Sureya Melkonian/Staff

Roughly one-half of the friendly faces serving you at your local fast-food chain rely on public assistance programs to survive, according to a report by UC Berkeley and University of Illinois researchers published Tuesday.

The report, entitled “The Public Cost of Low-Wage Jobs in the Fast-Food Industry,” found that 52 percent of fast-food workers’ families require some sort of government program, from Medicaid to food stamps, to supplement extraordinarily low wages — costing roughly $7 billion per year. In the entire workforce, the percentage of workers requiring such assistance is 25 percent, making the fast-food industry’s proportion double that of the nation’s workforce as a whole.

The report was created in response to months of worker protests across the country regarding wage increases and rights for unskilled workers, according to Sylvia Allegretto, one of the report’s authors and an economist at the Berkeley Center for Labor Research and Education.

“There’s sort of this public image of fast-food workers being teenagers or students, but over two-thirds are the main breadwinners in their families,” said Ken Jacobs, a co-author of the report and chair of the campus Center for Labor Research and Education. “These jobs and the income from these jobs are core to families’ incomes by and large.”

One of the most recent developments in the national minimum wage controversy was California Gov. Jerry Brown’s signing of a bill to increase the state’s minimum wage to $10 per hour by 2016. The increase is long overdue but would be more effective if implemented immediately rather than over the course of the next three years, the researchers said.

“It is absolutely a step in the right direction,” Jacobs said. “In terms of people earning enough to survive and support their families, it’s still not going to be enough, but it is a clear positive step.”

The report also aims to dispel common myths surrounding unskilled, low-income jobs by proving that workers’ low wages cost the nation a tremendous amount of money through various in-kind transfers.

“We could be using that (money) to build up our communities, invest in our schools, fix our roads and create good-paying jobs,” said Jonathan Westin, director of Fast Food Forward, a labor rights movement.

The report, however, has drawn criticism from organizations such as the National Restaurant Association for misrepresentation of data, such as the inclusion of Earned Income Tax Credit, a tax refund that is separate from the traditional classification of government entitlement programs.

“America’s restaurant industry provides opportunities for millions of Americans, women and men from all backgrounds, to move up the ladder and succeed,” said Scott DeFife, executive vice president of policy and government affairs at the National Restaurant Association, in a statement. “These misleading efforts use a very narrow lens and selective data to attack the industry for their own purposes.”

Claire Chiara covers research and ideas. Contact her at cchiara@dailycal.org.

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According to Executive Officer Lt. Col. Jeffrey Erts, members of the ROTC — called cadets — were supposed to receive the first of their bimonthly stipends, which range from $300 to $500, on Oct. 15. As the U.S. Army scales back on educational assistance because of the federal government shutdown, however, cadets can expect a delay of their stipends until Congress can agree on a budget.

“We expect that they will be paid eventually, but not until there’s a budget,” Erts said. “And right now, there’s no budget.”

The delay of the stipends is disruptive for many cadets, according to UC Berkeley sophomore Tony Chang, a cadet in the ROTC. Chang is studying to work in the Medical Corps and uses the stipend to pay for books and food.

“I know emergencies can happen, and I just want to be prepared, so I had saved up money before the shutdown,” he said. “But other cadets are asking for a little help.”

In addition to the stipend, some students also receive the Army ROTC scholarship, which covers either a cadet’s tuition or housing costs as well as other school-related costs. Erts estimated that of the 50 students enrolled in the program, about 18 receive the scholarship.

Whether the scholarship money will be distributed this semester will be determined in the next two weeks, he said.

“We still have some time,” Erts said. “But if the scholarship is delayed, we will have a discussion with the school to make sure cadets remain enrolled in classes.”

The funding shortage affects other aspects of the ROTC as well. Erts said that while recruitment has been largely unaffected, the program can no longer hold recruitment events off campus, which could hinder the strength of the program in the future.

Meanwhile, the Fall Field Training Exercise, one of the ROTC’s most important events for the fall semester, has been postponed, according to senior military instructor Master Sgt. Jose Magana.

Calling the exercise “critical,” Magana said it offers the only chance for cadets to learn skills such as land navigation and ways to acclimate to the field environment.

Two of the program’s employees were furloughed during the first week of the shutdown, but they were allowed to return to work, according to Erts.

Nevertheless, both cadets and officials remain optimistic. Erts said cadets are taking the funding challenges in stride.

“In some ways, they are too busy to get involved in politics,” he said.

For Tony Chang, the Army is more than an avenue to pay for college anyway.

“I always wanted to be in the Army,” he said. “I fall in love with it more and more all the time.”

Contact Savannah Luschei at sluschei@dailycal.org.

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Kore Chan/Senior Staff

A UC Berkeley student was robbed at gunpoint near Moffitt Library on Sunday evening.

The incident marks the fourth robbery or attempted robbery to occur on campus or on property close to campus since Thursday.

In the Sunday robbery, a UC Berkeley student was walking west on University Drive about 9:11 p.m. when two males approached him, according to a UCPD crime alert released Monday.

One of the perpetrators walked up to the victim, pointed a black handgun at his chest and demanded his cellphone. Before he could comply, the perpetrator pushed the student to the ground. The student dropped his phone, one of the perpetrators picked it up and the two perpetrators fled north on the west side of Haviland Hall, according to the alert.

The armed robbery was the second of its kind this week, after an incident at the intersection of Berkeley Way and Oxford Street early Thursday morning, according to a UCPD crime alert released Thursday. About 5:30 a.m., an armed person struck a 57-year-old UC Berkeley affiliate. The woman fell to the ground, and the perpetrator took her purse and fled the scene.

Later that evening, a 19-year-old student was robbed in front of Unit 3’s Beverly Cleary residence hall while waiting at the shuttle pickup location on Channing Way, according to a UCPD crime alert released Friday. The perpetrator in this incident also pushed the student to the ground before snatching her cellphone and fleeing the scene.

In a fourth incident this weekend, however, a student successfully resisted an attempted theft.

The student was walking between Dwinelle Hall and the Valley Life Sciences Building just after midnight Saturday when three males approached him, according to a UCPD crime alert released Monday. Two of the men stood in front of and behind the student, one issuing verbal threats while the other grabbed his backpack from behind. The student clenched his backpack and began to yell, after which the men fled the scene.

Immediately after each of the four crimes, UCPD searched the area but was unable to locate the perpetrators.

According to a recent Berkeley Police Department report, 221 robberies have occurred within the city from January to June 2013. The report also noted a 67 percent increase  in robberies targeting people with iPhones, smartphones and other small electronic devices in the first six months of 2013 compared with the same months in 2012.

Megan Messerly is a news editor. Contact her at mmesserly@dailycal.org and follow her on Twitter @meganmesserly.

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Michael Drummond/Senior Staff

More than 40,000 Bay Area residents took to Shattuck Avenue on Sunday in celebration of Berkeley’s second Sunday Streets event.

From 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., Shattuck Avenue closed to cars and welcomed pedestrians and cyclists instead. Between Haste and Rose streets, participants could engage in a variety of activities, including live art and salsa dancing, as well as watch various performance groups.

“It’s about getting people to experience their urban environment in a totally different way and appreciate Berkeley in a new way,” said Sunday Streets Berkeley director Emunah Hauser.

The event is organized by Livable Berkeley, a coalition which strives to make Berkeley a more sustainable place, and a few partner organizations. According to Hauser, more than 150 organizations and activity leaders, including several UC Berkeley clubs and organizations, participated in Sunday Streets.

Sunday Streets drew people not only from Berkeley but from surrounding cities as well.

“It’s a really special feeling to have so much of a main street shut down,” said Oakland resident Tina Marie. “People look at each other differently. You’re taking people in.”

Because the street was closed off, several bus lines scheduled detours and added temporary stops near University Avenue and Oxford Street.

For Berkeley resident Michael Marchant, the absence of cars created a safer environment for his children.

“We look forward to any of these events where they block off streets to cars,” he said. “It makes it easier as a parent if you don’t have to worry about traffic.”

Hauser said this year’s Sunday Streets had a larger focus on transportation outreach than last year’s. Bay Area Bike Share allowed people to test bikes, and goBerkeley, a pilot program aiming to improve transportation in the city, asked for feedback from residents about public amenities.

To focus on physical activity and active transportation, Livable Berkeley does not invite street vendors to set up booths. Instead, many stores along Shattuck set up tables themselves, providing free samples or selling smaller store items.

Belli Osteria, a restaurant which does not normally open on Sundays, set up a pasta-making demonstration. Its co-owner Damien Morrison said Sunday Streets increased the restaurant’s exposure.

While some businesses had lines out the door, others saw a decrease in customers.

“There are plenty of distractions, so probably not as many people want to hang out in the comic book store,” said Mike Courtright, an employee at Fantastic Comics. While Courtright saw some new faces in the store, he saw fewer of his regular customers.

Sunday Streets, however, does not come without cost for the event’s organizers. Hauser estimates the event cost about $65,000 this year.

Although fundraising and private sponsorship cover a large part of this cost, Berkeley City Council pledged in January to provide Sunday Streets about $59,000 to split between 2013 and 2014.

Councilmember Kriss Worthington predicts the council will continue funding the event for subsequent years. Still, he feels the city’s contribution is a little high.

“It’s unfortunate that the other longtime community events don’t get more funding,” Worthington said. “This event gets as much as 20 other city events, so there’s a degree of unfairness.”

But for Councilmember Laurie Capitelli, Sunday Streets is “money well spent.”

“Everything shouldn’t be business,” Capitelli said. “Sometimes we should just celebrate as a community, and that’s important.”

Contact Tahmina Achekzai at tachekzai@dailycal.org.

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Alex Mabanta/Staff

Sproul: home of clambering clubbers, a cappella groups, horchata vendors and mantra-chanting Tibetan independence protesters.

Enter Felix Santos — the new face on the block. With a cardboard cutout, a clipboard and plenty of free time, Santos is making his passion for poetry a contagious disease. Witness the train of students passing beneath Sather Gate. Exactly what kind of poet does it take to stop a Golden Bear’s Moffitt migration?

Last Thursday, we at the Daily Clog chatted with the 21-year-old stanza extravaganza to find out.

The Daily Clog: Explain to us what you are doing.

Santos: I write free poems on the spot. Any topic of the audience’s choice. Then I recite it to them and give it to them.

DC: What happens if you get the same topic?

Santos: Everything I write is original. Even if I get the same topic, I never write the same poem. I try my best to go deeper than people expect.

DC: Why do you recite your poetry?

Santos: I think there is something very intimate in spoken poetry.  I wrote it and know how it’s supposed to sound. Oh, and my handwriting is terrible, so that’s probably the only time they will understand the whole thing (laughs).

DC: And money?

Santos: I want to detach money from this entirely. I  believe that when you have a skill to give that to people, if you ask for tips, people feel obligated. But then it’s not a gift. And I like the idea of giving my poetry to help people.

DC: So why are you here at UC Berkeley?

Santos: (smiles) Because of the way the sun hits the trees here.

DC: And when and where can readers expect to find you?

Santos: Usually on Sproul once a week for four to five hours. It does depend on how I feel, because these are my days off. I work five days a week as a cook for Haven in Oakland, and I don’t have any set days. But I’ve been doing this since March, and I’m going to do this for as long as I can.

Contact Alex Mabanta at amabanta@dailycal.org.

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This piece of “art” is one of many that can be found in bathrooms around campus. We can’t be sure, but we bet this is the only ass this anonymous student will ever see.

A particularly interesting set of graffiti in a Moffitt Library bathroom saw students try their hands at creating every pun possible around the word “grout“:

Others use the walls to write somewhat controversial opinions:

Or have pretty interesting “artistic” disputes:

Or use the opportunity to brighten someone’s day:

There are even blogs dedicated to documenting the hilarious and often strange comments written by Cal students from the toilet seat. UC Berkeley Bathroom Graffiti, better known as ucbbg, shares evidence of what its author describes as “the wit and wisdom of pooping people with pens.” This picture is our favorite:

Do you know of any places on campus with weird bathroom graffiti? Let us know!

Image sources: ucberkeleybathroomchronicles, ucbbg

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It’s that time of year again. You walk into class, and you hear sniffles and coughs. It’s super inconvenient that flu season and midterm season always seem to coincide. If you’re unlucky, someone from your floor or apartment has already gotten sick, and you can’t shake the feeling that you will be the next victim of the bug.

We at the Clog are here to suggest four ways to help keep you feeling like this:

And not like this:

1. Drink lots of water.

It’s simple and intuitive, but it really helps.

2. Eat healthy foods.

Trying to avoid getting sick during midterm season is like trying to not fall asleep after pulling two all-nighters — it’s difficult. Pizza at Crossroads may seem like heaven during midterms, but heading to the salad bar and eating nutritiously will help you keep sickness at bay.

3. Manage your stress.

There is a connection between mental and physical health. Keeping your stress under control and trying to get eight hours of sleep a night (unrealistic, we know), will help you ward off a cold.

4. Avoid getting physically close to people who you know are sick.

There is a fine line between being rude and protecting your health. If you notice your friend has been hacking away, there is no shame in trying to dodge his or her incoming hug.

Image Sources: anitakhart, gifbuffet, bonesandblood-sunandmoon, wisen8, thisisdieting, harakirithetz and fermzilla

Contact Sujin Shin at sujinshin@dailycal.org.

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A few weeks ago, American author Joyce Carol Oates mused on Twitter how fascinating it was that alumni always lament the falling standards at their alma mater after they have graduated but never while they were in attendance. If this is the case, then homecoming is a charged time. It is a remembrance of the glory days for many as Berkeley welcomes back waves of alumni who were students here when the school was really great.

There will be returning individuals who remember the Free Speech Movement and the moment in time when Berkeley was synonymous with action and revolution and the liberal fringe. There will certainly be more recent alums among us who recall milder times, high points such as The Play or a long winning streak when Cal had the Axe. That things have changed at Cal will be obvious to returning alumni, but they will also see how things have stayed the same.

The relationship between alumni and their alma mater is often complicated. It’s comparable to a family relationship — it defines us once we’ve graduated, and it’s an association we cannot shed. We finish growing up here, and in some ways, we must define ourselves by how we are different from it. It’s easy to feel loyal to a place that has given so much, especially given the prestige and continued cachet of the name of UC Berkeley. It’s also easy to feel unsure of what that really means in the present.

This year’s events provide for a unique visit home. The university is still reeling from the explosion and ensuing confusion on the last day of September. That the explosion was the result of copper theft is a detail that is not lost on the UC Berkeley community. This university is, after all, home to former Secretary of Labor and current UC Berkeley public policy professor Robert Reich, who recently released his documentary “Inequality for All.” Reich could tell you copper theft is often the action of poor people, who sometimes risk stealing against their better judgment because it’s obviously dangerous, and people have died attempting it. Setting aside our shared trauma as students and alumni here, the incident itself is worth examining in larger social and economic context. Cal is increasingly an island of privilege in the middle of the Bay Area’s astonishing rich-poor gap. Strange days around homecoming, indeed.

This homecoming also takes place during a historic and frustrating government shutdown, the last of which took place in 1995 and 1996. The relationship between this campus and the federal government is difficult, no less so under President Obama than under President Clinton. We celebrated the inauguration and reelection of the current president on the same plaza where we protested his drone strikes and railed against the appointment of his former Secretary of Homeland Security as UC president. If alumni worry Sproul Plaza will grow cold, this homecoming should reassure them: The Cal legacy is solid.

Despite the continual change and turmoil and adjustments and rate hikes and occasional explosions, I doubt Joyce Carol Oates would find her backward-looking pessimist alumni here. Alums returning to Cal are indeed returning to their alma mater — a Latin term meaning “nourishing mother.” The relationship we have with this mother after we’ve left her is always going to be complicated and rich. She is still really great, according to the people who decide these things. She’s not the mother we remember: She’s got new scars, and she rearranges the furniture. Her income is often in question, and she always seems to be in a fight. But Cal is still here to nourish us, students and alumni and community alike. Every fall, no matter what, she will be here to welcome us home.

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We’ve always been told to tell the truth, but sometimes a little white lie goes a long way. And, sadly, we students lie a lot more than you might think. Do you instinctively tell your GSI, “Yes, I did do all the reading,” even though you only skimmed the first and last pages? Do you automatically defer to lies when faced with tough questions like, “Why didn’t you reply to my text?” or, “Do I look fat in these jeans?”

We at the Clog have compiled a list of six of the most common lies students tell.

1) “I didn’t get the email”

It’s the easiest excuse in the book to get out of doing something you know you were either not prepared to do or didn’t want to do.

2) “I’ll be there in five minutes!”

Whether you are just getting out of bed or halfway down getting ready, when someone calls and asks where you are, the answer always seems to be, “I’m on my way!” You’ll tell your friends, “Just give me five minutes,” knowing full well it will take you another half hour to get there.

3) “I’m not drunk”

We all know you’re drunk. And when you see the pictures tomorrow, you’ll know you were drunk too.

4) “I’m not going to spend money this week”

And then you pass by Yogurtland and Chipotle and your resolution suddenly dissolves.

5) “Sorry, I’m going to be studying all day today”

Studying all day? More like, “Sorry, I’m going to be laying in bed all day watching “Breaking Bad” and eating Nutella straight from the jar.”

6) “I’ll go to the RSF later”

And by “later,” you mean “next week.”

Image Sources: Tulane Public Relations under Creative Commons, aboardthehotmessexpress, ermahgerdsomeoneactually, thehopelessgraduate, youarethe1ilove, bodaciousdream and grishmisha

Contact Sujin Shin at sujinshin@dailycal.org.

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