In 2018, when Washington, D.C., was having a high-profile argument over Initiative 77, a ballot measure to end the lower tipped minimum wage in the city, Max Hawla was making a decent income as a bartender and barback. With his tips he pulled in about $40,000 a year, even though the minimum wage he was guaranteed by city law was just $3.33 an hour. To make that income, though, he had to work five bar shifts a week—which are physically demanding and usually run much longer than eight consecutive hours.
He loved getting paid in tips because he felt like it rewarded him for working as hard as he wanted. And he feared that if Initiative 77 succeeded—which would have raised the tipped wage over the course of eight years to match the city’s regular minimum wage, currently $16.10 an hour—those tips would dry up. “I was staunchly against Initiative 77,” he said. He remembers changing his profile picture to a crossed-out 77. He wasn’t alone. Although the initiative passed that June by a clear 12-point margin, a group funded by the National Restaurant Association calling itself Save Our Tips rounded up bartenders and servers like Hawla and flooded the city council with calls to overturn it. Lawmakers heeded the call and reversed the ballot measure just four months after voters approved it and before it could go into effect.
But Hawla has since done a 180 on the issue. In September 2021, he took a...
You don't have permission to access "http://www.marketscreener.com/news/doj-announces-first-false-claims-act-settlement-under-civil-rights-fraud-initiative-ibm-to-pay-17-ce7f59dadb80fe2c" on this ...