Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton cited school foodservice employees during a speech this week as a workforce sector in particular need of a pay increase, and vowed to deliver it if she's elected in November.
“It is an outrage that so many of the foodservice staff, the bus drivers, the paraprofessionals and education support professionals who keep our schools running and our children learning struggle themselves to provide for their own families,” the Democratic Party hopeful said Tuesday in a speech to the National Education Association.
Her call for higher wages for school cafeteria workers is part of a larger promise made during her speech to raise pay for those who work in the educational sector. She said that no educator should have to take second or third jobs just to forgive teachers' outstanding college loans.
Although Clinton’s stance on a $15 federal minimum wage has been unclear in the past, she recently clarified that she supports a multi-step movement to that rate. She has endorsed the type of wage schedule similar to the one that was enacted by New York this spring.
Clinton, a former secretary of state and U.S. senator from New York, leads rivals Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump in most recent presidential preference polls.