food experience--reflects the plight of many in Los Angeles’ restaurant work force, which is almost entirely nonunion.

“As part of L.A.’s ‘sweatshop’ economy, Koreatown restaurants pay workers far below the legal minimum wage while imposing 12-14 hours of back-breaking labor each day,” concluded the Korean Immigrant Workers Advocates, a nonprofit organization that aids area employees.

Nonetheless, the study, based on the responses of 100 workers, showed an upward trend in wages among Koreatown restaurant workers, who are mostly Latino and Korean immigrants. Almost two-thirds reported earning at least the minimum wage, now $5.75 an hour. Two years ago, these same workers said, only about a third of them were earning the legal wage.

Greater government enforcement, a booming economy and pressure from workers’ advocates have led to the improvement, said Danny Park, an organizer with the Korean immigrant workers group.

Beatriz Silva, an organizer with Local 11 of the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees union, said that restaurants, as much as garment factories, “are the literal sweatshops.”

Restaurants, particularly small ones with a low-wage immigrant staffs and substantial turnover, are considered especially difficult union organizing targets, Silva said.

Among the study’s other findings:

* Slightly more than half the workers surveyed said they worked 40 to 60 hours per week. More than one-quarter said they worked more than 60 hours a week. The survey did not measure the frequency of overtime pay, saying only that it was rare.

* Few receive health-care insurance or have access to workers’ compensation. Yet 40% said they had suffered backaches, burns, slips or other injuries, some of which required medical treatment.

Jong Min Kang, president of the Korean-American Business Assn. in Los Angeles, said his group has tried to educate entrepreneurs.

“We hope they follow the law: It’s good for them, and it’s good for the workers,” Kang said.

But Kristin Olsen, spokesman for the California Restaurant Assn., called “those results the exception rather than the rule and very rare in the California restaurant industry.”

The study found working conditions particularly bad for illegal immigrants.

“The bosses know they can pay those of us without papers virtually whatever they want,” said Roman Vargas, 33, a former Koreatown dishwasher who now works with another Koreatown group that assists employees in wage and other disputes. “They pay us what they want. If we protest, they let us go.”