And who's keeping Burger King workers below the poverty line?

What would you do with an extra $18,000 in your pocket?

That's the amount of extra cash each and every Burger King employee in America would have received last year if Goldman Sachs (one of the fast-food chain's largest owners) had shared its bailout billions with rank-and-file workers.
Instead, Goldman Sachs squandered 6.5 billion of our taxpayer dollars on bonuses for their financial staff. These were some of the highest bonuses on Wall Street! Meanwhile, Burger King workers earn wages averaging just $14,000 a year -- well below the federal poverty line for a family of three.

Here are the facts:

GOLDMAN SACHS

 Goldman received $10 billion in taxpayer bailout money5 and then paid out $6.5 billion in bonuses.6 Goldman, along with other stakeholders in AIG, received up to $37 billion in bailout funds associated with its rescue.7

 Goldman is a top owner of Burger King8 controlling the fast food company's board along with TPG and Bain Capital.9 From 2006 to 2008, Burger King has spent $319,648 in lobbying, including lobbying against the Employee Free Choice Act.10

 Together with other top Burger King owners, Goldman allows the fast food company to cost taxpayers an estimated $273 million a year because workers lack access to affordable employer health coverage, are paid sub-poverty wages, and must rely on publicly-funded healthcare, income support, and food stamp programs.11

 Lloyd Blankfein, the CEO of Burger King owner Goldman Sachs, netted over $70.3 million in total compensation in 2007,12 the most ever for a Wall Street CEO.13 Burger King chief executive John Chidsey received total compensation of nearly $5.4 million in 2008.14

 Burger King fast food workers struggle to get by on a median wage of $6.93 per hour.15 For full-time employees, this wage amounts to just over $14,000 annually, well below the federal poverty line for a family of three.16

 The Goldman Sachs bonuses alone could have provided an $18,000 pay increase for each of Burger King's 360,000 corporate and franchise employees17 ⎯ more than doubling a worker's $14,000 annual salary and contributing to a meaningful economic stimulus by putting discretionary income in the hands of hundreds of thousands of American families.