| > the market rate for labor is not $7.25 anywhere in the country Here are a couple of restaurants where the feds found they broken the federal minimum wage law, from last fall. https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/sol/sol20241220 "Court orders 3 West Michigan taco restaurants to pay $823K in back wages, damages to 177 workers shortchanged minimum wage, overtime" "... concluding that the restaurants operated an illegal tip pool that led to violations of federal minimum wage and overtime regulations." "the court found the employers ... Failed to pay tipped employees the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour." https://www.dol.gov/newsroom/releases/whd/whd20241121 "US Department of Labor recovers $87K in back wages, damages from New Port Richey restaurant for 21 workers denied minimum wage, overtime" "U.S. Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division investigators found the restaurant required employees to purchase a uniform shirt, which caused their average weekly wages to fall below the federal minimum wage" That site lists more, and I'm sure they aren't the only organization which does these investigations. |
> 0, Defendants violated the provisions of Sections 206 and 215(a)(2) by including kitchen staff employees in the tip pool when they are not customarily or regularly tipped employees, thereby invalidating the tip credit.
It was an invalid tip pool, because it included kitchen staff in the pool. So then the feds threw out the tip credit when calculating the effective minimum wage. In fact, there's no evidence at all that the employees actually took home less than $7.25. It's a technical violation, sure, but not evidence to your point at all.
This should have been obvious if you read your own link — do you honestly believe the waitstaff was working for $3/$4 an hour? Come on.