Still, McDonald’s faces some additional challenges on the labor front.

Last week, the National Labor Relations Board rejected an appeal by McDonald’s in a case that will decide whether the company is a joint employer of workers at its franchises. A joint employer determination would make it easier to apply any concession workers wrested from the McDonald’s Corporation to workers at McDonald’s franchises, including, for example, a card-check provision that could bring a union into existence at a store once a majority of workers signed union cards.

“The S.E.I.U. is hoping that if the decision comes out the way they want it to, the overseas efforts will be one more pressure point on McDonald’s to grant some kind of organizing concession,” said Glenn Spencer of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The wage increase at McDonald’s may also do little to appease its employees. A worker at a McDonald’s in Chichester, Pa., said that she and her colleagues had their hours cut sharply after the wage increase went into effect on July 1, with the store’s manager routinely depriving them of two or three hours of work on an eight-hour shift.

The worker, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of being fired, said she had typically worked 65 hours in each two-week pay period before the wage increase. “The last pay period it was 46 hours,” she said. “This pay period it was 43. Per week, that’s 21-22 hours.” (A second person who examined the worker’s recent pay stubs corroborated her account.)

“Like any place of business, employee shifts and hours vary depending on the guest traffic,” said Heidi Barker Sa Shekhem, a McDonald’s spokeswoman. “Our sales information for this location shows traffic was slower in July than in June, which may have impacted some employee shifts and hours.”

While McDonald’s defenses at home remain strong, the labor campaign abroad hopes to weaken the company on other fronts.

The European Commission recently began looking into accusations leveled by a coalition of European and American unions and anti-poverty activists that McDonald’s avoided over 1 billion euros in taxes in Europe between 2009 and 2013 by funneling royalties to a Luxembourg-based subsidiary.