About us

Restaurant Workers of America (RWA) is the first organization of its kind—an employee advocacy organization dedicated to the preservation of tip income, and to the well-being of employees in the full-service restaurant industry. 

Our focus is to educate both members and non-members about economic and legislative issues pertaining to the restaurant industry. Specifically, RWA is dedicated to preserving the freedom and flexibility of America’s restaurant workers by advocating for a tip credit in states without one and to protect it where it is currently in place.

RWA’s board currently consists of five restaurant workers and one owner who have helped build grassroots movements of restaurant servers in their own markets—from the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul to Seattle, Washington, and from District of Columbia to the state of Maine. The work to fight for a tip credit in states that don’t currently have one is ongoing in The Twin Cities and Seattle. Two of these fights—in Maine and Washington, DC—were successful, either in fighting off a legislative push to eliminate the tip credit or reinstating one that was eliminated.