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Slavery 21st Century
You thought it was over, think again
the corporations of today are just remodeled slave plantations of the past
july 22, 2020
Slavery did not end it was merely outsourced,
reconfigured, and made politically correct
The Global Slavery Index
published on Thursday by Walk Free Foundation, describes modern slavery as a complex and often hidden crime that crosses borders, sectors and jurisdictions. The US number, the study estimates, is almost one hundredth of the estimated 40.3 million global total number of people it defines as being enslaved.
labor history - recommended reading
*THE SILK STRIKE OF 1913
*AMERICAN LABOR VIOLENCE: ITS CAUSES, CHARACTER, AND OUTCOME
headlines and issues
*Women at Google miss out on thousands of dollars as a result of pay discrimination, lawsuit alleges(ARTICLE BELOW)
*'I'm using unemployment benefits to buy insulin': US workers face hardships over pandemic(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Gig workers for Shipt stage a walk-out in protest of opaque pay structure
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Minor League Teams Could Be Latest Casualties of COVID’s Disaster Capitalism
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*A bathroom-break bill? California looks to make sure warehouse workers can take a break(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Uber Drivers Protest Outside CEO’s Home to Demand Labor Protections
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Production workers strike against major Navy shipbuilder
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*US employers step up anti-unionization efforts as pandemic spurs activism
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Strikes erupt as US essential workers demand protection amid pandemic
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Essential Sanitary Workers Strike for Hazard Pay and PPE in New Orleans
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Revealed: Amazon told workers paid sick leave law doesn't cover warehouses
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*California sues Uber and Lyft for misclassifying drivers as contractors
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*These Workers Packed Lip Gloss and Pandora Charm Bracelets. They Were Labeled “Essential” but Didn’t Feel Safe.(excerpt BELOW)
*THEY WERE WARNED NOT TO TAKE SICK DAYS — THEN SIX WORKERS AT THEIR WAREHOUSE DIED OF CORONAVIRUS(ARTICLE BELOW)
*TRUMP USING CORONAVIRUS STIMULUS TO ‘ENRICH CORPORATE EXECUTIVES’ WHILE SHOWING ‘COMPLETE DISREGARD’ FOR WORKERS: TOP UNIONS(ARTICLE BELOW)
*DESPITE COVID-19, TRUMP KEEPS ON GUTTING PROTECTIONS FOR WORKERS
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Trader Joe’s and other US firms suppress unionization efforts during pandemic
(ARTICLE BELOW)
*‘Minority report union-busting’ tactics at Whole Foods decried following reporting on company’s labor activism heat map(ARTICLE BELOW)
*EMPLOYEES SAY SMITHFIELD PLANT IN WISCONSIN CONCEALED COVID-19 INFECTIONS, PRESSURED THEM TO WORK ELBOW-TO-ELBOW WITHOUT PROTECTION(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Workers at Warren Buffett’s furniture rental company were given bad gear and dared to complain about it(ARTICLE BELOW)
*Robert Reich: Here are the 5 biggest corporate lies about unions
(ARTICLE BELOW)
funnies(at the end)Whole Foods staff to protest working conditions as coronavirus cases rise
Google
Women at Google miss out on thousands of dollars as a result of pay discrimination, lawsuit alleges
An ongoing 2017 case found that discriminatory practices may be pushing women into lower-paying career tracks
Kari Paul - the guardian
Wed 22 Jul 2020 06.00 EDT
Women at Google lose out on thousands of dollars each year compared with men as a result of discriminatory practices including pushing female employees into lower-paying career tracks, a lawsuit has alleged.
The findings stem from an ongoing lawsuit brought against Google in 2017, which accused the tech company of gender pay discrimination between female employees – from coders to teachers in its in-house childcare department – and their male counterparts. More details about the extent of the pay disparity emerged in a memorandum filed in court on Tuesday to classify that lawsuit as a class action, which, if approved, would mean it applies to 10,800 women who have been employed by Google at any time since September 2013.
The women affected encompass a large variety of positions, and more than half are software engineers.
Women at Google make an average of $2,000 less per year than men on paper, but may be losing out on even more, David Neumark, a University of California Irvine distinguished professor of economics, found in a study cited in the lawsuit. His calculations showed women at Google may be losing out on $17,000 a year because of discriminatory job classifications.
“Google has a pattern and practice of channeling women with comparable education and experience into lower-salary levels,” James Finberg, a lawyer representing the plaintiffs in the case said.
The former employees bringing the lawsuit against Google have alleged the company tied starting salary to prior pay, perpetuating wage inequality. Google discontinued this practice in 2017, but has since failed to address the existing inequalities at the company, the lawsuit alleges.
Google’s job classification system divides employees into different responsibility levels to determine tasks and compensation. Under that system, workers in the same “job family” at Google are “those that are doing similar job duties and responsibilities but stratified at different levels of capabilities or skill sets”. Different levels within each job family come with different salary grades. The lawsuit alleges women were consistently pushed into lower-level job tracks and paid less than men with similar job descriptions.
Kelly Ellis, a plaintiff in the case, claimed she experienced this when she was first hired at Google. She felt she had enough experience to be placed at a higher responsibility level, but was told all employees are initially assigned a lower responsibility level and thus paid less.
“Throughout my time at Google, I always felt like I was behind where I should have been and trying to catch up,” she said. Later she learned that wasn’t the case for her male colleagues: they had been assigned more responsibilities and higher pay from the beginning.
Ultimately Google paid women less base salary, smaller bonuses, and less stock than men in equal job codes and locations, the lawsuit alleges. The likelihood of such a disparity occurring by chance rather than by direct discrimination is 1 in 100, Neumark’s analysis showed.
Heidi Lamar, another plaintiff in the case claims she experienced the same patterns in her position in the Google childcare facilities. She said Google management blamed it on her work quality or the performance in her initial job interview, but investigations as part of the lawsuit found this wasn’t the case. In this discovery process, during which the legal team searched for evidence of discrimination, an evaluation of her interview showed she received high marks.
“I felt very vindicated when I saw my interview scores were higher than my male colleagues,” she said. “I suspected as much, but it was nice to have it proven.”
The discovery process revealed a number of systemic discriminations, including that 49% of people hired as Level 2 software engineers were women but that percentage dropped for higher level positions – 22% for Level 3, 14.2% for Level 4, and 7.2% for Level 5. Ellis said that when she was hired, she was asked what she was paid at her previous job and given the same salary at Google.
“I didn’t really realize the full extent to which I was discriminated against until I stopped working there, and I realized even more being involved in this lawsuit just how blatant and what a pattern it all was,” Ellis said.
To address pay equality, Google has been running yearly pay equity analyses since 2012, said Eileen Naughton, vice-president of People Operations at the company. As a result of these investigations the company made salary adjustments for 2% of employees in 2019, totaling $5.1m.
“The claims in this lawsuit are unfounded and we plan to defend our policies and practices,” Naughton said.
There will be a hearing for the case on 2 December.
The findings stem from an ongoing lawsuit brought against Google in 2017, which accused the tech company of gender pay discrimination between female employees – from coders to teachers in its in-house childcare department – and their male counterparts. More details about the extent of the pay disparity emerged in a memorandum filed in court on Tuesday to classify that lawsuit as a class action, which, if approved, would mean it applies to 10,800 women who have been employed by Google at any time since September 2013.
The women affected encompass a large variety of positions, and more than half are software engineers.
Women at Google make an average of $2,000 less per year than men on paper, but may be losing out on even more, David Neumark, a University of California Irvine distinguished professor of economics, found in a study cited in the lawsuit. His calculations showed women at Google may be losing out on $17,000 a year because of discriminatory job classifications.
“Google has a pattern and practice of channeling women with comparable education and experience into lower-salary levels,” James Finberg, a lawyer representing the plaintiffs in the case said.
The former employees bringing the lawsuit against Google have alleged the company tied starting salary to prior pay, perpetuating wage inequality. Google discontinued this practice in 2017, but has since failed to address the existing inequalities at the company, the lawsuit alleges.
Google’s job classification system divides employees into different responsibility levels to determine tasks and compensation. Under that system, workers in the same “job family” at Google are “those that are doing similar job duties and responsibilities but stratified at different levels of capabilities or skill sets”. Different levels within each job family come with different salary grades. The lawsuit alleges women were consistently pushed into lower-level job tracks and paid less than men with similar job descriptions.
Kelly Ellis, a plaintiff in the case, claimed she experienced this when she was first hired at Google. She felt she had enough experience to be placed at a higher responsibility level, but was told all employees are initially assigned a lower responsibility level and thus paid less.
“Throughout my time at Google, I always felt like I was behind where I should have been and trying to catch up,” she said. Later she learned that wasn’t the case for her male colleagues: they had been assigned more responsibilities and higher pay from the beginning.
Ultimately Google paid women less base salary, smaller bonuses, and less stock than men in equal job codes and locations, the lawsuit alleges. The likelihood of such a disparity occurring by chance rather than by direct discrimination is 1 in 100, Neumark’s analysis showed.
Heidi Lamar, another plaintiff in the case claims she experienced the same patterns in her position in the Google childcare facilities. She said Google management blamed it on her work quality or the performance in her initial job interview, but investigations as part of the lawsuit found this wasn’t the case. In this discovery process, during which the legal team searched for evidence of discrimination, an evaluation of her interview showed she received high marks.
“I felt very vindicated when I saw my interview scores were higher than my male colleagues,” she said. “I suspected as much, but it was nice to have it proven.”
The discovery process revealed a number of systemic discriminations, including that 49% of people hired as Level 2 software engineers were women but that percentage dropped for higher level positions – 22% for Level 3, 14.2% for Level 4, and 7.2% for Level 5. Ellis said that when she was hired, she was asked what she was paid at her previous job and given the same salary at Google.
“I didn’t really realize the full extent to which I was discriminated against until I stopped working there, and I realized even more being involved in this lawsuit just how blatant and what a pattern it all was,” Ellis said.
To address pay equality, Google has been running yearly pay equity analyses since 2012, said Eileen Naughton, vice-president of People Operations at the company. As a result of these investigations the company made salary adjustments for 2% of employees in 2019, totaling $5.1m.
“The claims in this lawsuit are unfounded and we plan to defend our policies and practices,” Naughton said.
There will be a hearing for the case on 2 December.
US economy
'I'm using unemployment benefits to buy insulin': US workers face hardships over pandemic
Millions of workers have lost health insurance and faced salary cuts and unions say firms are not doing enough to take care of employees
Michael Sainato in New York
THE GUARDIAN
Fri 17 Jul 2020 06.03 EDT
As millions of workers around the US remain out of work due to the coronavirus pandemic, employers are pushing cuts to wages, eliminating health insurance and other benefits, and terminating workers rather than furloughing them.
Rodney Watts worked at the Atlanta international airport employed by the retail and concessions contractor HMS Host for nine years as a warehouse shift supervisor before getting laid off in March.
Watts says he is using his unemployment benefits to pay for his insulin, as he lost his health insurance with his job termination.
“Without insurance I have to pay out of pocket … I take insulin shots three times a day. Now I’m using unemployment to pay for it,” said Watts. “My diabetes is a rollercoaster. If I don’t take my shots, I feel real bad. The insulin runs me almost $400 for just a small bottle and I also take metformin.”
Research on the impact of the crisis shows:
Some employers are pushing to avoid providing workers with health insurance, even as the workers begin to return to work, and others out of work who have kept their health insurance are struggling to afford co-pays for life-saving medications.
Hanna Castano of Euclid, Ohio, who has type 1 diabetes, lost her job as a server at a Bob Evans restaurant in March 2020 when the pandemic shutdown began. She found a new job at a local drug mart but was shortly laid off due to lack of customer demand the store had anticipated. The change in employment disrupted her unemployment benefits, of which she has only received one week of pay, and the loss of income left her struggling to afford the $50 co-pay for her insulin under her Medicaid coverage. Though her restaurant reopened, she is still waiting to be called back into work when customer demand recovers.
“I will go sick because my daughter needs something that I have to get,” said Castano, who has relied on financial support from friends and family while living in a motel. “I don’t know how much longer I can keep paying for my insulin and not being able to get the food and diapers that my daughter needs because I will die without it.”
The Fontainebleau hotel in Miami Beach, Florida, is suing the Unite Here union, seeking to stop making healthcare payments for more than 1,000 workers under the current union contract.
A housekeeper for 10 years at the hotel, Cristina Aguirre-Sevillano, cannot afford medicine prescribed to her, which costs nearly $400 out of pocket, after recently testing positive for Covid-19.
“I haven’t been able to get the medicine my doctor recommended me to take,” said Aguirre-Sevillano. “My daughter is also under my health insurance plan, so she lost her health insurance. I don’t have health insurance, I can’t afford medicine and I can’t pay my rent either because I only received one payment of $275 from unemployment since being furloughed in March.”
Initially furloughed in March, Aguirre-Sevillano was called back to work in June but has worked only five days. She is one of several workers in Florida who have not received their full unemployment benefits yet, and she continues to experience problems with the state system.
Wendi Walsh, the Unite Here Local 355 secretary-treasurer, said union contract language stipulates hotels must continue healthcare coverage for employees until they have not worked the required number of hours for two consecutive quarters. She said: “Every other hotel we represent has that same contract language and they are abiding by it because they are legally required to do so and amidst a pandemic it’s the moral thing to do, but the Fontainebleau has taken a different path, going so far as to file a lawsuit to avoid taking care of their employees during a deadly outbreak of a virus.”
According to Walsh, the hotel also proposed implementing wage cuts of between 10% and 20% for workers in the bargaining unit. “The union is rejecting that proposal and would oppose the company unilaterally implementing those wage cuts,” added Walsh.
Monalisa Rodriguez, a server and hostess at Terranea Resort outside Los Angeles, for seven years, was terminated in May after initially being furloughed.
“It was devastating. At the same time they fired us, they took away our health benefits,” said Rodriguez, who was hoping to eventually retire from the resort. She relies solely on her income to provide for two children and take care of her mother. “It’s been extremely hard. I’ve struggled a lot trying to figure out how to provide for my family, relying on food banks and the Salvation Army to make ends meet.”
A spokesperson for Terranea Resort said in an email that 550 out of 1,100 employees were laid off in May 2020 for the resort’s survival. “We will continue to bring back all employees according to our seniority policy and will rehire laid-off employees should we have the opportunity to do so.”
Mozes Bautista, who has worked at Hilton Embassy Suites in Phoenix, Arizona, for five years, recently returned to work after being terminated, but he has to wait until September 2020 for his health insurance to restart with the company.
“They said they would give back the paid time off but only gave back some of it. Because they fired us, we’re reclassified as new hires so we don’t have health insurance until September,” said Batista. “They’re no longer matching our 401(k) either.”
Gate Gourmet, an airliner catering contractor, was one of several airline companies to receive federal bailout funds to prevent layoffs, but it terminated workers anyway. Over $170m is allocated from the Cares Act to Gate Gourmet for payroll protection. According to Unite Here, Gate Gourmet had about 8,000 employees before the pandemic, with only 1,100 currently working and plans to bring back just 1,600 additional workers on 1 September.
Lamar Banks worked as a customer service assistant for nearly six years at Gate Gourmet in Chicago before he was laid off in May 2020, just weeks after he had a child and had to use all his paid time off to quarantine after a supervisor tested positive for coronavirus.
“I got a letter in the mail shortly after saying it was going to be a permanent layoff,” said Banks. “They stopped health insurance.” Banks said Cobra, which allows Americans to continue benefits they once received from a job, costs $500 a month, and she had not received unemployment yet. “I don’t know what I’m going to do or what that means. I was thinking when things got better, I’d be able to go back to work.”
Gate Gourmet would not clarify its current employment numbers. “We are committed to complying with all our obligations, including covid safety measures, seriously and will use all Cares Act funds exclusively for the continuation of payment of employee wages, salaries and benefits,” said a spokesperson. “We continue to be a proud employer to thousands of workers in the United States and are ready to serve our customers as they begin to resume operations.”
The Fontainebleau Hotel and HMS Host did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Speaking to the Miami Herald, Silvia Pereda, Fontainebleau vice-president of human resources, said the hotel was “focused on recovering its financial stability so that it can return as many of its laid-off, former employees as possible to employment, which will, critically, result in them receiving a paycheck and benefits once again”.
The union’s demands for payment of benefits for laid-off workers was making this harder, Pereda said.
Rodney Watts worked at the Atlanta international airport employed by the retail and concessions contractor HMS Host for nine years as a warehouse shift supervisor before getting laid off in March.
Watts says he is using his unemployment benefits to pay for his insulin, as he lost his health insurance with his job termination.
“Without insurance I have to pay out of pocket … I take insulin shots three times a day. Now I’m using unemployment to pay for it,” said Watts. “My diabetes is a rollercoaster. If I don’t take my shots, I feel real bad. The insulin runs me almost $400 for just a small bottle and I also take metformin.”
Research on the impact of the crisis shows:
- Almost 27 million Americans may have lost their employer-tied health insurance during the pandemic, according to a May 2020 report by the Kaiser Foundation, taking into account the family members of workers who lost health insurance due to job losses.
- At least 4 million workers in the private sector have received a pay cut during the pandemic. Some 6 million workers have had their schedules reduced to part-time. Nearly 11% of the US workforce is out of work with no reasonable chance of returning to their job before the pandemic.
Some employers are pushing to avoid providing workers with health insurance, even as the workers begin to return to work, and others out of work who have kept their health insurance are struggling to afford co-pays for life-saving medications.
Hanna Castano of Euclid, Ohio, who has type 1 diabetes, lost her job as a server at a Bob Evans restaurant in March 2020 when the pandemic shutdown began. She found a new job at a local drug mart but was shortly laid off due to lack of customer demand the store had anticipated. The change in employment disrupted her unemployment benefits, of which she has only received one week of pay, and the loss of income left her struggling to afford the $50 co-pay for her insulin under her Medicaid coverage. Though her restaurant reopened, she is still waiting to be called back into work when customer demand recovers.
“I will go sick because my daughter needs something that I have to get,” said Castano, who has relied on financial support from friends and family while living in a motel. “I don’t know how much longer I can keep paying for my insulin and not being able to get the food and diapers that my daughter needs because I will die without it.”
The Fontainebleau hotel in Miami Beach, Florida, is suing the Unite Here union, seeking to stop making healthcare payments for more than 1,000 workers under the current union contract.
A housekeeper for 10 years at the hotel, Cristina Aguirre-Sevillano, cannot afford medicine prescribed to her, which costs nearly $400 out of pocket, after recently testing positive for Covid-19.
“I haven’t been able to get the medicine my doctor recommended me to take,” said Aguirre-Sevillano. “My daughter is also under my health insurance plan, so she lost her health insurance. I don’t have health insurance, I can’t afford medicine and I can’t pay my rent either because I only received one payment of $275 from unemployment since being furloughed in March.”
Initially furloughed in March, Aguirre-Sevillano was called back to work in June but has worked only five days. She is one of several workers in Florida who have not received their full unemployment benefits yet, and she continues to experience problems with the state system.
Wendi Walsh, the Unite Here Local 355 secretary-treasurer, said union contract language stipulates hotels must continue healthcare coverage for employees until they have not worked the required number of hours for two consecutive quarters. She said: “Every other hotel we represent has that same contract language and they are abiding by it because they are legally required to do so and amidst a pandemic it’s the moral thing to do, but the Fontainebleau has taken a different path, going so far as to file a lawsuit to avoid taking care of their employees during a deadly outbreak of a virus.”
According to Walsh, the hotel also proposed implementing wage cuts of between 10% and 20% for workers in the bargaining unit. “The union is rejecting that proposal and would oppose the company unilaterally implementing those wage cuts,” added Walsh.
Monalisa Rodriguez, a server and hostess at Terranea Resort outside Los Angeles, for seven years, was terminated in May after initially being furloughed.
“It was devastating. At the same time they fired us, they took away our health benefits,” said Rodriguez, who was hoping to eventually retire from the resort. She relies solely on her income to provide for two children and take care of her mother. “It’s been extremely hard. I’ve struggled a lot trying to figure out how to provide for my family, relying on food banks and the Salvation Army to make ends meet.”
A spokesperson for Terranea Resort said in an email that 550 out of 1,100 employees were laid off in May 2020 for the resort’s survival. “We will continue to bring back all employees according to our seniority policy and will rehire laid-off employees should we have the opportunity to do so.”
Mozes Bautista, who has worked at Hilton Embassy Suites in Phoenix, Arizona, for five years, recently returned to work after being terminated, but he has to wait until September 2020 for his health insurance to restart with the company.
“They said they would give back the paid time off but only gave back some of it. Because they fired us, we’re reclassified as new hires so we don’t have health insurance until September,” said Batista. “They’re no longer matching our 401(k) either.”
Gate Gourmet, an airliner catering contractor, was one of several airline companies to receive federal bailout funds to prevent layoffs, but it terminated workers anyway. Over $170m is allocated from the Cares Act to Gate Gourmet for payroll protection. According to Unite Here, Gate Gourmet had about 8,000 employees before the pandemic, with only 1,100 currently working and plans to bring back just 1,600 additional workers on 1 September.
Lamar Banks worked as a customer service assistant for nearly six years at Gate Gourmet in Chicago before he was laid off in May 2020, just weeks after he had a child and had to use all his paid time off to quarantine after a supervisor tested positive for coronavirus.
“I got a letter in the mail shortly after saying it was going to be a permanent layoff,” said Banks. “They stopped health insurance.” Banks said Cobra, which allows Americans to continue benefits they once received from a job, costs $500 a month, and she had not received unemployment yet. “I don’t know what I’m going to do or what that means. I was thinking when things got better, I’d be able to go back to work.”
Gate Gourmet would not clarify its current employment numbers. “We are committed to complying with all our obligations, including covid safety measures, seriously and will use all Cares Act funds exclusively for the continuation of payment of employee wages, salaries and benefits,” said a spokesperson. “We continue to be a proud employer to thousands of workers in the United States and are ready to serve our customers as they begin to resume operations.”
The Fontainebleau Hotel and HMS Host did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Speaking to the Miami Herald, Silvia Pereda, Fontainebleau vice-president of human resources, said the hotel was “focused on recovering its financial stability so that it can return as many of its laid-off, former employees as possible to employment, which will, critically, result in them receiving a paycheck and benefits once again”.
The union’s demands for payment of benefits for laid-off workers was making this harder, Pereda said.
Gig workers for Shipt stage a walk-out in protest of opaque pay structure
The Target-owned company rolled out a new algorithmic pay structure that workers say is intentionally obscure
NICOLE KARLIS - salon
JULY 16, 2020 2:45AM (UTC)
On Wednesday, a group of workers for Shipt, a grocery and retail delivery app service owned by Target, staged a walk-out in response to a new algorithmic pay model that went into effect in 12 U.S. cities. As with many platform economy jobs, Shipt relies on an army of on-demand contractors with their own vehicles and smartphone; known as "shoppers" in company parlance, these workers are given shopping orders through the app, then walk through stores picking up goods and then driving them to customers.
Yet Shipt shoppers boycotting the app tell Salon that the new pay structure is no longer transparent, and that it seems designed to cut their pay. Such opaque pay schemes are a common feature of tech platforms that rely on gig labor, as being obscure about the precise pay amount makes it harder for workers to assess if getting involved is a bad deal. Medium.com, a blogging and writing platform that pays writers who post their work, has a similarly arcane pay structure.
Shipt workers also are asking customers to boycott the app and show support, if they can.
"As a result of moving into this new pay scale our worst fears are being realized," Willy Solis, a 41-year-old shopper based in Dallas, Texas, told Salon. "The pay structure on the previous pay scale was very transparent."
Shipt is planning on eventually rolling out this pay structure to all of its cities over time. Indeed, unlike its competitor, Instacart, which has transitioned to a similar pay scale that evoked a similar response, Shipt shoppers originally were on a commission-based pay scale. Shoppers received a 7.5 percent commission on all orders plus $5; a percentage based on sales, plus dollar amount.
Shipt claims the new algorithm is better for shoppers, and that it aims to compensate them for their effort.
Molly Snyder, Shipt's Chief Communications Officer told Salon the API used "understands traffic patterns, time of day, construction" and "the complexity of the order." Indeed, these metrics in the past have been criticized by other companies that rely on gig workers, like Uber and Instacart.
"The goal in rolling out this evolved pay model is to ensure that they're being compensated fairly for the effort, the tremendous effort that they put into shopping on behalf of shift," Snyder told Salon.
But the workers who boycotted the app on July 15 didn't agree. Solis said the company sent out a visual graphic explaining that they're going to use "variables" to decide how to compensate shoppers. However, shoppers experienced glitches with the new algorithm, in addition to between 30 percent to 75 percent pay cuts on some orders.
"There's no way for them to control or to be able to use a variable to know how many people are in the store, how much shop time it's going to take us," Solis said. "The shop time that they have calculated is always wrong."
Solis said that this morning he heard from a shopper that the estimated shop time was an hour and ten minutes for a very quick shop, emphasizing that the miscalculations can go either way. Solis said shoppers have been expressing their concern about the new pay structure since February. Wednesday's action is the third workers have taken action against the company. Solis said shoppers have been sending emails, making phone calls, and in some cities have even had in-person meetings with Shipt representatives to voice their concerns.
Joshua B., a 34 year-old in Scottsdale, Arizona, participated in the walk-out even though Scottsdale isn't one of the affected markets —yet.
"it's important to stand with t he other shoppers whose pay is getting cut, and I know for all of us who are still on v1 [pay version 1] it's only a matter of time before we get our pay cut out from underneath us," Joshua, who asked to keep his last name anonymous for fear of retaliation, told Salon.
Snyder told Salon that based on the earlier roll-out of the pay structure a "vast majority" of shoppers' pay went up.
"Pay actually either stayed the same or in some cases went up a little bit, and in some cases they did go down but the vast majority was the same or up," Snyder said. "It is easy to look at one order where your pay went up dramatically or one word went down, that is really not kind of the way we would encourage people to think about it, this is an overall view of how people are paid."
As reported by Gizmodo in February, Shipt shoppers in small metro areas like Kalamazoo, Michigan, where the new pay model was being tested, had a different experience with the algorithmic-based pay model. Shipt shoppers said they experienced in some cases pay cuts up to 50 percent, which churned out less than respectable wages. Gizmodo reported that Shipt shoppers attributed the corporatized change in culture to the departure of founder Bill Smith. Target bought the platform in late 2017 for $550 million.
Solis added that in the private Facebook group for Shipt shoppers, managed by Shipt, that the company has been censoring and deleting comments from workers "advocating for transparency" around the pay scale.
"There are terms of use, and if people violate those terms of use, we will either take down posts or we won't approve posting them," Snyder said.
In terms of how long the boycott will last, Solis said there's a "strong momentum" to keep it going, but that workers need to eat and will have to soon get back to work.
Yet Shipt shoppers boycotting the app tell Salon that the new pay structure is no longer transparent, and that it seems designed to cut their pay. Such opaque pay schemes are a common feature of tech platforms that rely on gig labor, as being obscure about the precise pay amount makes it harder for workers to assess if getting involved is a bad deal. Medium.com, a blogging and writing platform that pays writers who post their work, has a similarly arcane pay structure.
Shipt workers also are asking customers to boycott the app and show support, if they can.
"As a result of moving into this new pay scale our worst fears are being realized," Willy Solis, a 41-year-old shopper based in Dallas, Texas, told Salon. "The pay structure on the previous pay scale was very transparent."
Shipt is planning on eventually rolling out this pay structure to all of its cities over time. Indeed, unlike its competitor, Instacart, which has transitioned to a similar pay scale that evoked a similar response, Shipt shoppers originally were on a commission-based pay scale. Shoppers received a 7.5 percent commission on all orders plus $5; a percentage based on sales, plus dollar amount.
Shipt claims the new algorithm is better for shoppers, and that it aims to compensate them for their effort.
Molly Snyder, Shipt's Chief Communications Officer told Salon the API used "understands traffic patterns, time of day, construction" and "the complexity of the order." Indeed, these metrics in the past have been criticized by other companies that rely on gig workers, like Uber and Instacart.
"The goal in rolling out this evolved pay model is to ensure that they're being compensated fairly for the effort, the tremendous effort that they put into shopping on behalf of shift," Snyder told Salon.
But the workers who boycotted the app on July 15 didn't agree. Solis said the company sent out a visual graphic explaining that they're going to use "variables" to decide how to compensate shoppers. However, shoppers experienced glitches with the new algorithm, in addition to between 30 percent to 75 percent pay cuts on some orders.
"There's no way for them to control or to be able to use a variable to know how many people are in the store, how much shop time it's going to take us," Solis said. "The shop time that they have calculated is always wrong."
Solis said that this morning he heard from a shopper that the estimated shop time was an hour and ten minutes for a very quick shop, emphasizing that the miscalculations can go either way. Solis said shoppers have been expressing their concern about the new pay structure since February. Wednesday's action is the third workers have taken action against the company. Solis said shoppers have been sending emails, making phone calls, and in some cities have even had in-person meetings with Shipt representatives to voice their concerns.
Joshua B., a 34 year-old in Scottsdale, Arizona, participated in the walk-out even though Scottsdale isn't one of the affected markets —yet.
"it's important to stand with t he other shoppers whose pay is getting cut, and I know for all of us who are still on v1 [pay version 1] it's only a matter of time before we get our pay cut out from underneath us," Joshua, who asked to keep his last name anonymous for fear of retaliation, told Salon.
Snyder told Salon that based on the earlier roll-out of the pay structure a "vast majority" of shoppers' pay went up.
"Pay actually either stayed the same or in some cases went up a little bit, and in some cases they did go down but the vast majority was the same or up," Snyder said. "It is easy to look at one order where your pay went up dramatically or one word went down, that is really not kind of the way we would encourage people to think about it, this is an overall view of how people are paid."
As reported by Gizmodo in February, Shipt shoppers in small metro areas like Kalamazoo, Michigan, where the new pay model was being tested, had a different experience with the algorithmic-based pay model. Shipt shoppers said they experienced in some cases pay cuts up to 50 percent, which churned out less than respectable wages. Gizmodo reported that Shipt shoppers attributed the corporatized change in culture to the departure of founder Bill Smith. Target bought the platform in late 2017 for $550 million.
Solis added that in the private Facebook group for Shipt shoppers, managed by Shipt, that the company has been censoring and deleting comments from workers "advocating for transparency" around the pay scale.
"There are terms of use, and if people violate those terms of use, we will either take down posts or we won't approve posting them," Snyder said.
In terms of how long the boycott will last, Solis said there's a "strong momentum" to keep it going, but that workers need to eat and will have to soon get back to work.
op - ed: Minor League Teams Could Be Latest Casualties of COVID’s Disaster Capitalism
BY Bill Fletcher Jr. & Garrett Broshuis, Truthout
PUBLISHED July 5, 2020
No Minor League season. Teams releasing players. Some team owners continue to pay Minor League players, while others convey “tough luck” sentiments and cut the players off. More than 40 Minor League teams to be eliminated; untold damage for local economies as a result. This is our new reality in the age of COVID-19.
Take, for instance, the Clinton LumberKings, a Minor League baseball team in Clinton, Iowa. Minor League baseball has been played in this town since 1937. With its working-class roots, Clinton’s Minor League team has become part of the town’s identity, providing affordable entertainment and a glimpse at stars before they become stars. After all, it is hundreds of miles from the nearest Major League Baseball (MLB) team. And it has also employed scores of workers for almost 100 years, from front office personnel to concession workers to ushers.
Now Clinton’s team, along with 41 others, are on a list of teams to be eliminated, and Minor League Baseball may never be played there again.
All of this happening in the context of the COVID-19/economic crises, with the future of the Minor Leagues — indeed, the future of baseball — up in the air.
There are three points to make here. First, just as with others in big business, Major League Baseball owners are taking advantage of this situation in order to bring about changes that they knew would have been met with steep resistance under other circumstances. Author Naomi Klein speaks of “disaster capitalism,” in which those of wealth and avarice take advantage of disasters in order to advance their agendas and/or make changes that would have been difficult to have made otherwise. We saw this in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria. In today’s context, what is happening to Minor Leaguers and the MLB as a whole is representative of a design that the MLB owners had in place. Months prior to COVID-19, MLB owners were seriously discussing cutting the number of teams and cutting the number of draft rounds. There were mobilizations taking place against them, bad press for the owners, and then the plague hit.
The changes underway may result in Minor League jobs never returning. We may be looking at a dramatic and pro-corporate restructuring of baseball as an industry after both the pandemic and economic crises end, unless there is a loud and organized public response. This is just as true for workers outside of baseball — be they journalists, retail workers, meatpackers or public sector workers — as for those in baseball, including (but not limited to) the players.
Second, baseball may be a game, but what is unfolding for the Minor Leaguers is far from a game or a joke. The lives and careers of thousands of players and other workers in the industry are unraveling as the uncertainty of their situations grow in intensity. The pay for the highest-level Minor Leaguers — those at the Triple-A level, one step from the Major Leagues — was already outrageously low at $12,000 a year. The MLB requires them to conduct much work with no compensation (such as during spring training), purchase their own equipment, gain pitiful amounts of per diem while on the road, and share uncomfortably close quarters with other players due to a lack of resources to live on their own.
Third, this dismal situation mirrors that faced by millions of workers across the U.S. who have lost their jobs or, in other cases, been compelled to work under unhealthy conditions in the midst of this pandemic. Not only are we forced to protect ourselves through social distancing, but families are forced to give up work, in many cases, in order to take care of their children. Already stretched budgets — due to the polarization of wealth we have been seeing grow in this country over the last 40 years — have reached the snapping point. Minor Leaguers are not cresting this situation but are being swamped by this catastrophe.
Major League players are also facing a pounding by the MLB owners but, at least in their case, the Major Leaguers have the protection of a union, the Major League Baseball Players Association. In the case of the Minor Leagues, there is nothing, and the owners know that they can roll over the players and the communities where these Minor League teams are located with little risk unless something is done right now. That means organization and it means building coalitions. A step in that direction has been our founding of a new nonprofit, Advocates for Minor Leaguers which, while not a labor union, seeks to provide a voice for Minor Leaguers and to work to better their working conditions. This struggle is not about enriching Minor League players. It is about displaying the same concern that we have for all workers who are losing their jobs, their homes and their futures.
Now is the time for action, not pity.
Take, for instance, the Clinton LumberKings, a Minor League baseball team in Clinton, Iowa. Minor League baseball has been played in this town since 1937. With its working-class roots, Clinton’s Minor League team has become part of the town’s identity, providing affordable entertainment and a glimpse at stars before they become stars. After all, it is hundreds of miles from the nearest Major League Baseball (MLB) team. And it has also employed scores of workers for almost 100 years, from front office personnel to concession workers to ushers.
Now Clinton’s team, along with 41 others, are on a list of teams to be eliminated, and Minor League Baseball may never be played there again.
All of this happening in the context of the COVID-19/economic crises, with the future of the Minor Leagues — indeed, the future of baseball — up in the air.
There are three points to make here. First, just as with others in big business, Major League Baseball owners are taking advantage of this situation in order to bring about changes that they knew would have been met with steep resistance under other circumstances. Author Naomi Klein speaks of “disaster capitalism,” in which those of wealth and avarice take advantage of disasters in order to advance their agendas and/or make changes that would have been difficult to have made otherwise. We saw this in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria. In today’s context, what is happening to Minor Leaguers and the MLB as a whole is representative of a design that the MLB owners had in place. Months prior to COVID-19, MLB owners were seriously discussing cutting the number of teams and cutting the number of draft rounds. There were mobilizations taking place against them, bad press for the owners, and then the plague hit.
The changes underway may result in Minor League jobs never returning. We may be looking at a dramatic and pro-corporate restructuring of baseball as an industry after both the pandemic and economic crises end, unless there is a loud and organized public response. This is just as true for workers outside of baseball — be they journalists, retail workers, meatpackers or public sector workers — as for those in baseball, including (but not limited to) the players.
Second, baseball may be a game, but what is unfolding for the Minor Leaguers is far from a game or a joke. The lives and careers of thousands of players and other workers in the industry are unraveling as the uncertainty of their situations grow in intensity. The pay for the highest-level Minor Leaguers — those at the Triple-A level, one step from the Major Leagues — was already outrageously low at $12,000 a year. The MLB requires them to conduct much work with no compensation (such as during spring training), purchase their own equipment, gain pitiful amounts of per diem while on the road, and share uncomfortably close quarters with other players due to a lack of resources to live on their own.
Third, this dismal situation mirrors that faced by millions of workers across the U.S. who have lost their jobs or, in other cases, been compelled to work under unhealthy conditions in the midst of this pandemic. Not only are we forced to protect ourselves through social distancing, but families are forced to give up work, in many cases, in order to take care of their children. Already stretched budgets — due to the polarization of wealth we have been seeing grow in this country over the last 40 years — have reached the snapping point. Minor Leaguers are not cresting this situation but are being swamped by this catastrophe.
Major League players are also facing a pounding by the MLB owners but, at least in their case, the Major Leaguers have the protection of a union, the Major League Baseball Players Association. In the case of the Minor Leagues, there is nothing, and the owners know that they can roll over the players and the communities where these Minor League teams are located with little risk unless something is done right now. That means organization and it means building coalitions. A step in that direction has been our founding of a new nonprofit, Advocates for Minor Leaguers which, while not a labor union, seeks to provide a voice for Minor Leaguers and to work to better their working conditions. This struggle is not about enriching Minor League players. It is about displaying the same concern that we have for all workers who are losing their jobs, their homes and their futures.
Now is the time for action, not pity.
A bathroom-break bill? California looks to make sure warehouse workers can take a break
Cyrus Farivar - nbc news
7/2/2020
OAKLAND, Calif. — A California bill aims to change working conditions for warehouse workers who have come under increased productivity pressure from major retailers that track their every move.
The bill, AB-3056, aims to ensure that workers are not penalized for time spent on personal hygiene, such as hand washing or using the restroom. Many workers say automated monitoring systems warn management if they spend too much time "off task."
The bill would apply to warehouse workers for Amazon, Walmart, Target and other large retailers across California, which has the most warehouses of any state, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Last month, the measure passed the state Assembly, largely along party lines, with Democrats voting in favor.
The bill would also ensure that warehouse workers are paid overtime if they are compelled to work beyond their prescribed work "quota" in a given day.
The rise of e-commerce has led Amazon, Walmart, Target and other retailers to ramp up the use of massive warehouses, where workers are expected to work quickly to fulfill online orders. Workers often have strict productivity quotas, which can mean they sometimes avoid taking restroom breaks to avoid potential retribution.
Some Amazon employees have said that at certain warehouses, the restrooms are so far from their primary workstations that they simply do not use the restrooms lest they risk being marked as "off task." In late April, hundreds of workers even organized a "sickout" protest across several cities nationwide.
"Automated systems generate warnings when too many time off tasks occur in a worker's shift, and accumulated warnings can result in workers being fired without a human manager even being involved," the bill's author, Assembly member Lorena Gonzalez, wrote in a news release May 20.
Amazon spokeswoman Brittany Parmley declined to respond to most queries, including questions about how many fulfillment centers are in California and how many people work at them.
Parmley wrote in an email that employees are required to take meals and rest breaks. "They are NEVER restricted from using the restroom or washing hands, and may speak to HR or a manager at any time without penalty," she wrote. "Restrooms are on every floor of a [fulfillment center] and are a short walk away from each workstation."
Walmart and Target did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Labor law observers and advocates say that if the bill passes the state Senate and is signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom, California would likely be the first state to pass this type of labor protections for warehouse workers.
Gonzalez, who was the architect of a separate state law that pushes Uber and Lyft to classify their drivers as employees, said in a recent phone interview that COVID-19 has aggravated problems that she said are inherent to this type of blue-collar work.
"The speed at which they are required to do their work makes it nearly impossible for workers to be able to do the human functions," she said. "It's more important than ever that workers can wash their hands."
Parmley said Amazon does not have an official position on the bill. In a June 11 letter to Assembly members, the California Chamber of Commerce, of which Amazon is a member, said it opposed the bill, as it would increase "costs and burden on employers," adding that the measure was "simply not realistic or feasible, and would harm the very workers it purports to protect."
Outside labor experts have said pushing workers to perform more work in a given time means many of those workers are being squeezed like never before.
"Increasing quotas is how you make labor cheaper," said Shelly Steward, associate director for research at the Aspen Institute's Future of Work Initiative. "This legislation speaks to that and puts a limit to that that is tied to wages, and it's the first legislation I've seen that speaks to the pace of work. It's sad that we're at a point that we need a law to protect workers' right to go to the restroom, but that's where we are."
The bill, AB-3056, aims to ensure that workers are not penalized for time spent on personal hygiene, such as hand washing or using the restroom. Many workers say automated monitoring systems warn management if they spend too much time "off task."
The bill would apply to warehouse workers for Amazon, Walmart, Target and other large retailers across California, which has the most warehouses of any state, according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Last month, the measure passed the state Assembly, largely along party lines, with Democrats voting in favor.
The bill would also ensure that warehouse workers are paid overtime if they are compelled to work beyond their prescribed work "quota" in a given day.
The rise of e-commerce has led Amazon, Walmart, Target and other retailers to ramp up the use of massive warehouses, where workers are expected to work quickly to fulfill online orders. Workers often have strict productivity quotas, which can mean they sometimes avoid taking restroom breaks to avoid potential retribution.
Some Amazon employees have said that at certain warehouses, the restrooms are so far from their primary workstations that they simply do not use the restrooms lest they risk being marked as "off task." In late April, hundreds of workers even organized a "sickout" protest across several cities nationwide.
"Automated systems generate warnings when too many time off tasks occur in a worker's shift, and accumulated warnings can result in workers being fired without a human manager even being involved," the bill's author, Assembly member Lorena Gonzalez, wrote in a news release May 20.
Amazon spokeswoman Brittany Parmley declined to respond to most queries, including questions about how many fulfillment centers are in California and how many people work at them.
Parmley wrote in an email that employees are required to take meals and rest breaks. "They are NEVER restricted from using the restroom or washing hands, and may speak to HR or a manager at any time without penalty," she wrote. "Restrooms are on every floor of a [fulfillment center] and are a short walk away from each workstation."
Walmart and Target did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Labor law observers and advocates say that if the bill passes the state Senate and is signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom, California would likely be the first state to pass this type of labor protections for warehouse workers.
Gonzalez, who was the architect of a separate state law that pushes Uber and Lyft to classify their drivers as employees, said in a recent phone interview that COVID-19 has aggravated problems that she said are inherent to this type of blue-collar work.
"The speed at which they are required to do their work makes it nearly impossible for workers to be able to do the human functions," she said. "It's more important than ever that workers can wash their hands."
Parmley said Amazon does not have an official position on the bill. In a June 11 letter to Assembly members, the California Chamber of Commerce, of which Amazon is a member, said it opposed the bill, as it would increase "costs and burden on employers," adding that the measure was "simply not realistic or feasible, and would harm the very workers it purports to protect."
Outside labor experts have said pushing workers to perform more work in a given time means many of those workers are being squeezed like never before.
"Increasing quotas is how you make labor cheaper," said Shelly Steward, associate director for research at the Aspen Institute's Future of Work Initiative. "This legislation speaks to that and puts a limit to that that is tied to wages, and it's the first legislation I've seen that speaks to the pace of work. It's sad that we're at a point that we need a law to protect workers' right to go to the restroom, but that's where we are."
Uber Drivers Protest Outside CEO’s Home to Demand Labor Protections
BY Nicole Karlis, Salon - TRUTHOUT
PUBLISHED June 25, 2020
Protesters stage a demonstration in front of the home of Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi on June 24, 2020, in San Francisco, California.
On Wednesday morning, a caravan of around 50 Uber and Lyft drivers cruised down a quiet street in San Francisco’s ritzy Pacific Heights’ neighborhood and parked in front of Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi’s home. One white van with a “Black Lives Matter” sign draped over the roof blasted Dolly Parton’s working-class anthem “9 to 5” from their speaker system. A woman who joined the protest on foot held a sign declaiming how Uber owes her $90,000 in back wages. Two protesters held a banner reading “a thief lives here.”
But for the hour-and-a-half that drivers spoke, chanted and honked, the “thief” in question was nowhere to be found. “We want Dara,” one protester shouted, in front of his four-story home.
Drivers filled the void of Khosrowshahi’s absence with speeches that boiled down to one core message: the exploitation of app-based drivers has gone too far. The protest, organized by Gig Workers Rising and We Drive Progress, arrives at a moment in which the pandemic, Uber’s disinformation campaign in response to Assembly Bill 5, and racial and economic inequalities have pushed drivers to a tipping point. While the drivers wanted to get Khosrowshahi’s direct attention, they did have a list of specific demands, including the provision of personal protective equipment (PPE) for drivers.
Alan Franklin, who has driven for Uber and Lyft for the last three years, told Salon he joined the protest in part to bring credibility to the work drivers do. The boss, Franklin explained, “seems to maybe have forgotten that we are his bread and butter.”
“We were promised things to protect us and our passengers, known as PPE, such as hand sanitizer, possible screens to set that six-foot distance, and none of those things were ever given to us,” Franklin said, adding that as business declined, driver safety seemed to get left behind. “Our safety became, not second place, not third place, but just dead last.”
As shelter-in-place started to ripple across the country, Uber closed its Greenlight Hubs, facilities where drivers can go to get in-person help. Their closure left many in the dark when they faced bureaucratic or financial hurdles as a member of Uber’s contract workforce.
Uber claims to have distributed PPE as of mid-May to at least 450,000 drivers, but many of the drivers at Wednesday’s protest said they had seen no evidence of that. Salon contacted Uber for a comment, but didn’t receive a response regarding PPE. Amid the pandemic, there have been a few reports of drivers dying of COVID-19. Assembly Bill 5, which goes into effect this year, is supposed to turn Uber’s driver-contractors into workers and provide them with better benefits. Yet currently, Uber’s drivers aren’t paid sick days nor given health insurance coverage.
“We were promised PPE and that PPE was never delivered,” Franklin said.
Cherri Murphy, social justice minister in the East Bay and leader at Gig Workers Rising, who has been driving for Lyft for three years, said she joined the protest in solidarity with Uber drivers to demand that Uber drops a ballot measure that would exempt app-based drivers from California’s Assembly Bill 5 (AB 5). While AB 5 mandates Uber and Lyft to make drivers W-2 employees, both companies have instead manipulated the job criteria of their drivers to strengthen the argument that they’re independent contractors instead.
Uber and Lyft are at the helm of an astroturf coalition called Protect App-Based Drivers & Services, along with DoorDash, Postmates and Instacart. They have collectively spent a reported $110 million on the initiative to avoid having to convert their workers to employees and thus pay them standard benefits.
Murphy told Salon that before the pandemic, driving for Lyft was already like “rubbing two pennies together, trying to make ends meet.”
“The pandemic really exposed a lot of systemic issues, particularly [with] Black Lives Matter,” Murphy said, adding that Uber and Lyft’s hollow solidarity statements do not match their actions. “If you believe that Black lives matter, then drop the ballot measure and do what you’re supposed to do.”
The setting of the protest made the lifestyle difference between drives and CEO quite stark.
Khosrowshahi’s purported $16.5 million home sits in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in one of the wealthiest cities of America; the workers out front were demanding the most basic workplace rights and protections. Of course, this was strategic.
“We’re out here in front of this $16.5 million house, while they’re living comfortably and we’re out here fighting [to] secure our bills and have a place to live,” Murphy explained to Salon.
Hector Castellanos, a Bay Area driver for Lyft and Uber and leader with We Drive Progress, told Salon drivers are horrified that Uber has spent millions on the ballot initiative when they could have spent it on PPE, unemployment, or other benefits for employees. As Salon has previously reported, many Uber and Lyft drivers haven’t received unemployment benefits for obscure reasons — either the state’s fault, or Uber and Lyft’s fault, depending on one’s interpretation as to whether they’re employees or independent contractors. For Castellanos, the current crisis is reminiscent of a personal crisis he experienced a few years ago.
“A few years ago, I have shoulder surgery and I have eight months without working, and I didn’t receive anything from this company,” Castellanos told Salon. “My daughter was in school and she had to drop out of school to help me with the house payments and everything.”
Drivers weren’t the only attendees. San Francisco Supervisor Gordon Mar showed support on behalf of the city’s board of supervisors.
“It’s more important than ever for these corporations to do the right thing, and more importantly to follow the law and properly classify their workers, but unfortunately they’re doing the opposite, they’re doubling down on their illegal business practice,” Mar told Salon.
Legislative solidarity emerged from outside of the protest. Around the same time the protesters disbanded, news broke that California is seeking to force Uber and Lyft to reclassify their drivers.
Drivers who spoke with Salon said they will keep fighting until November.
As the planned protest drew to a close, drivers wrote their grievances on paper and taped it to Khosrowshahi’s gate. A banner that read, “Drop the ballot measure” blocked the driveway. Another, smaller sign read: “Dara, today we come with cars, tomorrow we come with pitchforks.”
But for the hour-and-a-half that drivers spoke, chanted and honked, the “thief” in question was nowhere to be found. “We want Dara,” one protester shouted, in front of his four-story home.
Drivers filled the void of Khosrowshahi’s absence with speeches that boiled down to one core message: the exploitation of app-based drivers has gone too far. The protest, organized by Gig Workers Rising and We Drive Progress, arrives at a moment in which the pandemic, Uber’s disinformation campaign in response to Assembly Bill 5, and racial and economic inequalities have pushed drivers to a tipping point. While the drivers wanted to get Khosrowshahi’s direct attention, they did have a list of specific demands, including the provision of personal protective equipment (PPE) for drivers.
Alan Franklin, who has driven for Uber and Lyft for the last three years, told Salon he joined the protest in part to bring credibility to the work drivers do. The boss, Franklin explained, “seems to maybe have forgotten that we are his bread and butter.”
“We were promised things to protect us and our passengers, known as PPE, such as hand sanitizer, possible screens to set that six-foot distance, and none of those things were ever given to us,” Franklin said, adding that as business declined, driver safety seemed to get left behind. “Our safety became, not second place, not third place, but just dead last.”
As shelter-in-place started to ripple across the country, Uber closed its Greenlight Hubs, facilities where drivers can go to get in-person help. Their closure left many in the dark when they faced bureaucratic or financial hurdles as a member of Uber’s contract workforce.
Uber claims to have distributed PPE as of mid-May to at least 450,000 drivers, but many of the drivers at Wednesday’s protest said they had seen no evidence of that. Salon contacted Uber for a comment, but didn’t receive a response regarding PPE. Amid the pandemic, there have been a few reports of drivers dying of COVID-19. Assembly Bill 5, which goes into effect this year, is supposed to turn Uber’s driver-contractors into workers and provide them with better benefits. Yet currently, Uber’s drivers aren’t paid sick days nor given health insurance coverage.
“We were promised PPE and that PPE was never delivered,” Franklin said.
Cherri Murphy, social justice minister in the East Bay and leader at Gig Workers Rising, who has been driving for Lyft for three years, said she joined the protest in solidarity with Uber drivers to demand that Uber drops a ballot measure that would exempt app-based drivers from California’s Assembly Bill 5 (AB 5). While AB 5 mandates Uber and Lyft to make drivers W-2 employees, both companies have instead manipulated the job criteria of their drivers to strengthen the argument that they’re independent contractors instead.
Uber and Lyft are at the helm of an astroturf coalition called Protect App-Based Drivers & Services, along with DoorDash, Postmates and Instacart. They have collectively spent a reported $110 million on the initiative to avoid having to convert their workers to employees and thus pay them standard benefits.
Murphy told Salon that before the pandemic, driving for Lyft was already like “rubbing two pennies together, trying to make ends meet.”
“The pandemic really exposed a lot of systemic issues, particularly [with] Black Lives Matter,” Murphy said, adding that Uber and Lyft’s hollow solidarity statements do not match their actions. “If you believe that Black lives matter, then drop the ballot measure and do what you’re supposed to do.”
The setting of the protest made the lifestyle difference between drives and CEO quite stark.
Khosrowshahi’s purported $16.5 million home sits in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in one of the wealthiest cities of America; the workers out front were demanding the most basic workplace rights and protections. Of course, this was strategic.
“We’re out here in front of this $16.5 million house, while they’re living comfortably and we’re out here fighting [to] secure our bills and have a place to live,” Murphy explained to Salon.
Hector Castellanos, a Bay Area driver for Lyft and Uber and leader with We Drive Progress, told Salon drivers are horrified that Uber has spent millions on the ballot initiative when they could have spent it on PPE, unemployment, or other benefits for employees. As Salon has previously reported, many Uber and Lyft drivers haven’t received unemployment benefits for obscure reasons — either the state’s fault, or Uber and Lyft’s fault, depending on one’s interpretation as to whether they’re employees or independent contractors. For Castellanos, the current crisis is reminiscent of a personal crisis he experienced a few years ago.
“A few years ago, I have shoulder surgery and I have eight months without working, and I didn’t receive anything from this company,” Castellanos told Salon. “My daughter was in school and she had to drop out of school to help me with the house payments and everything.”
Drivers weren’t the only attendees. San Francisco Supervisor Gordon Mar showed support on behalf of the city’s board of supervisors.
“It’s more important than ever for these corporations to do the right thing, and more importantly to follow the law and properly classify their workers, but unfortunately they’re doing the opposite, they’re doubling down on their illegal business practice,” Mar told Salon.
Legislative solidarity emerged from outside of the protest. Around the same time the protesters disbanded, news broke that California is seeking to force Uber and Lyft to reclassify their drivers.
Drivers who spoke with Salon said they will keep fighting until November.
As the planned protest drew to a close, drivers wrote their grievances on paper and taped it to Khosrowshahi’s gate. A banner that read, “Drop the ballot measure” blocked the driveway. Another, smaller sign read: “Dara, today we come with cars, tomorrow we come with pitchforks.”
Just can't do right for workers!!!
Production workers strike against major Navy shipbuilder
By DAVID SHARP - ap
6/22/2020
BATH, Maine (AP) — More than 4,000 workers went on strike against one of the Navy’s largest shipbuilders Monday after rejecting a three-year contract. It was the first strike by production workers at Bath Iron Works in 20 years.
Pickets formed at midnight when the old contract expired in a dispute that focused on subcontracting, work rules and seniority over wages and benefits.
Bath Iron Works already had fallen six months behind on ship construction, partly due to the coronavirus pandemic, and the strike threatened to further delay production of destroyers for the U.S. Navy, the company said.
The three-year contract proposal would have given production workers a 3% raise each year. But the shipbuilders’ union objected to more than a dozen changes that it considered to be concessions — including hiring subcontractors.
Machinists Union Local S6, which represents 4,300 workers, voted 87% in favor of a strike. The tally was announced on Sunday.
“This should send a crystal clear message to BIW management: Respect your workers, go back to the bargaining table and negotiate a fair contract,” Maine AFL-CIO President Cynthia Phinney said in a statement.
Frustration had been building among workers since the last contract in which the Machinists union accepted concessions that were deemed necessary to win a U.S. Coast Guard contract — and save shipbuilding jobs.
Bath Iron Works lost that contract to another shipyard in 2016. It also lost a competition for Navy frigates in late April.
Shipbuilders contend the problems have been caused by mismanagement. The company contends the shipyard must be more efficient and get back on schedule to successfully compete for work.
Competition is becoming fierce. Bath Iron Works, a subsidiary of General Dynamics, competes against Mississippi’s Ingalls Shipbuilding for construction of technologically sophisticated destroyers. But smaller shipyards in Alabama and Wisconsin are also competing for work on smaller warships.
The issue at Bath Iron Works is how much the shipyard can absorb and remain competitive, said Loren Thompson, an analyst at the Lexington Institute.
“Management is afraid that they’re going to price themselves out of the market,” he said.
The shipyard on the Kennebec River is one of the Navy’s five largest shipbuilders and a major employer in Maine, with 6,800 workers.
Bath Iron Works contends changes in the contract are aimed at making more efficient use of workers and streamlining the hiring of subcontractors.
The shipyard hired 1,800 workers last year and expects to hire 1,000 workers this year, but subcontractors are still needed for the shipyard to get caught up on the construction schedule, company president Dirk Lesko has said.
The pandemic made existing tensions worse. The union called for a two-week closure of the shipyard, and lawmakers jumped into the fray, urging the shipyard to do more to protect workers.
The federal government classified the shipyard as essential and production, using stringent protocols for disinfecting and distancing, never ceased.
Three workers tested positive for the coronavirus but all of them have since returned to work, the shipyard said.
Pickets formed at midnight when the old contract expired in a dispute that focused on subcontracting, work rules and seniority over wages and benefits.
Bath Iron Works already had fallen six months behind on ship construction, partly due to the coronavirus pandemic, and the strike threatened to further delay production of destroyers for the U.S. Navy, the company said.
The three-year contract proposal would have given production workers a 3% raise each year. But the shipbuilders’ union objected to more than a dozen changes that it considered to be concessions — including hiring subcontractors.
Machinists Union Local S6, which represents 4,300 workers, voted 87% in favor of a strike. The tally was announced on Sunday.
“This should send a crystal clear message to BIW management: Respect your workers, go back to the bargaining table and negotiate a fair contract,” Maine AFL-CIO President Cynthia Phinney said in a statement.
Frustration had been building among workers since the last contract in which the Machinists union accepted concessions that were deemed necessary to win a U.S. Coast Guard contract — and save shipbuilding jobs.
Bath Iron Works lost that contract to another shipyard in 2016. It also lost a competition for Navy frigates in late April.
Shipbuilders contend the problems have been caused by mismanagement. The company contends the shipyard must be more efficient and get back on schedule to successfully compete for work.
Competition is becoming fierce. Bath Iron Works, a subsidiary of General Dynamics, competes against Mississippi’s Ingalls Shipbuilding for construction of technologically sophisticated destroyers. But smaller shipyards in Alabama and Wisconsin are also competing for work on smaller warships.
The issue at Bath Iron Works is how much the shipyard can absorb and remain competitive, said Loren Thompson, an analyst at the Lexington Institute.
“Management is afraid that they’re going to price themselves out of the market,” he said.
The shipyard on the Kennebec River is one of the Navy’s five largest shipbuilders and a major employer in Maine, with 6,800 workers.
Bath Iron Works contends changes in the contract are aimed at making more efficient use of workers and streamlining the hiring of subcontractors.
The shipyard hired 1,800 workers last year and expects to hire 1,000 workers this year, but subcontractors are still needed for the shipyard to get caught up on the construction schedule, company president Dirk Lesko has said.
The pandemic made existing tensions worse. The union called for a two-week closure of the shipyard, and lawmakers jumped into the fray, urging the shipyard to do more to protect workers.
The federal government classified the shipyard as essential and production, using stringent protocols for disinfecting and distancing, never ceased.
Three workers tested positive for the coronavirus but all of them have since returned to work, the shipyard said.
US unions
US employers step up anti-unionization efforts as pandemic spurs activism
The coronavirus crisis is making organization efforts difficult for unions and bosses seem keen to take advantage
Michael Sainato
the guardian
Thu 18 Jun 2020 07.36 EDT
During the coronavirus pandemic, employers have opposed unionization elections even as workers’ activism over safety protections, job security and wages has increased in the face of an economic shutdown and health fears.
But the pandemic has created difficult conditions for workers to organize elections in – something many employers appear to have taken advantage of, despite the wave of labor activism sweeping the US.
The number of resolved union election cases at the National Labor Relations Board dropped from 84 in March 2020 to 13 in April 2020 as the pandemic raged. Several of the delayed union elections then had petitions withdrawn or have yet to be scheduled. During the pandemic, union election petitions have declined significantly.
According to the NLRB, union representation case intake in April 2020 decreased by 67.6% compared with April 2019.
The NLRB initially froze all union elections, while permitting mail-in ballot elections if employers and workers agreed to proceed. The board lifted the freeze on 6 April, after 116 union elections were delayed, and several other groups of workers had petition hearings postponed.
For many workers, the need to have a union has never been greater.
Monica Luna, an associate at a T-Mobile retail store in Del Rio, Texas for nearly three years, filed for a union election with the NLRB in April 2020 in response to working conditions during the pandemic and the lack of job security as T-Mobile is shuttering stores around the US.
“A week and a half after, our district manager started making appearances and we started having union avoidance meetings,” said Luna.
Her retail store remained opened entirely throughout the pandemic, yet her pay of $13 an hour remained the same. “I think it’s funny [that] all of a sudden we’re trying to form a union, and the district manager showed up and stayed for the week, was buying us food, giving his opinion regarding the union, trying to give us facts, saying if we didn’t pay dues we could get fired.”
A T-Mobile spokesperson said in an email: “We as a company have the right to educate our employees about the facts around union representation so they can make informed decisions.”
The Communications Workers of America lost the election. Organizer Tim Dubnau put the defeat down to the anti-union meetings and frequent intervention from the district manager, while organizers were unable to meet with workers due to concerns of spreading the virus.
Activists and labor unions and several elected officials in Congress have been pushing for the NLRB to develop procedures to hold union elections electronically, citing employer opposition to mail-in ballot elections and the urgency of safety protections for workers who risk exposure to coronavirus.
As union elections resumed during the pandemic, several employers have continued to oppose unionization efforts through captive audience meetings and pushes to postpone or delay elections.
Mission hospital in Asheville, North Carolina, has been fighting with nurses working to join National Nurses United, with the hospital pushing for an in-person voting election and to expand the bargaining unit from 1,600 nurses to all nurses, nurse practitioners and nurse anesthetists in the county.
The hospital has also argued to postpone the election until after the pandemic, while hiring union avoidance consultants, the Crossroads Group, to hold anti-union meetings with workers and managers through the pandemic.
“We’re still waiting for the NLRB to announce who will be able to vote and when and how the vote will take place,” said Sarah Kuhl, a registered nurse at Mission Health’s oncology department.
Kuhl noted the hospital is still pushing for an in-person election vote, while anti-union meetings continue, and management distributes anti-union flyers. “Our cases of Covid-19 here in Asheville are increasing and staff members have been impacted, so an in-person vote would be irresponsible to patients and staff.”
A Mission hospital spokesperson told the Guardian: “We respect every colleague’s right to decide for themselves whether they desire union representation or not. However, we do not believe unions benefit our facilities, our colleagues, and most importantly our patients.”
Rose Turner, organizing director at UFCW local 1529, filed a petition for a union election in Byhalia, Mississippi, as soon as the board lifted the election freeze on 6 April to represent workers at Hearthside Food Solutions, the largest private bakery in the US which packages cereal for Kellogg’s.
Immediately following the petition filing, Hearthside hired a union avoidance firm to hold regular meetings with workers to deter them from voting for the union. The vote was scheduled to be held via mail-in ballot due to the pandemic, but Hearthside Food Solutions pushed to hold a manual election and the NLRB agreed.
The union won the election in a 62 to 47 vote.
“I’ve been with the union for over 30 years. That was the hardest election I ever experienced,” said Turner, citing the difficulty for the union to hold meetings and speak to workers ahead of the vote. “In the end, we prevailed.”
Epic Academy College Prep and Hearthside Food Solutions did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
But the pandemic has created difficult conditions for workers to organize elections in – something many employers appear to have taken advantage of, despite the wave of labor activism sweeping the US.
The number of resolved union election cases at the National Labor Relations Board dropped from 84 in March 2020 to 13 in April 2020 as the pandemic raged. Several of the delayed union elections then had petitions withdrawn or have yet to be scheduled. During the pandemic, union election petitions have declined significantly.
According to the NLRB, union representation case intake in April 2020 decreased by 67.6% compared with April 2019.
The NLRB initially froze all union elections, while permitting mail-in ballot elections if employers and workers agreed to proceed. The board lifted the freeze on 6 April, after 116 union elections were delayed, and several other groups of workers had petition hearings postponed.
For many workers, the need to have a union has never been greater.
Monica Luna, an associate at a T-Mobile retail store in Del Rio, Texas for nearly three years, filed for a union election with the NLRB in April 2020 in response to working conditions during the pandemic and the lack of job security as T-Mobile is shuttering stores around the US.
“A week and a half after, our district manager started making appearances and we started having union avoidance meetings,” said Luna.
Her retail store remained opened entirely throughout the pandemic, yet her pay of $13 an hour remained the same. “I think it’s funny [that] all of a sudden we’re trying to form a union, and the district manager showed up and stayed for the week, was buying us food, giving his opinion regarding the union, trying to give us facts, saying if we didn’t pay dues we could get fired.”
A T-Mobile spokesperson said in an email: “We as a company have the right to educate our employees about the facts around union representation so they can make informed decisions.”
The Communications Workers of America lost the election. Organizer Tim Dubnau put the defeat down to the anti-union meetings and frequent intervention from the district manager, while organizers were unable to meet with workers due to concerns of spreading the virus.
Activists and labor unions and several elected officials in Congress have been pushing for the NLRB to develop procedures to hold union elections electronically, citing employer opposition to mail-in ballot elections and the urgency of safety protections for workers who risk exposure to coronavirus.
As union elections resumed during the pandemic, several employers have continued to oppose unionization efforts through captive audience meetings and pushes to postpone or delay elections.
Mission hospital in Asheville, North Carolina, has been fighting with nurses working to join National Nurses United, with the hospital pushing for an in-person voting election and to expand the bargaining unit from 1,600 nurses to all nurses, nurse practitioners and nurse anesthetists in the county.
The hospital has also argued to postpone the election until after the pandemic, while hiring union avoidance consultants, the Crossroads Group, to hold anti-union meetings with workers and managers through the pandemic.
“We’re still waiting for the NLRB to announce who will be able to vote and when and how the vote will take place,” said Sarah Kuhl, a registered nurse at Mission Health’s oncology department.
Kuhl noted the hospital is still pushing for an in-person election vote, while anti-union meetings continue, and management distributes anti-union flyers. “Our cases of Covid-19 here in Asheville are increasing and staff members have been impacted, so an in-person vote would be irresponsible to patients and staff.”
A Mission hospital spokesperson told the Guardian: “We respect every colleague’s right to decide for themselves whether they desire union representation or not. However, we do not believe unions benefit our facilities, our colleagues, and most importantly our patients.”
Rose Turner, organizing director at UFCW local 1529, filed a petition for a union election in Byhalia, Mississippi, as soon as the board lifted the election freeze on 6 April to represent workers at Hearthside Food Solutions, the largest private bakery in the US which packages cereal for Kellogg’s.
Immediately following the petition filing, Hearthside hired a union avoidance firm to hold regular meetings with workers to deter them from voting for the union. The vote was scheduled to be held via mail-in ballot due to the pandemic, but Hearthside Food Solutions pushed to hold a manual election and the NLRB agreed.
The union won the election in a 62 to 47 vote.
“I’ve been with the union for over 30 years. That was the hardest election I ever experienced,” said Turner, citing the difficulty for the union to hold meetings and speak to workers ahead of the vote. “In the end, we prevailed.”
Epic Academy College Prep and Hearthside Food Solutions did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Strikes erupt as US essential workers demand protection amid pandemic
Michael Sainato
the guardian
Tue 19 May 2020 07.01 EDT
Working conditions, low pay and lack of safety protections have triggered protests across various industries
Wildcat strikes, walkouts and protests over working conditions have erupted across the US throughout the coronavirus pandemic as “essential” workers have demanded better pay and safer working conditions. Labor leaders are hoping the protests can lead to permanent change.
Norma Kennedy, an employee at an American Apparel clothing plant is one of those people. Kennedy along with dozens of other workers walked off her job in Selma, Alabama, on 23 April after two workers tested positive for coronavirus. The plant has remained open during the pandemic to manufacture face masks for a US army contract.
“We left for our own protection,” said Kennedy. “Beforehand, management said if someone tested positive they would shut down and have the plant cleaned. When workers tested positive, they didn’t want to shut it down. They’re not really concerned about the workers.”
Working conditions, low pay and lack of safety protections have triggered protests throughout the pandemic as workers across various industries, including food service, meat processing, retail, manufacturing, transportation and healthcare have come together to protest about issues, many of which were apparent before the coronavirus.
“There are no federal mandates or requirements to implement the social distancing guidance or anything else. It’s only guidance and employers can choose to implement them or not,” said Deborah Berkowitz, director of worker safety and health for the National Employment Law Project. “And that is why, in an unprecedented way, they are walking out to bring public attention to the fact that their companies are not protecting their safety and health.”
Roberto Echiveste, a truck driver in El Paso, Texas, for 10 years, was one of hundreds of drivers who joined in a protest convoy through El Paso on Friday 1 May. During the pandemic, Echiveste and other drivers have seen their freight rates drop from $2-$2.50 per mile to as low as $0.50 per mile.
“I’m losing money just to work. The last week I worked I paid $200 out of my own pocket just to get home,” said Echiveste. “I have to pay to work and truck brokers are keeping most of the cut. We have to pay on average $500 each time we fuel, insurance is around $1,000 per month, and parts for my truck are three to four times more expensive than a regular car part, and some drivers are still paying for the truck and trailer. On that alone, I pay over $2,300 per month.”
Echiveste said the protest was coordinated on Facebook, and he joined it with his brother, father and neighbor who are all truck drivers.
Similar protests were held by truck drivers in southern California, Arizona, Sacramento, California, Lansing, Michigan, Washington DC and Chicago, Illinois, over decreased freight rates and working conditions during the pandemic.
Fast-food workers with the Fight for $15 and a union campaign have organized one-day strikes and protests in California, Illinois, Florida, Missouri and Tennessee through the pandemic.
Ieshia Townsend, a McDonald’s worker in Chicago for five years, participated in one of the strikes and walked off the job in protest of lack of hazard pay, proper personal protective equipment, paid sick leave and lack of health insurance benefits.
“Workers like me are going on strike because McDonald’s and other billion-dollar corporations do not care about us as workers. They don’t care if we’re safe on the job, they don’t care if we’re sick on the job,” said Townsend, who has also experienced significant cuts to her work schedule during the pandemic.
McDonald’s dismissed the strikes as “limited activity” and noted they are granting 10% of pay earned in the month of May in bonuses to workers at corporate owned stores, which make up only 5% of McDonald’s restaurants.
On 29 April, Braden Lauder, a shift manager for one year at an Arby’s in Morris, Illinois went on strike with co-workers over the lack of hazard pay, lack of personal protective equipment, and understaffing.
“We’re understaffed, underpaid and underappreciated,” said Lauder. He makes $12 an hour as a shift manager, and noted several of his co-workers make under $10 an hour. “At the same time, I’m a shift manager so I do the paperwork for the sales that we pull each day and I know for a fact that we’re busier now than we have been at any other point since I started almost a year ago.”
Arby’s did not comment on the lack of hazard pay. “The safety of our team members and guests continues to be our top priority. This was an isolated incident that occurred at a franchised location, and we understand from the owner that all parties are engaged in an open dialogue,” said an Arby’s spokesperson.
On 11 May, more than 100 Uber drivers in San Francisco held a caravan protest outside Uber headquarters following the company’s virtual stockholder meeting to demand Uber drop funding for a ballot initiative to repeal Assembly Bill 5 (AB5), which took effect on 1 January 2020.
AB5 classifies drivers as employees, granting drivers rights such as minimum wage and access to unemployment and workers’ compensation benefits. Uber has devoted spending at least $30m on the ballot initiative to repeal the law.
“We feel that money could be used to support drivers during this crisis,” said Mekela Edwards, an Uber driver in the San Francisco, California, area for about one year. “This crisis, personally for me, just showed me how vulnerable I am as a driver.”
Edwards has been unable to work due to her doctor directing her to self-isolate during the pandemic. It took several weeks before she began receiving unemployment benefits and has yet to receive a response to her application for paid sick leave from Uber.
“I applied, I submitted the doctor’s note, filled out the application, submitted my paperwork and have still not heard from Uber at all,” Edwards added.
Uber and American Apparel did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Sharon Block, executive director of the Labor and Worklife Program at Harvard Law School, said it was too early to tell if these worker actions around the US will have a lasting impact.
“These walkouts show that essential workers don’t want to be treated any more as if they were disposable. They are demanding a voice in how their companies respond to the pandemic. Having a voice is a life-and-death matter now more than ever,” said Block. “Success will be a matter of whether consumers and policymakers will be inspired by these workers’ courage.”
Wildcat strikes, walkouts and protests over working conditions have erupted across the US throughout the coronavirus pandemic as “essential” workers have demanded better pay and safer working conditions. Labor leaders are hoping the protests can lead to permanent change.
Norma Kennedy, an employee at an American Apparel clothing plant is one of those people. Kennedy along with dozens of other workers walked off her job in Selma, Alabama, on 23 April after two workers tested positive for coronavirus. The plant has remained open during the pandemic to manufacture face masks for a US army contract.
“We left for our own protection,” said Kennedy. “Beforehand, management said if someone tested positive they would shut down and have the plant cleaned. When workers tested positive, they didn’t want to shut it down. They’re not really concerned about the workers.”
Working conditions, low pay and lack of safety protections have triggered protests throughout the pandemic as workers across various industries, including food service, meat processing, retail, manufacturing, transportation and healthcare have come together to protest about issues, many of which were apparent before the coronavirus.
“There are no federal mandates or requirements to implement the social distancing guidance or anything else. It’s only guidance and employers can choose to implement them or not,” said Deborah Berkowitz, director of worker safety and health for the National Employment Law Project. “And that is why, in an unprecedented way, they are walking out to bring public attention to the fact that their companies are not protecting their safety and health.”
Roberto Echiveste, a truck driver in El Paso, Texas, for 10 years, was one of hundreds of drivers who joined in a protest convoy through El Paso on Friday 1 May. During the pandemic, Echiveste and other drivers have seen their freight rates drop from $2-$2.50 per mile to as low as $0.50 per mile.
“I’m losing money just to work. The last week I worked I paid $200 out of my own pocket just to get home,” said Echiveste. “I have to pay to work and truck brokers are keeping most of the cut. We have to pay on average $500 each time we fuel, insurance is around $1,000 per month, and parts for my truck are three to four times more expensive than a regular car part, and some drivers are still paying for the truck and trailer. On that alone, I pay over $2,300 per month.”
Echiveste said the protest was coordinated on Facebook, and he joined it with his brother, father and neighbor who are all truck drivers.
Similar protests were held by truck drivers in southern California, Arizona, Sacramento, California, Lansing, Michigan, Washington DC and Chicago, Illinois, over decreased freight rates and working conditions during the pandemic.
Fast-food workers with the Fight for $15 and a union campaign have organized one-day strikes and protests in California, Illinois, Florida, Missouri and Tennessee through the pandemic.
Ieshia Townsend, a McDonald’s worker in Chicago for five years, participated in one of the strikes and walked off the job in protest of lack of hazard pay, proper personal protective equipment, paid sick leave and lack of health insurance benefits.
“Workers like me are going on strike because McDonald’s and other billion-dollar corporations do not care about us as workers. They don’t care if we’re safe on the job, they don’t care if we’re sick on the job,” said Townsend, who has also experienced significant cuts to her work schedule during the pandemic.
McDonald’s dismissed the strikes as “limited activity” and noted they are granting 10% of pay earned in the month of May in bonuses to workers at corporate owned stores, which make up only 5% of McDonald’s restaurants.
On 29 April, Braden Lauder, a shift manager for one year at an Arby’s in Morris, Illinois went on strike with co-workers over the lack of hazard pay, lack of personal protective equipment, and understaffing.
“We’re understaffed, underpaid and underappreciated,” said Lauder. He makes $12 an hour as a shift manager, and noted several of his co-workers make under $10 an hour. “At the same time, I’m a shift manager so I do the paperwork for the sales that we pull each day and I know for a fact that we’re busier now than we have been at any other point since I started almost a year ago.”
Arby’s did not comment on the lack of hazard pay. “The safety of our team members and guests continues to be our top priority. This was an isolated incident that occurred at a franchised location, and we understand from the owner that all parties are engaged in an open dialogue,” said an Arby’s spokesperson.
On 11 May, more than 100 Uber drivers in San Francisco held a caravan protest outside Uber headquarters following the company’s virtual stockholder meeting to demand Uber drop funding for a ballot initiative to repeal Assembly Bill 5 (AB5), which took effect on 1 January 2020.
AB5 classifies drivers as employees, granting drivers rights such as minimum wage and access to unemployment and workers’ compensation benefits. Uber has devoted spending at least $30m on the ballot initiative to repeal the law.
“We feel that money could be used to support drivers during this crisis,” said Mekela Edwards, an Uber driver in the San Francisco, California, area for about one year. “This crisis, personally for me, just showed me how vulnerable I am as a driver.”
Edwards has been unable to work due to her doctor directing her to self-isolate during the pandemic. It took several weeks before she began receiving unemployment benefits and has yet to receive a response to her application for paid sick leave from Uber.
“I applied, I submitted the doctor’s note, filled out the application, submitted my paperwork and have still not heard from Uber at all,” Edwards added.
Uber and American Apparel did not respond to multiple requests for comment.
Sharon Block, executive director of the Labor and Worklife Program at Harvard Law School, said it was too early to tell if these worker actions around the US will have a lasting impact.
“These walkouts show that essential workers don’t want to be treated any more as if they were disposable. They are demanding a voice in how their companies respond to the pandemic. Having a voice is a life-and-death matter now more than ever,” said Block. “Success will be a matter of whether consumers and policymakers will be inspired by these workers’ courage.”
years of not voting and now they are striking!!!!
Essential Sanitary Workers Strike for Hazard Pay and PPE in New Orleans
BY Mike Ludwig, Truthout
PUBLISHED May 15, 2020
The severe outbreak of COVID-19 in southern Louisiana was the last straw for a group of sanitation workers who pick up trash in eastern New Orleans. Last week, they walked off the job and went on strike, demanding hazard pay and a $15 living wage.
Without “hoppers,” as the workers are known, garbage would pile up on the streets and contribute to the spread of disease and other public health problems. However, the group of hoppers in New Orleans say their employers did not provide them with hazard pay or sufficient personal protection equipment as COVID-19 shut down the city. Technically employed by a subcontractor and working for a private disposal firm, the hoppers say were paid as little as $10.25 an hour, with no benefits such as paid sick leave, for lifting 250,000 pounds of waste per week — an essential public service.
The hoppers’ protest is a wildcat strike, meaning the hoppers went on strike without approval or support from an established union. The work stoppage entered its second week on Wednesday, highlighting the pitfalls of privatizing public services in cash-strapped cities like New Orleans, where tax revenues are now plummeting due to the COVID-19 outbreak. At one point, prisoners in a work release program were brought in to replace the strikers at extremely low wages, but the private contractor who runs the program with a local sheriff pulled out after learning about the labor dispute.
“In the early ‘90s, this service switched over from public to private, which across the board hurts workers and benefits private companies,” said a striking hopper known as “Big E” who spoke to Truthout on the picket line Thursday.
Big E pointed out that he and his fellow hoppers are all Black men. They hold signs reading “I am a man” inspired by the 1968 sanitation strike in Memphis, Tennessee, that was a pivotal moment in the civil rights movement. Big E said they have taken support from white activists and prominent politicians to get the respect and media attention they deserve. Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards recently launched a task force to study why Black COVID-19 patients account for a disproportionate number of the states’ deaths, but that’s no mystery for Big E. Just look at the jobs that Black workers perform.
“Low wages, no benefits, dangerous work,” Big E said. “What is happening here is representative of what is happening across this nation.”
The strikers in New Orleans are far from alone. The labor news site PayDayReport.com has identified 200 wildcat strikes across the country during the pandemic as workers refuse to risk their health by going to work. In some cases, workers protested for a few hours before bosses agreed to their demands; in other cases, workers called out sick in large numbers over longer periods of time. In Pittsburgh, sanitation workers made national headlines when they went on strike in March demanding better protective gear. Many other strikes have likely occurred without receiving media attention.
The striking hoppers work at a shop run by Metro Services, a waste disposal and construction company that operates across the South and has a $10.7 million contract with the City of New Orleans. They say their demands are reasonable: consistent access to protective gear, $150 in weekly hazard pay for working during a pandemic, and a living wage of $15 per hour. They also want Metro Services to fix its trucks, which have leaked toxic hydraulic fluid on workers and into the environment, according to hoppers and activists who support them.
“Every day we do our jobs, we put ourselves and our families in danger,” said Rahman Brooks, a striking hopper who spoke to Truthout on the picket line Thursday. “We deserve hazard pay and proper PPE for our safety and the safety of our families.”
In a statement, Metro Services said the striking hoppers are making “intentionally misleading allegations” about working conditions, and the company has a stockpile of hand sanitizer, N95 masks and protective gear. The company, one of the city’s primary trash collection contractors, said that none of its direct employees joined the strike. The striking hoppers are employed by PeopleReady, a temp agency that has largely stayed out of view since the strike starting making the evening news.
Striking Against Austerity and Privatization
Thanks to right-wing and pro-business politicians in the state capitol of Baton Rouge, the minimum wage in New Orleans is frozen at the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour. Grassroots activists have been clamoring for years to raise the wage floor in a city where rampant inequality is magnified by hurricanes and crises like the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2016, they won a victory when the city passed a “living wage” ordinance that guarantees paid sick leave for city employees and contractors and incrementally raised their minimum wage to $11.19 per hour.
However, city officials extended a number of contracts shortly before the ordinance took effect, according to Alfred Marshall, a former city employee and organizer with Stand With Dignity, a grassroots group of Black workers in New Orleans. This created a loophole allowing some contractors and subcontractors to continue paying wages below the $11.19 minimum. In an email, a spokeswoman for Metro Services said its subcontractors have assured the company that all of its workers are making $11.19 an hour as required by the city ordinance. Marshall said PeopleReady was forced to raise its wages after the strike broke out.
Layers of contractors and subcontractors are a common feature of privatized public services, making it easy for public officials and employers to point fingers when labor disputes erupt or services are interrupted. Big E said hiring hoppers through PeopleReady makes it easier for Metro Service to avoid accountability during the strike, while city officials can claim they are simply honoring a pre-existing contract, rather than enforcing their own labor standards.
“I think this is a really good example of when privatization allows the government to sidestep its accountability and pass the buck to the contractor, and the contractor takes the heat,” said Jeremy Mohler, the communications director at In the Public Interest, a group that advocates for public ownership of public services. “It’s a really good example of how, when the accountability is passed to the private sector, this public good — you can say clean streets and sanitation are public goods — is taken for granted and no longer seen as something everyone should have access to.”
COVID-19 Could Push Public Services Into Private Hands
The privatization of public services has been a nationwide trend for years, but Mohler said the economic crash of 2008 poured fuel on the fire. State and city budgets shrank as tax revenues dropped, and austerity-minded politicians increasingly turned to private contractors promising to save public money while providing more efficient service. It does not always work out that way, and as Truthout has reported, public spending never recovered after the Great Recession, leaving the government ill-prepared for the COVID-19 outbreak and frontline workers at risk.
Mohler said contractors save money by paying low wages and cutting corners, which can result in shoddy services and workers having less money to pump into local economies. Private contractors also funnel tax dollars toward their own overhead costs, such as advertising, executive compensation and legal.
Mohler said there are also political factors driving privatization, since public workers are more likely to belong to unions than those working for private companies. Republicans know that unions representing teachers, firefighters, postal workers and other public employees are major backers of the Democratic Party, and GOP politicians continue to take bold swipes at their influence and bargaining power.
A number of cities have reversed course and “insourced” public services (that is, returned them to public hands) from water treatment to snow plowing in recent years, according to ITPI. A 2012 survey found that 53 percent of city managers cited insufficient cost savings and 51 percent cited unsatisfactory service quality as reasons for insourcing services. Across the world, public services unions are documenting hundreds of cases of “re-municipalization” as local governments bring privatized services back under public control.
“We’re still caught in this ideological framing that is really a right-wing, corporate framing — that the private sector can be more efficient and the public sector is bloated and bureaucratic,” Mohler said. “I think we are still stuck in this framing, even though we have learned some hard lessons after 2008.”
The COVID-19 pandemic threatens to bring another wave of privatization as public revenues hit rock bottom once again. Last month, 980,000 public service workers nationwide lost their jobs due to the pandemic — more than were lost in the entire Great Recession, according to AFSCME, a national union for service workers. Municipalities across the country are projected to lose hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue due to the economic fallout caused by COVID-19, according to a new Bloomberg report.
AFSCME and other unions are currently calling on Congress to provide substantial federal funding for state and city governments so essential services survive the crisis and frontline workers can have safety gear and fair wages. However, the latest stimulus package is currently held up by Republican opposition in the Senate.
“Congress must act immediately to fund the front lines so we can protect public services,” said Vincent Variale, a first responder for the New York Fire Department and AFSCME member, in a statement on Wednesday. “We need to keep EMS workers, nurses, child care providers, sanitation workers and so many others on the job, and we need to keep them healthy so that we can fight the coronavirus and reopen the economy so that we’re stronger than before.”
New Orleans began outsourcing waste collection in the 1980s, and by the 1990s, the city’s hoppers had gone from being decently paid city employees to temp workers receiving minimum wage with no benefits. In New Orleans, it’s well-known that waste collection is a lucrative business –- at least for company owners and CEOs. In the 1990s, the hoppers staged a citywide strike with help from unions, bringing garbage collection to a halt and forcing the private contractors to negotiate.
Today, the hoppers picketing Metro Services are organizing a union they call the City Waste Union. Rahman said he hopes other hoppers will join them. After all, hoppers working for other contractors are also paid low wages for grueling but essential labor that benefits every resident. For now, the City Waste Union is demanding a meeting with Metro Services to negotiate working conditions. Rahman said the bosses should be willing to “meet them in the middle.”
Without “hoppers,” as the workers are known, garbage would pile up on the streets and contribute to the spread of disease and other public health problems. However, the group of hoppers in New Orleans say their employers did not provide them with hazard pay or sufficient personal protection equipment as COVID-19 shut down the city. Technically employed by a subcontractor and working for a private disposal firm, the hoppers say were paid as little as $10.25 an hour, with no benefits such as paid sick leave, for lifting 250,000 pounds of waste per week — an essential public service.
The hoppers’ protest is a wildcat strike, meaning the hoppers went on strike without approval or support from an established union. The work stoppage entered its second week on Wednesday, highlighting the pitfalls of privatizing public services in cash-strapped cities like New Orleans, where tax revenues are now plummeting due to the COVID-19 outbreak. At one point, prisoners in a work release program were brought in to replace the strikers at extremely low wages, but the private contractor who runs the program with a local sheriff pulled out after learning about the labor dispute.
“In the early ‘90s, this service switched over from public to private, which across the board hurts workers and benefits private companies,” said a striking hopper known as “Big E” who spoke to Truthout on the picket line Thursday.
Big E pointed out that he and his fellow hoppers are all Black men. They hold signs reading “I am a man” inspired by the 1968 sanitation strike in Memphis, Tennessee, that was a pivotal moment in the civil rights movement. Big E said they have taken support from white activists and prominent politicians to get the respect and media attention they deserve. Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards recently launched a task force to study why Black COVID-19 patients account for a disproportionate number of the states’ deaths, but that’s no mystery for Big E. Just look at the jobs that Black workers perform.
“Low wages, no benefits, dangerous work,” Big E said. “What is happening here is representative of what is happening across this nation.”
The strikers in New Orleans are far from alone. The labor news site PayDayReport.com has identified 200 wildcat strikes across the country during the pandemic as workers refuse to risk their health by going to work. In some cases, workers protested for a few hours before bosses agreed to their demands; in other cases, workers called out sick in large numbers over longer periods of time. In Pittsburgh, sanitation workers made national headlines when they went on strike in March demanding better protective gear. Many other strikes have likely occurred without receiving media attention.
The striking hoppers work at a shop run by Metro Services, a waste disposal and construction company that operates across the South and has a $10.7 million contract with the City of New Orleans. They say their demands are reasonable: consistent access to protective gear, $150 in weekly hazard pay for working during a pandemic, and a living wage of $15 per hour. They also want Metro Services to fix its trucks, which have leaked toxic hydraulic fluid on workers and into the environment, according to hoppers and activists who support them.
“Every day we do our jobs, we put ourselves and our families in danger,” said Rahman Brooks, a striking hopper who spoke to Truthout on the picket line Thursday. “We deserve hazard pay and proper PPE for our safety and the safety of our families.”
In a statement, Metro Services said the striking hoppers are making “intentionally misleading allegations” about working conditions, and the company has a stockpile of hand sanitizer, N95 masks and protective gear. The company, one of the city’s primary trash collection contractors, said that none of its direct employees joined the strike. The striking hoppers are employed by PeopleReady, a temp agency that has largely stayed out of view since the strike starting making the evening news.
Striking Against Austerity and Privatization
Thanks to right-wing and pro-business politicians in the state capitol of Baton Rouge, the minimum wage in New Orleans is frozen at the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour. Grassroots activists have been clamoring for years to raise the wage floor in a city where rampant inequality is magnified by hurricanes and crises like the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2016, they won a victory when the city passed a “living wage” ordinance that guarantees paid sick leave for city employees and contractors and incrementally raised their minimum wage to $11.19 per hour.
However, city officials extended a number of contracts shortly before the ordinance took effect, according to Alfred Marshall, a former city employee and organizer with Stand With Dignity, a grassroots group of Black workers in New Orleans. This created a loophole allowing some contractors and subcontractors to continue paying wages below the $11.19 minimum. In an email, a spokeswoman for Metro Services said its subcontractors have assured the company that all of its workers are making $11.19 an hour as required by the city ordinance. Marshall said PeopleReady was forced to raise its wages after the strike broke out.
Layers of contractors and subcontractors are a common feature of privatized public services, making it easy for public officials and employers to point fingers when labor disputes erupt or services are interrupted. Big E said hiring hoppers through PeopleReady makes it easier for Metro Service to avoid accountability during the strike, while city officials can claim they are simply honoring a pre-existing contract, rather than enforcing their own labor standards.
“I think this is a really good example of when privatization allows the government to sidestep its accountability and pass the buck to the contractor, and the contractor takes the heat,” said Jeremy Mohler, the communications director at In the Public Interest, a group that advocates for public ownership of public services. “It’s a really good example of how, when the accountability is passed to the private sector, this public good — you can say clean streets and sanitation are public goods — is taken for granted and no longer seen as something everyone should have access to.”
COVID-19 Could Push Public Services Into Private Hands
The privatization of public services has been a nationwide trend for years, but Mohler said the economic crash of 2008 poured fuel on the fire. State and city budgets shrank as tax revenues dropped, and austerity-minded politicians increasingly turned to private contractors promising to save public money while providing more efficient service. It does not always work out that way, and as Truthout has reported, public spending never recovered after the Great Recession, leaving the government ill-prepared for the COVID-19 outbreak and frontline workers at risk.
Mohler said contractors save money by paying low wages and cutting corners, which can result in shoddy services and workers having less money to pump into local economies. Private contractors also funnel tax dollars toward their own overhead costs, such as advertising, executive compensation and legal.
Mohler said there are also political factors driving privatization, since public workers are more likely to belong to unions than those working for private companies. Republicans know that unions representing teachers, firefighters, postal workers and other public employees are major backers of the Democratic Party, and GOP politicians continue to take bold swipes at their influence and bargaining power.
A number of cities have reversed course and “insourced” public services (that is, returned them to public hands) from water treatment to snow plowing in recent years, according to ITPI. A 2012 survey found that 53 percent of city managers cited insufficient cost savings and 51 percent cited unsatisfactory service quality as reasons for insourcing services. Across the world, public services unions are documenting hundreds of cases of “re-municipalization” as local governments bring privatized services back under public control.
“We’re still caught in this ideological framing that is really a right-wing, corporate framing — that the private sector can be more efficient and the public sector is bloated and bureaucratic,” Mohler said. “I think we are still stuck in this framing, even though we have learned some hard lessons after 2008.”
The COVID-19 pandemic threatens to bring another wave of privatization as public revenues hit rock bottom once again. Last month, 980,000 public service workers nationwide lost their jobs due to the pandemic — more than were lost in the entire Great Recession, according to AFSCME, a national union for service workers. Municipalities across the country are projected to lose hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue due to the economic fallout caused by COVID-19, according to a new Bloomberg report.
AFSCME and other unions are currently calling on Congress to provide substantial federal funding for state and city governments so essential services survive the crisis and frontline workers can have safety gear and fair wages. However, the latest stimulus package is currently held up by Republican opposition in the Senate.
“Congress must act immediately to fund the front lines so we can protect public services,” said Vincent Variale, a first responder for the New York Fire Department and AFSCME member, in a statement on Wednesday. “We need to keep EMS workers, nurses, child care providers, sanitation workers and so many others on the job, and we need to keep them healthy so that we can fight the coronavirus and reopen the economy so that we’re stronger than before.”
New Orleans began outsourcing waste collection in the 1980s, and by the 1990s, the city’s hoppers had gone from being decently paid city employees to temp workers receiving minimum wage with no benefits. In New Orleans, it’s well-known that waste collection is a lucrative business –- at least for company owners and CEOs. In the 1990s, the hoppers staged a citywide strike with help from unions, bringing garbage collection to a halt and forcing the private contractors to negotiate.
Today, the hoppers picketing Metro Services are organizing a union they call the City Waste Union. Rahman said he hopes other hoppers will join them. After all, hoppers working for other contractors are also paid low wages for grueling but essential labor that benefits every resident. For now, the City Waste Union is demanding a meeting with Metro Services to negotiate working conditions. Rahman said the bosses should be willing to “meet them in the middle.”
nothing has changed in 300 years!!!
Revealed: Amazon told workers paid sick leave law doesn't cover warehouses
California workers say the company is pressuring sick employees to show up – and flouting a California law meant to protect them from Covid-19
Sam Levin in Los Angeles
the guardian
Thu 7 May 2020 06.00 EDT
Amazon workers in southern California’s industrial heartland say the company’s policies are forcing sick employees to work and that warehouses are refusing to comply with a state paid sick leave law meant to prevent Covid-19 outbreaks.
In the Inland Empire region outside Los Angeles, Amazon workers told the Guardian they fear losing their jobs if they are ill and stay home. At least four Amazon warehouses in the region have recorded Covid-19 cases.
On 1 May, Amazon ended a policy allowing unlimited unpaid time off, a measure adopted at the start of the coronavirus crisis that allowed workers to take time off for any reason. They would forgo wages, but if they were concerned about their safety or had new childcare responsibilities due to lockdowns, they could stay home without losing their jobs.
Without the policy, workers say they could now be fired if they miss shifts. They worry the reversal will result in sick and vulnerable people showing up for shifts because they can’t risk termination. The health concerns are particularly serious in the Inland Empire, which has some of the worst air quality in the US and disproportionately high rates of asthma and other respiratory illnesses.
Employees also shared emails showing that Amazon has dismissed some paid sick leave requests by claiming a California law intended to provide supplemental sick leave during the pandemic does not apply to the warehouses.
“I’m afraid to come to work, but I don’t have a choice,” said Eddie, a 48-year-old San Bernardino worker with diabetes, who asked to go by his middle name and works in one of the facilities that had an outbreak. “I shouldn’t be there. We’re risking our safety for the company … The more I think about it, the more stressed I get.”
“We are a vector of this disease,” said one worker at a warehouse in San Bernardino. The 27-year-old, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliation, recovered from pneumonia last year and is at high risk of serious complications if they contract Covid. “There shouldn’t even be a debate about this. It’s incredibly nerve-racking.”
The Inland Empire, about 60 miles east of Los Angeles, was once home to the west coast’s largest steel plant, a major air force base and an agricultural economy. Today, the historically rural area is a hub for distribution centers and the logistics industry, with huge warehouses for Amazon, UPS, Walmart and other retailers. The sector has added more than 50,000 jobs over the last decade as e-commerce has boomed, but a majority of families in the region don’t earn enough to make ends meet.
On 16 April, the California governor, Gavin Newsom, passed an executive order providing food sector workers two weeks of supplemental paid sick leave if they have to isolate due to Covid-19 concerns. The law covers “workers at warehouses where food is stored” and is aimed at protecting consumers from the virus and offering additional support to essential workers whose jobs involve the food supply.
Amazon warehouses in the industrial neighborhoods of San Bernardino and Riverside counties handle a wide range of packages, including food items. But employees say that when they have asked about Newsom’s order in recent weeks, the human resources department has ignored their questions or responded that the facilities are not considered part of the food sector.
The 27-year-old worker with a history of pneumonia works at a sort center and has been responsible for helping package a range of pantry food items. When they asked HR about the paid sick leave law for food workers, the company directed them to steps they could take to request unpaid time off.
A labor spokesperson for the state, however, told the Guardian that the law does apply to warehouses such as Amazon’s centers, noting that the order has a broad definition of “food facility”, which includes any operations that store or package food for human consumption.
Eileen Hards, an Amazon spokeswoman, declined to answer specific questions about Newsom’s order or whether the company has provided this form of paid sick leave, saying in an email: “Amazon has complied with all requirements given by the State.”
The company says in addition to the time off it provided before the coronavirus pandemic, it now gives two weeks of paid time off for infected employees and those presumed to have Covid-19. But in one recent case, a worker who tested positive only received his pay after a BuzzFeed reporter inquired about it, and employees across the country have reported difficulties getting any sick pay during the pandemic.
California’s law also appears to be broader than Amazon’s policy, requiring paid leave for workers who have to isolate due to health concerns, including if they live with someone sick or exposed, and it says they are entitled to “immediately” start leave upon request.
“People are absolutely going to show up sick. They have to,” said a 23-year-old worker at an Amazon fulfillment center in Rialto, a city near San Bernardino. The worker recently stopped going to work out of fear, even though he now risks losing his job and gets no paid time off. “We’re all crammed in there. It’s gonna get bad.”
---
Amazon confirmed that it had ended its unlimited unpaid time off policy, but the company says it continues to allow the option on a case-by-case basis. Workers accrue roughly 80 hours of unpaid time off over the course of a year, and they can now also apply for an unpaid personal leave of absence due to Covid concerns. But it can take weeks for Amazon to respond to these requests, and multiple employees who asked for this said their requests were “pending” and that they were worried they would soon lose their jobs.
Amazon workers across the US have accused the company of not doing enough to protect their health and safety amid the pandemic. Amazon has fired several employee activists after they participated in organizing actions, and a high-profile vice-president resigned this week over the firings. Meanwhile, Amazon has experienced a boom in sales during the pandemic, with revenues of $75.4bn in the first three months of 2020, over $33m an hour. The fortune of CEO Jeff Bezos has grown by $24bn during the crisis.
‘Infections are going to spike indefinitely’
“It’s wild that we’re asking for an [unlimited unpaid time off policy] to be returned, because even that was never enough,” said a San Bernardino employee in their 20s, who works at a sort center and is on an unpaid leave of absence. “It was a bare minimum so people who could afford to could have the chance to stay home without jeopardizing their job.”
The worker said they had another part-time job they could do from home and had some money saved as they worked toward graduate school: “This is going to set me back.”
Amazon has made changes over the last two months to try to enforce distancing within the warehouses, but the worker said the nature of the job made it hard to avoid other people. Another benefit of the unlimited time off was that the facilities became slightly less crowded, they said.
A 25-year-old who lives in Riverside county and has worked for Amazon for more than two years noted that Amazon was continuing to hire new workers as employees quit in fear.
“We don’t know what these people are bringing in. Infections are going to spike indefinitely,” said the worker, who has a baby and lives with his two older parents, who both have a range of health issues. “If I don’t go to work, I die of starvation. If I come home with an infection, I nearly kill half my family.”
Due to the lockdowns, he couldn’t find any other work. “Me and a lot of others have broke our back for Amazon … It’s almost like the virus doesn’t exist around them and all they care about are their numbers.”
Hards, the Amazon spokeswoman, said the company was “encouraging those who are unwell to stay home and taking extreme measures to keep people safe in our buildings”.
“Nothing is more important than the safety of our teams,” she added.
In the Inland Empire region outside Los Angeles, Amazon workers told the Guardian they fear losing their jobs if they are ill and stay home. At least four Amazon warehouses in the region have recorded Covid-19 cases.
On 1 May, Amazon ended a policy allowing unlimited unpaid time off, a measure adopted at the start of the coronavirus crisis that allowed workers to take time off for any reason. They would forgo wages, but if they were concerned about their safety or had new childcare responsibilities due to lockdowns, they could stay home without losing their jobs.
Without the policy, workers say they could now be fired if they miss shifts. They worry the reversal will result in sick and vulnerable people showing up for shifts because they can’t risk termination. The health concerns are particularly serious in the Inland Empire, which has some of the worst air quality in the US and disproportionately high rates of asthma and other respiratory illnesses.
Employees also shared emails showing that Amazon has dismissed some paid sick leave requests by claiming a California law intended to provide supplemental sick leave during the pandemic does not apply to the warehouses.
“I’m afraid to come to work, but I don’t have a choice,” said Eddie, a 48-year-old San Bernardino worker with diabetes, who asked to go by his middle name and works in one of the facilities that had an outbreak. “I shouldn’t be there. We’re risking our safety for the company … The more I think about it, the more stressed I get.”
“We are a vector of this disease,” said one worker at a warehouse in San Bernardino. The 27-year-old, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliation, recovered from pneumonia last year and is at high risk of serious complications if they contract Covid. “There shouldn’t even be a debate about this. It’s incredibly nerve-racking.”
The Inland Empire, about 60 miles east of Los Angeles, was once home to the west coast’s largest steel plant, a major air force base and an agricultural economy. Today, the historically rural area is a hub for distribution centers and the logistics industry, with huge warehouses for Amazon, UPS, Walmart and other retailers. The sector has added more than 50,000 jobs over the last decade as e-commerce has boomed, but a majority of families in the region don’t earn enough to make ends meet.
On 16 April, the California governor, Gavin Newsom, passed an executive order providing food sector workers two weeks of supplemental paid sick leave if they have to isolate due to Covid-19 concerns. The law covers “workers at warehouses where food is stored” and is aimed at protecting consumers from the virus and offering additional support to essential workers whose jobs involve the food supply.
Amazon warehouses in the industrial neighborhoods of San Bernardino and Riverside counties handle a wide range of packages, including food items. But employees say that when they have asked about Newsom’s order in recent weeks, the human resources department has ignored their questions or responded that the facilities are not considered part of the food sector.
The 27-year-old worker with a history of pneumonia works at a sort center and has been responsible for helping package a range of pantry food items. When they asked HR about the paid sick leave law for food workers, the company directed them to steps they could take to request unpaid time off.
A labor spokesperson for the state, however, told the Guardian that the law does apply to warehouses such as Amazon’s centers, noting that the order has a broad definition of “food facility”, which includes any operations that store or package food for human consumption.
Eileen Hards, an Amazon spokeswoman, declined to answer specific questions about Newsom’s order or whether the company has provided this form of paid sick leave, saying in an email: “Amazon has complied with all requirements given by the State.”
The company says in addition to the time off it provided before the coronavirus pandemic, it now gives two weeks of paid time off for infected employees and those presumed to have Covid-19. But in one recent case, a worker who tested positive only received his pay after a BuzzFeed reporter inquired about it, and employees across the country have reported difficulties getting any sick pay during the pandemic.
California’s law also appears to be broader than Amazon’s policy, requiring paid leave for workers who have to isolate due to health concerns, including if they live with someone sick or exposed, and it says they are entitled to “immediately” start leave upon request.
“People are absolutely going to show up sick. They have to,” said a 23-year-old worker at an Amazon fulfillment center in Rialto, a city near San Bernardino. The worker recently stopped going to work out of fear, even though he now risks losing his job and gets no paid time off. “We’re all crammed in there. It’s gonna get bad.”
---
Amazon confirmed that it had ended its unlimited unpaid time off policy, but the company says it continues to allow the option on a case-by-case basis. Workers accrue roughly 80 hours of unpaid time off over the course of a year, and they can now also apply for an unpaid personal leave of absence due to Covid concerns. But it can take weeks for Amazon to respond to these requests, and multiple employees who asked for this said their requests were “pending” and that they were worried they would soon lose their jobs.
Amazon workers across the US have accused the company of not doing enough to protect their health and safety amid the pandemic. Amazon has fired several employee activists after they participated in organizing actions, and a high-profile vice-president resigned this week over the firings. Meanwhile, Amazon has experienced a boom in sales during the pandemic, with revenues of $75.4bn in the first three months of 2020, over $33m an hour. The fortune of CEO Jeff Bezos has grown by $24bn during the crisis.
‘Infections are going to spike indefinitely’
“It’s wild that we’re asking for an [unlimited unpaid time off policy] to be returned, because even that was never enough,” said a San Bernardino employee in their 20s, who works at a sort center and is on an unpaid leave of absence. “It was a bare minimum so people who could afford to could have the chance to stay home without jeopardizing their job.”
The worker said they had another part-time job they could do from home and had some money saved as they worked toward graduate school: “This is going to set me back.”
Amazon has made changes over the last two months to try to enforce distancing within the warehouses, but the worker said the nature of the job made it hard to avoid other people. Another benefit of the unlimited time off was that the facilities became slightly less crowded, they said.
A 25-year-old who lives in Riverside county and has worked for Amazon for more than two years noted that Amazon was continuing to hire new workers as employees quit in fear.
“We don’t know what these people are bringing in. Infections are going to spike indefinitely,” said the worker, who has a baby and lives with his two older parents, who both have a range of health issues. “If I don’t go to work, I die of starvation. If I come home with an infection, I nearly kill half my family.”
Due to the lockdowns, he couldn’t find any other work. “Me and a lot of others have broke our back for Amazon … It’s almost like the virus doesn’t exist around them and all they care about are their numbers.”
Hards, the Amazon spokeswoman, said the company was “encouraging those who are unwell to stay home and taking extreme measures to keep people safe in our buildings”.
“Nothing is more important than the safety of our teams,” she added.
California sues Uber and Lyft for misclassifying drivers as contractors
Attorney general says the state will make the companies ‘play by the rules’ and adhere to the worker rights and protections law
Julia Carrie Wong in Oakland
the guardian
Tue 5 May 2020 16.20 EDT
California is suing Uber and Lyft, alleging they misclassified their drivers as independent contractors under the state’s new labor law, in the most significant challenge to the ride-hailing companies’ employment model to date.
Xavier Becerra, the state’s attorney general, announced the lawsuit Tuesday during a news conference. The labor law, known as AB5 and considered the nation’s strictest test, took effect on 1 January and makes it harder for companies to classify workers as independent contractors instead of employees who are entitled to minimum wage and benefits such as workers compensation and unemployment benefits – a key exclusion that has come to the fore during the coronavirus pandemic.
“Uber and Lyft claim their drivers aren’t engaged in the companies’ core mission and cannot qualify for benefits,” said Becerra. “These companies will take the workers’ labor, but they won’t accept the worker protections. California has ground rules with rights and protections for workers and their employers. We intend to make sure that Uber and Lyft play by the rules.”
The dispute over the employment status of Uber and Lyft drivers is as old as the companies themselves. Over the years, gig economy companies have attracted – and largely fought off or settled – a host of class-action lawsuits over employee classification. But an enforcement lawsuit by the state, which will not have the same incentive to settle as a private plaintiff’s attorney, represents an “unprecedented” escalation that is much more likely to bring about meaningful change, said Veena Dubal, a law professor at the University of California Hastings who researches the gig economy.
“These companies should have never been allowed to proliferate using the business model they were using, and it was the state of California that first legalized and allowed this, so that it’s the state of California that is finally stepping in and saying that these are employees is so gratifying,” Dubal said in an interview.
California represents Uber and Lyft’s largest source of revenue. The companies, as well as Doordash, have invested $30m apiece in a ballot initiative campaign to exclude their drivers from the law while giving new benefits such as health care coverage. The initiative is likely to qualify for the November ballot.
The ballot initiative campaign was the subject of a scathing reference in the legal complaint filed by the state, which lambasted the companies for launching “an aggressive public relations campaign in the hopes of enshrining their ability to mistreat their workers” in the middle of “a once-in-a-century pandemic”.
A federal judge in February denied Uber and Postmates’ request for a preliminary injunction that would have exempted them from the law. But separately, a federal judge in January indefinitely blocked the law from applying to more than 70,000 independent truckers, deciding that it is preempted by federal rules on interstate commerce.
The state legislature is also considering amending the law, though lawmakers are split whether to broaden or narrow it as other groups – such as freelance writers and photographers – contend they have been hurt by it through unintended consequences.
The state’s lawsuit alleges that Uber and Lyft haven’t paid enough payroll taxes as a result of the misclassification. The suit seeks restitution for unpaid wages owed to drivers, civil penalties and a permanent ruling that would prohibit the companies from misclassifying drivers in the future.
“We are looking forward to working with the attorney general and mayors across the state to bring all the benefits of California’s innovation economy to as many workers as possible, especially during this time when the creation of good jobs with access to affordable healthcare and other benefits is more important than ever,” Lyft said in a statement.
“At a time when California’s economy is in crisis with four million people out of work, we need to make it easier, not harder, for people to quickly start earning,” a spokesman for Uber said in a statement. “We will contest this action in court, while at the same time pushing to raise the standard of independent work for drivers in California, including with guaranteed minimum earnings and new benefits.”
RELATED: Uber to cut 3,700 jobs, CEO Khosrowshahi to waive base salary
Uber Technologies Inc will cut about 3,700 full-time jobs and Chief Executive Officer Dara Khosrowshahi will forgo his base salary for the remainder of the year, the company said on Wednesday, as the COVID-19 pandemic decimates ride-hailing businesses.
RELATED: Amazon Company is cracking down on protesters and organizing during pandemic, workers say
Xavier Becerra, the state’s attorney general, announced the lawsuit Tuesday during a news conference. The labor law, known as AB5 and considered the nation’s strictest test, took effect on 1 January and makes it harder for companies to classify workers as independent contractors instead of employees who are entitled to minimum wage and benefits such as workers compensation and unemployment benefits – a key exclusion that has come to the fore during the coronavirus pandemic.
“Uber and Lyft claim their drivers aren’t engaged in the companies’ core mission and cannot qualify for benefits,” said Becerra. “These companies will take the workers’ labor, but they won’t accept the worker protections. California has ground rules with rights and protections for workers and their employers. We intend to make sure that Uber and Lyft play by the rules.”
The dispute over the employment status of Uber and Lyft drivers is as old as the companies themselves. Over the years, gig economy companies have attracted – and largely fought off or settled – a host of class-action lawsuits over employee classification. But an enforcement lawsuit by the state, which will not have the same incentive to settle as a private plaintiff’s attorney, represents an “unprecedented” escalation that is much more likely to bring about meaningful change, said Veena Dubal, a law professor at the University of California Hastings who researches the gig economy.
“These companies should have never been allowed to proliferate using the business model they were using, and it was the state of California that first legalized and allowed this, so that it’s the state of California that is finally stepping in and saying that these are employees is so gratifying,” Dubal said in an interview.
California represents Uber and Lyft’s largest source of revenue. The companies, as well as Doordash, have invested $30m apiece in a ballot initiative campaign to exclude their drivers from the law while giving new benefits such as health care coverage. The initiative is likely to qualify for the November ballot.
The ballot initiative campaign was the subject of a scathing reference in the legal complaint filed by the state, which lambasted the companies for launching “an aggressive public relations campaign in the hopes of enshrining their ability to mistreat their workers” in the middle of “a once-in-a-century pandemic”.
A federal judge in February denied Uber and Postmates’ request for a preliminary injunction that would have exempted them from the law. But separately, a federal judge in January indefinitely blocked the law from applying to more than 70,000 independent truckers, deciding that it is preempted by federal rules on interstate commerce.
The state legislature is also considering amending the law, though lawmakers are split whether to broaden or narrow it as other groups – such as freelance writers and photographers – contend they have been hurt by it through unintended consequences.
The state’s lawsuit alleges that Uber and Lyft haven’t paid enough payroll taxes as a result of the misclassification. The suit seeks restitution for unpaid wages owed to drivers, civil penalties and a permanent ruling that would prohibit the companies from misclassifying drivers in the future.
“We are looking forward to working with the attorney general and mayors across the state to bring all the benefits of California’s innovation economy to as many workers as possible, especially during this time when the creation of good jobs with access to affordable healthcare and other benefits is more important than ever,” Lyft said in a statement.
“At a time when California’s economy is in crisis with four million people out of work, we need to make it easier, not harder, for people to quickly start earning,” a spokesman for Uber said in a statement. “We will contest this action in court, while at the same time pushing to raise the standard of independent work for drivers in California, including with guaranteed minimum earnings and new benefits.”
RELATED: Uber to cut 3,700 jobs, CEO Khosrowshahi to waive base salary
Uber Technologies Inc will cut about 3,700 full-time jobs and Chief Executive Officer Dara Khosrowshahi will forgo his base salary for the remainder of the year, the company said on Wednesday, as the COVID-19 pandemic decimates ride-hailing businesses.
RELATED: Amazon Company is cracking down on protesters and organizing during pandemic, workers say
These Workers Packed Lip Gloss and Pandora Charm Bracelets. They Were Labeled “Essential” but Didn’t Feel Safe.
PFS, which packs and ships jewelry and cosmetics, stayed open even as employees have tested positive for coronavirus. Some temporary workers say they quit over a lack of workplace protections, but agencies keep sending people to $9 an hour jobs.
by Wendi C. Thomas, MLK50: Justice Through Journalism - propublica
May 2, 9 a.m. EDT
MEMPHIS, Tenn. — On her first day at her new warehouse job, Daria Meeks assumed the business would provide face coverings. It didn’t.
She assumed her fellow workers would be spread out to account for the new coronavirus. They weren’t.
There wasn’t even soap in the bathroom.
Instead, on March 28, her first day at PFS, which packages and ships makeup and jewelry, Meeks found herself standing alongside four other new workers at a station the size of a card table as a trainer showed them how to properly tuck tissue paper into gift boxes.
The following day, Meeks, 29, was just two hours into her shift when she heard that a worker had thrown up.
“They said her blood pressure had went up and she was just nauseated, but when we turned around, everybody who was permanent that worked for PFS had on gloves and masks,” Meeks said.
Temporary workers like her weren’t offered either.
Since then, workers have been told twice that coworkers have tested positive for the coronavirus. The first time was April 10 at a warehouse just across the state line in Southaven, Mississippi. The next was April 16 at the warehouse in southeast Memphis where Meeks worked, several temporary and permanent workers told MLK50: Justice Through Journalism and ProPublica.
In interviews, the workers complained of a crowded environment where they shared devices and weren’t provided personal protective equipment. The company has about 500 employees at its four Memphis-area locations, according to the Memphis Business Journal.
In right-to-work states such as Tennessee and Mississippi, where union membership is low, manual laborers have long said they are vulnerable, and workers’ rights advocates say the global pandemic has underscored just how few protections they have.
A spokesman for Tennessee’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration confirmed that the department received an anonymous complaint about PFS in April.
“A few of (sic) people have tested positive for Covid-19 and the company has not taken precaution to prevent employees from contracting the coronavirus,” the complainant wrote. “As of today (04/13/2020) no one have (sic) come to clean or sanitize the building.”
In response, the spokesman said TOSHA sent the company a letter “informing them of measures they may take to help prevent the spread of COVID-19.”
PFS did not answer specific questions about the number of workers infected at its facilities or about specific precautions it takes. Instead the company released a short statement that said PFS “is committed to the safety and well-being of its employees.” It also said it performs temperature checks at the door and supplies workers with masks, gloves and face shields.
But workers said none of these measures were in effect as late as the middle of April, when Shelby County, Tennessee, and DeSoto County, Mississippi, each home to two PFS facilities, were reporting more than 1,600 coronavirus infections and 30 deaths. (As of Friday, there are more than 2,750 infections and 50 deaths in the two counties.) A current employee said the company now provides gloves and masks, but they’re optional, as are the temperature checks.
When Meeks started at PFS, cases in the county were still at a trickle. But she didn’t stick around long.
On her third day at work, workers were split into two groups for lunch, but the break room was still full. “You could barely pull out a chair, that’s how crowded it was,” she said. “Everybody was shoulder to shoulder.”
Meeks said she asked the security guard at the front desk if she could eat her lunch in the empty lobby but was told no.
“I said, this is just not going to work,” said Meeks, who was paid $9 an hour. “You got different people coughing, sneezing, allergies — you never know what’s going on with a person.”
She left during her break and didn’t come back.
Economy Dominated by Low-Wage Industry, Jobs
In cities across the country, workers at Amazon facilities and other warehouses have been infected with COVID-19, as have workers at meatpacking plants nationwide.
What makes Memphis different is the outsized share of the workforce in the logistics industry, which includes warehouses and distribution centers.
The Greater Memphis Chamber of Commerce boasts on its website that the logistics industry employs 1 in 6 workers in the Memphis metro area, a higher share than anywhere else in the country.
The high concentration of these low-wage jobs is a testament to the city’s decades-old campaign to brand itself as “America’s Distribution Center.” Memphis is home to FedEx’s headquarters and its world distribution hub, which is undergoing a $1.5 billion expansion, as well as to Nike’s largest global distribution center, a sprawling 2.8 million-square-foot facility.
According to 2019 data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, more than 58,000 workers in the Memphis metro area fill and stock orders, package materials and move materials by hand.
In Memphis, workers at distribution centers for FedEx, Nike and Kroger have tested positive for the coronavirus. The Shelby County Health Department received 64 complaints about businesses between April 1 and April 29, but could not say how many were about warehouses.
Interim guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention calls for employers to notify workers of positive cases. But it is voluntary. The federal OSHA has no such requirement, and neither does Tennessee’s OSHA.
Although Congress passed the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, which provides two weeks paid sick leave for coronavirus-affected or infected workers, it doesn’t apply to many warehouse and temporary employees, said Laura Padin, senior staff attorney at the Washington-based National Employment Law Project, which advocates for better public policy for workers, particularly low-wage workers.
“The big issue is that it exempts so many employers, especially employers with over 500 employees,” Padin said. “And the vast majority of temp workers and many warehouse workers work for employers with more than 500 employees.”
The coronavirus has disproportionately affected people of color, the very group that makes up the bulk of the warehouse and temporary workforce.
“Black workers make up 12% of the workforce but 26% of temp workers, and Latino workers make up 16% of the workforce but 25% of temp workers,” said Padin, citing Bureau of Labor Statistics data released in 2018.
Add to that the yawning racial wealth gap and low-wage workers like Meeks are in an untenable situation, Padin said.
“They either stay home and they risk their financial security,” Padin said, “or they go to work and risk their lives.”
“You Can Always Go Back”
With 1.45 million square feet of warehouse space among its four area locations, PFS is the ninth-largest third-party distribution operation in the metro area, according to the Memphis Business Journal’s 2020 Book of Lists. PFS doesn’t sell products under its own name but rather fulfills orders for better-known companies.
Pandora, which is perhaps best known for its charm bracelets, is one of PFS’s clients. “Each item shipped for PANDORA is wrapped in customized, branded, and sometimes seasonal packing materials, making every purchase a gift,” PFS’s website says.
Meeks’ favorite part of her job was taking each customer’s personal message, tucking it into a tiny envelope and then into the gift package.
“When we were sending out these Pandora bracelets and these Chanel gifts, I sat there and read all my cards,” said Meeks, who like all of the workers interviewed for this story, is black. “They were so cute.”
One Pandora customer sent a note to “beloved mother,” Meeks said, and another seemed to be from someone in a long-distance relationship.
“He was like: Even though I’m miles and miles away, I always think about you,” Meeks said. He wrote that he hoped the jewelry would “glitter in your eyes, or something like that.”
The day Meeks quit PFS, she said she called Prestigious Placement, the temporary agency that sent her there, asking for another job.
The temporary agency representative “was like, ‘Well, you can always go back to PFS until we get something else,’ and I was like, ‘No.’”
“She said, ‘Well, we haven’t had anyone to get sick,’” Meeks recalled.
Meeks said she tried to explain that regardless of whether some workers had tested positive, the company wasn’t taking enough steps, in her opinion, to keep current workers safe.
The representative said she’d ask the agency’s on-site manager about Meeks’ concerns, but Meeks said that there was no on-site manager present on her second or third day.
Prestigious Placement did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this story.
A local labor leader said Meeks’ experience illustrates the tough situation for temporary workers at warehouses.
“They tend not to have benefits, sick time and insurance and all the things that allow us to keep our whole community safe during a pandemic,” said Jeffrey Lichtenstein, executive secretary of the Memphis Labor Council, a federation of around 40 union locals.
Unlike companies such as Nike and FedEx, which have reputations to protect, the general public doesn’t know who PFS is or what it does, he said. “They have no brand vulnerability,” he said.
With little leverage to exert on businesses, these workers are up against a regional business model that mires them in dead-end, low-wage jobs, Lichtenstein said.
The city’s power brokers, he said, “have a couple of main tenets of their economic philosophy. One, logistics is really, really important, and two, cheap labor is very, very important.”
---
A Perfect Combination: Higher Pay and Less Risk
Just days after Meeks quit PFS, she turned to a different agency and was sent to a Memphis warehouse that labels and ships cleaning products.
Her first day was April 17, and she was impressed by the precautions the employer takes.
Before workers enter the building, Meeks said, their temperatures are taken in a white tent outside. If they don’t have a fever, they get a wristband that is a different color each day.
The company provides masks, gloves and goggles, she said, and there are even kickstands on the bathroom doors, so they can be opened by foot.
Working the third shift means fewer people, Meeks said. “We’re not working close to each other.”
Meeks said she wouldn’t put a price on her health, but at her new job, the risks are lower and the pay higher — up from $9 to $11.50 an hour.
She assumed her fellow workers would be spread out to account for the new coronavirus. They weren’t.
There wasn’t even soap in the bathroom.
Instead, on March 28, her first day at PFS, which packages and ships makeup and jewelry, Meeks found herself standing alongside four other new workers at a station the size of a card table as a trainer showed them how to properly tuck tissue paper into gift boxes.
The following day, Meeks, 29, was just two hours into her shift when she heard that a worker had thrown up.
“They said her blood pressure had went up and she was just nauseated, but when we turned around, everybody who was permanent that worked for PFS had on gloves and masks,” Meeks said.
Temporary workers like her weren’t offered either.
Since then, workers have been told twice that coworkers have tested positive for the coronavirus. The first time was April 10 at a warehouse just across the state line in Southaven, Mississippi. The next was April 16 at the warehouse in southeast Memphis where Meeks worked, several temporary and permanent workers told MLK50: Justice Through Journalism and ProPublica.
In interviews, the workers complained of a crowded environment where they shared devices and weren’t provided personal protective equipment. The company has about 500 employees at its four Memphis-area locations, according to the Memphis Business Journal.
In right-to-work states such as Tennessee and Mississippi, where union membership is low, manual laborers have long said they are vulnerable, and workers’ rights advocates say the global pandemic has underscored just how few protections they have.
A spokesman for Tennessee’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration confirmed that the department received an anonymous complaint about PFS in April.
“A few of (sic) people have tested positive for Covid-19 and the company has not taken precaution to prevent employees from contracting the coronavirus,” the complainant wrote. “As of today (04/13/2020) no one have (sic) come to clean or sanitize the building.”
In response, the spokesman said TOSHA sent the company a letter “informing them of measures they may take to help prevent the spread of COVID-19.”
PFS did not answer specific questions about the number of workers infected at its facilities or about specific precautions it takes. Instead the company released a short statement that said PFS “is committed to the safety and well-being of its employees.” It also said it performs temperature checks at the door and supplies workers with masks, gloves and face shields.
But workers said none of these measures were in effect as late as the middle of April, when Shelby County, Tennessee, and DeSoto County, Mississippi, each home to two PFS facilities, were reporting more than 1,600 coronavirus infections and 30 deaths. (As of Friday, there are more than 2,750 infections and 50 deaths in the two counties.) A current employee said the company now provides gloves and masks, but they’re optional, as are the temperature checks.
When Meeks started at PFS, cases in the county were still at a trickle. But she didn’t stick around long.
On her third day at work, workers were split into two groups for lunch, but the break room was still full. “You could barely pull out a chair, that’s how crowded it was,” she said. “Everybody was shoulder to shoulder.”
Meeks said she asked the security guard at the front desk if she could eat her lunch in the empty lobby but was told no.
“I said, this is just not going to work,” said Meeks, who was paid $9 an hour. “You got different people coughing, sneezing, allergies — you never know what’s going on with a person.”
She left during her break and didn’t come back.
Economy Dominated by Low-Wage Industry, Jobs
In cities across the country, workers at Amazon facilities and other warehouses have been infected with COVID-19, as have workers at meatpacking plants nationwide.
What makes Memphis different is the outsized share of the workforce in the logistics industry, which includes warehouses and distribution centers.
The Greater Memphis Chamber of Commerce boasts on its website that the logistics industry employs 1 in 6 workers in the Memphis metro area, a higher share than anywhere else in the country.
The high concentration of these low-wage jobs is a testament to the city’s decades-old campaign to brand itself as “America’s Distribution Center.” Memphis is home to FedEx’s headquarters and its world distribution hub, which is undergoing a $1.5 billion expansion, as well as to Nike’s largest global distribution center, a sprawling 2.8 million-square-foot facility.
According to 2019 data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, more than 58,000 workers in the Memphis metro area fill and stock orders, package materials and move materials by hand.
In Memphis, workers at distribution centers for FedEx, Nike and Kroger have tested positive for the coronavirus. The Shelby County Health Department received 64 complaints about businesses between April 1 and April 29, but could not say how many were about warehouses.
Interim guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention calls for employers to notify workers of positive cases. But it is voluntary. The federal OSHA has no such requirement, and neither does Tennessee’s OSHA.
Although Congress passed the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, which provides two weeks paid sick leave for coronavirus-affected or infected workers, it doesn’t apply to many warehouse and temporary employees, said Laura Padin, senior staff attorney at the Washington-based National Employment Law Project, which advocates for better public policy for workers, particularly low-wage workers.
“The big issue is that it exempts so many employers, especially employers with over 500 employees,” Padin said. “And the vast majority of temp workers and many warehouse workers work for employers with more than 500 employees.”
The coronavirus has disproportionately affected people of color, the very group that makes up the bulk of the warehouse and temporary workforce.
“Black workers make up 12% of the workforce but 26% of temp workers, and Latino workers make up 16% of the workforce but 25% of temp workers,” said Padin, citing Bureau of Labor Statistics data released in 2018.
Add to that the yawning racial wealth gap and low-wage workers like Meeks are in an untenable situation, Padin said.
“They either stay home and they risk their financial security,” Padin said, “or they go to work and risk their lives.”
“You Can Always Go Back”
With 1.45 million square feet of warehouse space among its four area locations, PFS is the ninth-largest third-party distribution operation in the metro area, according to the Memphis Business Journal’s 2020 Book of Lists. PFS doesn’t sell products under its own name but rather fulfills orders for better-known companies.
Pandora, which is perhaps best known for its charm bracelets, is one of PFS’s clients. “Each item shipped for PANDORA is wrapped in customized, branded, and sometimes seasonal packing materials, making every purchase a gift,” PFS’s website says.
Meeks’ favorite part of her job was taking each customer’s personal message, tucking it into a tiny envelope and then into the gift package.
“When we were sending out these Pandora bracelets and these Chanel gifts, I sat there and read all my cards,” said Meeks, who like all of the workers interviewed for this story, is black. “They were so cute.”
One Pandora customer sent a note to “beloved mother,” Meeks said, and another seemed to be from someone in a long-distance relationship.
“He was like: Even though I’m miles and miles away, I always think about you,” Meeks said. He wrote that he hoped the jewelry would “glitter in your eyes, or something like that.”
The day Meeks quit PFS, she said she called Prestigious Placement, the temporary agency that sent her there, asking for another job.
The temporary agency representative “was like, ‘Well, you can always go back to PFS until we get something else,’ and I was like, ‘No.’”
“She said, ‘Well, we haven’t had anyone to get sick,’” Meeks recalled.
Meeks said she tried to explain that regardless of whether some workers had tested positive, the company wasn’t taking enough steps, in her opinion, to keep current workers safe.
The representative said she’d ask the agency’s on-site manager about Meeks’ concerns, but Meeks said that there was no on-site manager present on her second or third day.
Prestigious Placement did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this story.
A local labor leader said Meeks’ experience illustrates the tough situation for temporary workers at warehouses.
“They tend not to have benefits, sick time and insurance and all the things that allow us to keep our whole community safe during a pandemic,” said Jeffrey Lichtenstein, executive secretary of the Memphis Labor Council, a federation of around 40 union locals.
Unlike companies such as Nike and FedEx, which have reputations to protect, the general public doesn’t know who PFS is or what it does, he said. “They have no brand vulnerability,” he said.
With little leverage to exert on businesses, these workers are up against a regional business model that mires them in dead-end, low-wage jobs, Lichtenstein said.
The city’s power brokers, he said, “have a couple of main tenets of their economic philosophy. One, logistics is really, really important, and two, cheap labor is very, very important.”
---
A Perfect Combination: Higher Pay and Less Risk
Just days after Meeks quit PFS, she turned to a different agency and was sent to a Memphis warehouse that labels and ships cleaning products.
Her first day was April 17, and she was impressed by the precautions the employer takes.
Before workers enter the building, Meeks said, their temperatures are taken in a white tent outside. If they don’t have a fever, they get a wristband that is a different color each day.
The company provides masks, gloves and goggles, she said, and there are even kickstands on the bathroom doors, so they can be opened by foot.
Working the third shift means fewer people, Meeks said. “We’re not working close to each other.”
Meeks said she wouldn’t put a price on her health, but at her new job, the risks are lower and the pay higher — up from $9 to $11.50 an hour.
CIRCA 1870: A CARTOON SATIRISING THE SWEATSHOPS OF THE CLOTHING INDUSTRY. ORIGINAL ARTIST: BY JOHN LEECH FROM PUNCH MAGAZINE. (PHOTO BY RISCHGITZ/GETTY IMAGES)
THEY WERE WARNED NOT TO TAKE SICK DAYS — THEN SIX WORKERS AT THEIR WAREHOUSE DIED OF CORONAVIRUS
Gabriel Thompson - the intercept
April 30 2020, 4:00 a.m.
AT LEAST SIX people who worked in a Long Island, New York, warehouse leased by Broadridge Financial Solutions have died of Covid-19, according to their family members and news reports.
Earlier this month, The Intercept and Type Investigations reported that employees of TMG Mail Solutions, a Broadridge contractor that prints and mails financial documents, had been pressured to work during the Covid-19 pandemic even as some of their co-workers tested positive for the virus. The workers also expressed concerns that delays in the provision of personal protective equipment like masks and gloves made an outbreak inevitable.
Broadridge Financial Solutions is a global financial services company that made nearly $4.4 billion in revenue last year. The production floor of the warehouse is staffed by Broadridge employees and TMG employees, along with employees of Randstad, a multinational staffing firm that has an office inside the building.
Four of the deceased workers were Broadridge employees, according to their families, and two were employees of Randstad.
Randstad declined to answer questions, noting that “personal employee information is considered confidential.” Broadridge declined to provide the number of employees who have contracted Covid-19 or the number who have died from the virus, citing privacy concerns.
“Our thoughts are with the families and co-workers at this difficult time,” Broadridge spokesperson Gregg Rosenberg wrote in an email. “This is a terrible loss for the Broadridge community. The health and safety of our employees, their families, and our community are our highest priority, and we have implemented extraordinary safety measures to keep workers safe in advance of public health guidelines.”
A representative of TMG said that fewer than 10 of its employees at the Broadridge warehouse had tested positive for the virus and that none had died.
ONE OF THE Randstad employees, Jose Bonilla Flores, had worked at the company for more than a decade, according to his wife, Ana Menjivar, who works for TMG. She described him as a diligent and tireless worker, someone who didn’t mind the 12-hour shifts, seven days a week that they both worked during the busy spring season when proxy statements were printed and shipped. The couple, from El Salvador, had met at the warehouse four years ago and have a 3-year-old son, Jonathan.
Like many warehouse workers, Flores and Menjivar were anxious about the coronavirus and had heard rumors that it was spreading among workers. “We were scared — that’s all we talked about,” Menjivar said. “At the same time, we didn’t want to lose work.”
Menjivar said she had been among the TMG workers to receive a flyer on the warehouse floor. As The Intercept and Type Investigations previously reported, the flyer warned, “If you don’t show up for work you will not be paid and after two days you will be considered to have abandoned your job.” The flyer also discouraged TMG employees from wearing masks or gloves unless they were sick or had compromised immune systems.
Flores, 53, had a slight cough and lost his sense of smell and taste but continued to work until April 2, when he developed a fever. The following day, he visited Brentwood Medical Center, where he was diagnosed with suspected Covid-19. A test determined he was positive. By then, Menjivar had also come down with symptoms of Covid-19 and was instructed by the same doctor to quarantine at home.
Over the next two weeks, Menjivar, whose symptoms were less severe, cared for her husband. He was weak and bedridden, she said, but his condition appeared to be stable until April 17, when he was suddenly unable to speak. She immediately called 911, but by the time the paramedics arrived, he had already died from a heart attack caused by the virus, a trend among Covid-19 patients that is alarming cardiac experts.
Menjivar said that neither she nor Flores had been provided masks or gloves to wear at work. She said that Flores’s final day at work was April 2 and hers was April 3. “The only thing that the companies care about is production,” she said over the phone between sobs. “They didn’t start giving people masks until he was already sick.”
Another Randstad employee, Lucio Acosta, 64, also died in April of Covid-19. His daughter, Mayra Acosta, said that her father had worked for Randstad for many years and that he had tested positive for Covid-19 at Southside Hospital in Bay Shore, New York. A close friend and co-worker, Luis Flores, also confirmed that Acosta worked for Randstad.
A Randstad spokesperson, Madison Southall, declined to say if or when employees were provided personal protective equipment like masks and gloves, stating that the company was “following applicable state and local orders as well as guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and public health authorities with respect to providing employees with protective equipment.”
Rosenberg, the Broadridge spokesperson, previously told The Intercept and Type Investigations that, in early April, the company provided gloves, masks, and hand sanitizer to its own employees and, a week later, offered the protective gear to all workers in the warehouse. In response to a recent inquiry, however, Rosenberg said that this had been a miscommunication. He said that Broadridge managers had handed out masks on March 26 to all workers on the production floor — including workers for TMG, Randstad, and Broadridge — and strongly encouraged them to wear them.
Menjivar and three other current TMG employees, all of whom work on the production floor, contradicted Rosenberg’s account. Menjivar, who worked until April 3, said she never received a mask nor was encouraged to wear one. Three other current TMG employees also reported that they were not provided protective equipment until April, after The Intercept and Type Investigations first contacted Broadridge. Menjivar also said that she saw one TMG worker wearing a mask brought from home. A supervisor confronted the worker and made them remove it, she said, saying that masks were prohibited unless the worker had a doctor’s note saying it was necessary.
An attorney representing TMG, James Prusinowski, did not respond to Menjivar’s account, stating that the company cannot discuss specific employee matters. He also declined to state if or when TMG employees were provided masks and gloves. “TMG is following and has followed all applicable CDC guidelines and NY requirements regarding social distancing, use of PPEs and other protocols to ensure employees remain safe during this period,” he wrote in an email.
IN ADDITION TO the Randstad employees, four employees of Broadridge have died from Covid-19, according to family members. Among the deceased is Juan Gonzalez, a broad-shouldered 49-year-old who worked in the quality control department, his sister said. Gonzalez had served in the Navy, she said, and worked at Broadridge more than a dozen years. He died on the same date as Flores, April 17, after being on a ventilator in the hospital for two weeks.[...]
Earlier this month, The Intercept and Type Investigations reported that employees of TMG Mail Solutions, a Broadridge contractor that prints and mails financial documents, had been pressured to work during the Covid-19 pandemic even as some of their co-workers tested positive for the virus. The workers also expressed concerns that delays in the provision of personal protective equipment like masks and gloves made an outbreak inevitable.
Broadridge Financial Solutions is a global financial services company that made nearly $4.4 billion in revenue last year. The production floor of the warehouse is staffed by Broadridge employees and TMG employees, along with employees of Randstad, a multinational staffing firm that has an office inside the building.
Four of the deceased workers were Broadridge employees, according to their families, and two were employees of Randstad.
Randstad declined to answer questions, noting that “personal employee information is considered confidential.” Broadridge declined to provide the number of employees who have contracted Covid-19 or the number who have died from the virus, citing privacy concerns.
“Our thoughts are with the families and co-workers at this difficult time,” Broadridge spokesperson Gregg Rosenberg wrote in an email. “This is a terrible loss for the Broadridge community. The health and safety of our employees, their families, and our community are our highest priority, and we have implemented extraordinary safety measures to keep workers safe in advance of public health guidelines.”
A representative of TMG said that fewer than 10 of its employees at the Broadridge warehouse had tested positive for the virus and that none had died.
ONE OF THE Randstad employees, Jose Bonilla Flores, had worked at the company for more than a decade, according to his wife, Ana Menjivar, who works for TMG. She described him as a diligent and tireless worker, someone who didn’t mind the 12-hour shifts, seven days a week that they both worked during the busy spring season when proxy statements were printed and shipped. The couple, from El Salvador, had met at the warehouse four years ago and have a 3-year-old son, Jonathan.
Like many warehouse workers, Flores and Menjivar were anxious about the coronavirus and had heard rumors that it was spreading among workers. “We were scared — that’s all we talked about,” Menjivar said. “At the same time, we didn’t want to lose work.”
Menjivar said she had been among the TMG workers to receive a flyer on the warehouse floor. As The Intercept and Type Investigations previously reported, the flyer warned, “If you don’t show up for work you will not be paid and after two days you will be considered to have abandoned your job.” The flyer also discouraged TMG employees from wearing masks or gloves unless they were sick or had compromised immune systems.
Flores, 53, had a slight cough and lost his sense of smell and taste but continued to work until April 2, when he developed a fever. The following day, he visited Brentwood Medical Center, where he was diagnosed with suspected Covid-19. A test determined he was positive. By then, Menjivar had also come down with symptoms of Covid-19 and was instructed by the same doctor to quarantine at home.
Over the next two weeks, Menjivar, whose symptoms were less severe, cared for her husband. He was weak and bedridden, she said, but his condition appeared to be stable until April 17, when he was suddenly unable to speak. She immediately called 911, but by the time the paramedics arrived, he had already died from a heart attack caused by the virus, a trend among Covid-19 patients that is alarming cardiac experts.
Menjivar said that neither she nor Flores had been provided masks or gloves to wear at work. She said that Flores’s final day at work was April 2 and hers was April 3. “The only thing that the companies care about is production,” she said over the phone between sobs. “They didn’t start giving people masks until he was already sick.”
Another Randstad employee, Lucio Acosta, 64, also died in April of Covid-19. His daughter, Mayra Acosta, said that her father had worked for Randstad for many years and that he had tested positive for Covid-19 at Southside Hospital in Bay Shore, New York. A close friend and co-worker, Luis Flores, also confirmed that Acosta worked for Randstad.
A Randstad spokesperson, Madison Southall, declined to say if or when employees were provided personal protective equipment like masks and gloves, stating that the company was “following applicable state and local orders as well as guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and public health authorities with respect to providing employees with protective equipment.”
Rosenberg, the Broadridge spokesperson, previously told The Intercept and Type Investigations that, in early April, the company provided gloves, masks, and hand sanitizer to its own employees and, a week later, offered the protective gear to all workers in the warehouse. In response to a recent inquiry, however, Rosenberg said that this had been a miscommunication. He said that Broadridge managers had handed out masks on March 26 to all workers on the production floor — including workers for TMG, Randstad, and Broadridge — and strongly encouraged them to wear them.
Menjivar and three other current TMG employees, all of whom work on the production floor, contradicted Rosenberg’s account. Menjivar, who worked until April 3, said she never received a mask nor was encouraged to wear one. Three other current TMG employees also reported that they were not provided protective equipment until April, after The Intercept and Type Investigations first contacted Broadridge. Menjivar also said that she saw one TMG worker wearing a mask brought from home. A supervisor confronted the worker and made them remove it, she said, saying that masks were prohibited unless the worker had a doctor’s note saying it was necessary.
An attorney representing TMG, James Prusinowski, did not respond to Menjivar’s account, stating that the company cannot discuss specific employee matters. He also declined to state if or when TMG employees were provided masks and gloves. “TMG is following and has followed all applicable CDC guidelines and NY requirements regarding social distancing, use of PPEs and other protocols to ensure employees remain safe during this period,” he wrote in an email.
IN ADDITION TO the Randstad employees, four employees of Broadridge have died from Covid-19, according to family members. Among the deceased is Juan Gonzalez, a broad-shouldered 49-year-old who worked in the quality control department, his sister said. Gonzalez had served in the Navy, she said, and worked at Broadridge more than a dozen years. He died on the same date as Flores, April 17, after being on a ventilator in the hospital for two weeks.[...]
Trump using coronavirus stimulus to ‘enrich corporate executives’ while showing ‘complete disregard’ for workers: top unions
April 28, 2020
By Jake Johnson, Common Dreams
Leaders of some of the largest labor unions in the United States are warning that the Trump administration is brushing aside the interests of workers in its distribution of trillions of dollars in coronavirus bailout funds and instead using the taxpayer money to further enrich wealthy corporate executives.
As funds authorized by the multi-trillion-dollar CARES Act begin to fly out the door, the unions wrote in letters (pdf) to Democratic leaders Monday that they “are troubled that important worker protections are not being required of recipients.”
“Specifically, we are alarmed that the Federal Reserve’s lending facility for large businesses does not require those companies to maintain workers on payroll, while the program for mid-sized businesses fails to include anti-outsourcing provisions or any provisions protecting workers’ right to organize,” the unions wrote. “This means that, rather than protect good, family-supporting jobs as you intended, the funds can be used to enrich corporate executives and shareholders without regard for workers.”
The unions sent the letters to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), and Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio.). The letters’ signatories include Dan Mauer of the Communications Workers of America, Tor Cowan of the American Federation of Teachers, and John Gray of the Service Employees International Union.
The CARES Act, which President Donald Trump signed into law last month, contains some restrictions on corporate recipients of federal bailout funds—including limits on layoffs, stock buybacks, and executive compensation—but the law also empowers Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin to waive those restrictions, effectively rendering them meaningless.
“We were happy to see that one of the provisions of the CARES Act required that most employers receiving taxpayer funds would be required to keep 90% of their employees on payroll,” the unions wrote Monday. “Unfortunately the Trump administration and the Federal Reserve effectively waived any requirement to maintain workforces at companies receiving aid.”
“The Treasury Department, meanwhile, has failed to follow guidance under the CARES Act protections for airline payrolls, potentially risking good jobs in those sectors, as well,” the unions said.
The unions’ warnings came as progressives continue to raise alarm about how the trillions of dollars in corporate bailout funds are being utilized, particularly given that the limited oversight mechanisms established by the CARES Act are not yet fully functional.
The Federal Reserve has committed to making public the names of companies that receive bailout money, but the central bank has not said it will release the terms and conditions of the taxpayer loans.
The unions demanded Monday that Democratic lawmakers work to guarantee that any future stimulus package contains enforceable restrictions to protect workers and prevent profiteering by corporate executives.
“We urge you to ensure that any future legislation responding to the pandemic and the economic fallout includes not only robust worker protection provisions, but that those provisions are binding and enforceable on recipients of federal taxpayer assistance, without the loopholes in the CARES Act that the Trump administration has exploited to undermine them already,” the labor leaders wrote.
“We cannot yet again have the federal government bailing out corporations and major employers and leaving workers with no meaningful protections,” they added.[...]
As funds authorized by the multi-trillion-dollar CARES Act begin to fly out the door, the unions wrote in letters (pdf) to Democratic leaders Monday that they “are troubled that important worker protections are not being required of recipients.”
“Specifically, we are alarmed that the Federal Reserve’s lending facility for large businesses does not require those companies to maintain workers on payroll, while the program for mid-sized businesses fails to include anti-outsourcing provisions or any provisions protecting workers’ right to organize,” the unions wrote. “This means that, rather than protect good, family-supporting jobs as you intended, the funds can be used to enrich corporate executives and shareholders without regard for workers.”
The unions sent the letters to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), and Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio.). The letters’ signatories include Dan Mauer of the Communications Workers of America, Tor Cowan of the American Federation of Teachers, and John Gray of the Service Employees International Union.
The CARES Act, which President Donald Trump signed into law last month, contains some restrictions on corporate recipients of federal bailout funds—including limits on layoffs, stock buybacks, and executive compensation—but the law also empowers Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin to waive those restrictions, effectively rendering them meaningless.
“We were happy to see that one of the provisions of the CARES Act required that most employers receiving taxpayer funds would be required to keep 90% of their employees on payroll,” the unions wrote Monday. “Unfortunately the Trump administration and the Federal Reserve effectively waived any requirement to maintain workforces at companies receiving aid.”
“The Treasury Department, meanwhile, has failed to follow guidance under the CARES Act protections for airline payrolls, potentially risking good jobs in those sectors, as well,” the unions said.
The unions’ warnings came as progressives continue to raise alarm about how the trillions of dollars in corporate bailout funds are being utilized, particularly given that the limited oversight mechanisms established by the CARES Act are not yet fully functional.
The Federal Reserve has committed to making public the names of companies that receive bailout money, but the central bank has not said it will release the terms and conditions of the taxpayer loans.
The unions demanded Monday that Democratic lawmakers work to guarantee that any future stimulus package contains enforceable restrictions to protect workers and prevent profiteering by corporate executives.
“We urge you to ensure that any future legislation responding to the pandemic and the economic fallout includes not only robust worker protection provisions, but that those provisions are binding and enforceable on recipients of federal taxpayer assistance, without the loopholes in the CARES Act that the Trump administration has exploited to undermine them already,” the labor leaders wrote.
“We cannot yet again have the federal government bailing out corporations and major employers and leaving workers with no meaningful protections,” they added.[...]
Despite COVID-19, Trump Keeps on Gutting Protections for Workers
BY Mike Ludwig, Truthout
PUBLISHED April 25, 2020
Last year, the Trump administration finalized the rollback of a 2016 rule requiring employers to electronically file detailed logs of injuries and illness in the workplace with federal safety regulators. Employers were already supposed to keep the logs on hand, and the rule was designed to help safety inspectors, unions and employers identify workplace hazards across industries and individual companies — including hazards that contribute to the spread of diseases like COVID-19.
However, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other business interests opposed the transparency requirement, and President Trump added the rule to the long list of federal regulations he has loosened or tossed out since taking office. Now, the Trump administration is reportedly poised to further gut federal rules for businesses as lobbyists for wealthy employers push back against calls for paid sick leave and enhanced workplace protections in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Advocates says enforcement of labor standards has plummeted under Trump, and previous deregulatory moves have already put essential and front line workers in danger of taking unnecessary risks and falling ill.
“Without universal health insurance, without universal sick leave, with a growing gig economy, and without our federal safety agency taking action … we’re all at greater risk for the spread of COVID-19 and other infectious diseases,” said Marcy Goldstein-Gelb, co-executive director of the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (National COSH), during a virtual press conference on Thursday. “Worker health is public health. The coronavirus and other hazards don’t stay put in any one workplace.”
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the federal agency tasked with enforcing workplace safety standards and protecting workers, established the injury and illness reporting rule under President Obama before suspending and gutting the rule under Trump. An ongoing lawsuit filed by public health groups claims the agency jammed the rollback through the regulatory process without clear supporting evidence. Meanwhile, labor advocates say OSHA has sat on the sidelines despite the escalating threat COVID-19 poses to front line workers nationwide. Instead of implementing temporary, emergency standards and investigating a massive backlog of complaints from workers, OSHA has issued a series of “alerts” and voluntary “guidance” for employers.
For example, OSHA and the Labor Department has so far refused to issue emergency safety standards for nurses and health care workers, despite petitions from unions and public health groups. Goldstein-Gelb pointed to slaughterhouses and meatpacking plants linked to hundreds of COVID-19 cases and several deaths that have yet to be seriously penalized by the government. Last week OSHA cut employers some slack and announced that inspectors will take their “good faith” efforts to comply with health and safety standards into “strong consideration” when deciding whether to issue a citation during the COVID-19 outbreak. An employer may fail to protect workers from the coronavirus, but an honest attempt may be enough to avoid a fine. Eugene Scalia, Trump’s labor secretary, previously defended corporate bosses in court and is facing blowback over apparent attempts to trim paid sick leave and unemployment rolls. A spokeswoman for OSHA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“It is absolutely a disaster that, at the federal level, OHSA has taken a big back seat in protecting workings in this crisis,” Goldstein-Gelb said. “They have every tool possible to be able to initiate an emergency standard, to take action in terms of investigations and enforcement using both existing tools and new tools, and have failed to do so.”
OSHA enforcement actions and workplace inspections continue to fall under Trump despite an uptick in deaths on the job, according to a new report from National COSH. In 2018, 5,520 U.S. workers died from workplace trauma, a nearly 9 percent increase since 2014. The number of OSHA workplace inspections fell by 10.5 percent over the same time period. Fatality rates are rising even faster among workers of color, who are more likely to work under dangerous conditions. From 2014 to 2018, the number of deaths among Latinx and Black workers increased by nearly 20 and 30 percent respectively. Today, OSHA has just 875 inspectors covering about 9 million workplaces.
“Tragically, the higher rates of illness and death from COVID-19 we are seeing in Latinx and African American communities track the higher rates of workplace injuries and fatalities we see in the same populations in the workplace,” said National COSH co-director Jessica Martinez.
Trump’s deregulatory blitz began shortly after he took office with an executive order that requires federal agencies to eliminate two rules for every new rule they implement, making it difficult for regulators to adapt to new challenges posed by the outbreak. By the time the pandemic hit, Trump had already blocked the Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces rule, which would have helped ensure that federal contracts only go to employers who follow basic labor and employment laws, according to the Economic Policy Institute. Now, the administration says further deregulation is necessary to blunt the outbreaks damage to the economy and hopes to grant liability waivers that would clear businesses of legal responsibility if their employees get sick or die from COVID-19. Meanwhile, business groups successfully lobbied the White House to exempt large employers from paid sick leave requirements in Congress’s initial COVID-19 stimulus package.
With a friend in the White House, powerful industry groups have pushed back against state and local attempts to establish paid sick leave requirements and raise the minimum wage, forcing low-paid workers to choose between showing up sick and losing much-needed income. Horacio Ruiz, a server at the Capital Grille in Pittsburgh, told reporters on Thursday that he’s seen co-workers and even managers come into work when they are sick and should be at home. Ruiz worked with Restaurant Opportunity Centers (ROC) United to pass a paid sick leave law in Pittsburgh five years ago, but a legal challenge filed by an affiliate of the powerful National Restaurant Association held the law up in court.
“Our city council passed a paid sick leave law five years ago, but the state affiliate of the National Restaurant Association fought us in court, so it didn’t go into effect until March of this year,” Ruiz said. “If the restaurant owners didn’t fight us for so long, workers in Pittsburgh would have had more paid sick leave credit when this pandemic began.”
As the pandemic continues, Goldstein-Gelb said her organization receives “frequent” reports from workers who face retaliation for refusing to work in unsafe conditions or stay home due to a weakened immune system or a sick loved one. Teófilo L. Reyes, the deputy research director at ROC United, said some employers are doing the right thing despite the deregulatory atmosphere created by Trump. For example, the corporation behind restaurant chains such as Olive Garden and Longhorn Steakhouse agreed to provide accrued paid sick leave to hourly employees after facing public pressure. However, other large employers are enjoying the federal exemption, and Reyes said that makes any workplace that remains open more dangerous.
“If someone is sick, their incentive is to keep quiet about it as long as possible, because they are not allowed to take time off to take care of themselves,” Reyes said in an interview.
Meanwhile, back in Pittsburgh, Ruiz said he and other restaurant employees have already spent their federal stimulus checks and what sick pay they had on rent and groceries. Restaurants in the city remain closed due to the outbreak.
“I do not know what will happen to us if this pandemic continues for a longer period of time,” Ruiz said.
However, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other business interests opposed the transparency requirement, and President Trump added the rule to the long list of federal regulations he has loosened or tossed out since taking office. Now, the Trump administration is reportedly poised to further gut federal rules for businesses as lobbyists for wealthy employers push back against calls for paid sick leave and enhanced workplace protections in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Advocates says enforcement of labor standards has plummeted under Trump, and previous deregulatory moves have already put essential and front line workers in danger of taking unnecessary risks and falling ill.
“Without universal health insurance, without universal sick leave, with a growing gig economy, and without our federal safety agency taking action … we’re all at greater risk for the spread of COVID-19 and other infectious diseases,” said Marcy Goldstein-Gelb, co-executive director of the National Council for Occupational Safety and Health (National COSH), during a virtual press conference on Thursday. “Worker health is public health. The coronavirus and other hazards don’t stay put in any one workplace.”
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the federal agency tasked with enforcing workplace safety standards and protecting workers, established the injury and illness reporting rule under President Obama before suspending and gutting the rule under Trump. An ongoing lawsuit filed by public health groups claims the agency jammed the rollback through the regulatory process without clear supporting evidence. Meanwhile, labor advocates say OSHA has sat on the sidelines despite the escalating threat COVID-19 poses to front line workers nationwide. Instead of implementing temporary, emergency standards and investigating a massive backlog of complaints from workers, OSHA has issued a series of “alerts” and voluntary “guidance” for employers.
For example, OSHA and the Labor Department has so far refused to issue emergency safety standards for nurses and health care workers, despite petitions from unions and public health groups. Goldstein-Gelb pointed to slaughterhouses and meatpacking plants linked to hundreds of COVID-19 cases and several deaths that have yet to be seriously penalized by the government. Last week OSHA cut employers some slack and announced that inspectors will take their “good faith” efforts to comply with health and safety standards into “strong consideration” when deciding whether to issue a citation during the COVID-19 outbreak. An employer may fail to protect workers from the coronavirus, but an honest attempt may be enough to avoid a fine. Eugene Scalia, Trump’s labor secretary, previously defended corporate bosses in court and is facing blowback over apparent attempts to trim paid sick leave and unemployment rolls. A spokeswoman for OSHA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
“It is absolutely a disaster that, at the federal level, OHSA has taken a big back seat in protecting workings in this crisis,” Goldstein-Gelb said. “They have every tool possible to be able to initiate an emergency standard, to take action in terms of investigations and enforcement using both existing tools and new tools, and have failed to do so.”
OSHA enforcement actions and workplace inspections continue to fall under Trump despite an uptick in deaths on the job, according to a new report from National COSH. In 2018, 5,520 U.S. workers died from workplace trauma, a nearly 9 percent increase since 2014. The number of OSHA workplace inspections fell by 10.5 percent over the same time period. Fatality rates are rising even faster among workers of color, who are more likely to work under dangerous conditions. From 2014 to 2018, the number of deaths among Latinx and Black workers increased by nearly 20 and 30 percent respectively. Today, OSHA has just 875 inspectors covering about 9 million workplaces.
“Tragically, the higher rates of illness and death from COVID-19 we are seeing in Latinx and African American communities track the higher rates of workplace injuries and fatalities we see in the same populations in the workplace,” said National COSH co-director Jessica Martinez.
Trump’s deregulatory blitz began shortly after he took office with an executive order that requires federal agencies to eliminate two rules for every new rule they implement, making it difficult for regulators to adapt to new challenges posed by the outbreak. By the time the pandemic hit, Trump had already blocked the Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces rule, which would have helped ensure that federal contracts only go to employers who follow basic labor and employment laws, according to the Economic Policy Institute. Now, the administration says further deregulation is necessary to blunt the outbreaks damage to the economy and hopes to grant liability waivers that would clear businesses of legal responsibility if their employees get sick or die from COVID-19. Meanwhile, business groups successfully lobbied the White House to exempt large employers from paid sick leave requirements in Congress’s initial COVID-19 stimulus package.
With a friend in the White House, powerful industry groups have pushed back against state and local attempts to establish paid sick leave requirements and raise the minimum wage, forcing low-paid workers to choose between showing up sick and losing much-needed income. Horacio Ruiz, a server at the Capital Grille in Pittsburgh, told reporters on Thursday that he’s seen co-workers and even managers come into work when they are sick and should be at home. Ruiz worked with Restaurant Opportunity Centers (ROC) United to pass a paid sick leave law in Pittsburgh five years ago, but a legal challenge filed by an affiliate of the powerful National Restaurant Association held the law up in court.
“Our city council passed a paid sick leave law five years ago, but the state affiliate of the National Restaurant Association fought us in court, so it didn’t go into effect until March of this year,” Ruiz said. “If the restaurant owners didn’t fight us for so long, workers in Pittsburgh would have had more paid sick leave credit when this pandemic began.”
As the pandemic continues, Goldstein-Gelb said her organization receives “frequent” reports from workers who face retaliation for refusing to work in unsafe conditions or stay home due to a weakened immune system or a sick loved one. Teófilo L. Reyes, the deputy research director at ROC United, said some employers are doing the right thing despite the deregulatory atmosphere created by Trump. For example, the corporation behind restaurant chains such as Olive Garden and Longhorn Steakhouse agreed to provide accrued paid sick leave to hourly employees after facing public pressure. However, other large employers are enjoying the federal exemption, and Reyes said that makes any workplace that remains open more dangerous.
“If someone is sick, their incentive is to keep quiet about it as long as possible, because they are not allowed to take time off to take care of themselves,” Reyes said in an interview.
Meanwhile, back in Pittsburgh, Ruiz said he and other restaurant employees have already spent their federal stimulus checks and what sick pay they had on rent and groceries. Restaurants in the city remain closed due to the outbreak.
“I do not know what will happen to us if this pandemic continues for a longer period of time,” Ruiz said.
Coronavirus outbreak
Trader Joe’s and other US firms suppress unionization efforts during pandemic
As workers become increasingly concerned about workplace safety, employers have been suppressing organizing efforts
Michael Sainato
the guardian
Thu 23 Apr 2020 05.00 EDT
US corporations are cracking down on unionization efforts as workers try to organize under the shadow of the coronavirus pandemic.
Companies, including grocery chains Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods, airport concession operators, local authorities and even a furniture company owned by the billionaire Warren Buffett have moved to control efforts to unionize as workers become increasingly concerned about workplace safety during the emergency.
The Trader Joe’s chairman and CEO, Dan Bane, sent a letter to all employees on 31 March opposing labor unions, and calling attempts to recruit staff “a distraction”, the latest in a series of memos and actions taken by the company to suppress union organizing efforts calling for hazard pay and adequate protections for grocery store workers during the pandemic.
“It’s a blatant anti-union letter,” said a Trader Joe’s employee in New Jersey who requested to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. “It’s in bad taste and shows the greed this company has instead of taking proactive measures to keep the crew and customers safe.”
A Trader Joe’s spokesperson told the Guardian in an email, “Because a union has chosen to inject itself into the lives of our crew members during this time of crisis – even as we follow and lead in best practices in compensation, benefits, safety and sanitation – we have no alternative but to remind and share the facts with our crew members.”
As workers on the frontlines of the coronavirus pandemic have organized protests and strikes, several employers have responded by stepping up attempts to oppose unionization, repeal workers’ rights won in bargaining, and fire workers en masse who had recently publicized intent to organize a union in their workplace.
Concession workers at Orlando international airport have filed official complaints against their employer, HMSHost, over the lack of coronavirus safety protections, which included continuing to hold anti-union captive audience meetings during the pandemic. A union election for workers to join Unite Here scheduled for late March was delayed and is currently being rescheduled due to the pandemic.
“I tried to refuse to go because we were short-staffed,” said Rosanny Tejeda, a Starbucks barista at Orlando international airport for about one year before recently being furloughed. Tejeda claimed the meeting did not adhere to social distancing or take into account any coronavirus safety precautions, and she was targeted throughout the meeting for wearing a union pin.
“They didn’t care about our health when they sent us to those meetings,” said Tejeda. “To them, the union was a more important issue than the coronavirus. They made sure to give us papers about the union, but didn’t give us training or protective equipment for us in the stores.”
A spokesperson for HMSHost said in an email: “During these difficult times, we continue to prioritize the safety and well-being of our teams and travelers. As we try to serve the few passengers that are still traveling, we are educating our associates daily with updated guidance according to the CDC recommendations.”
Citing the pandemic, the manager of Clark county, Nevada, unilaterally suspended all union contracts with the county. The decision affects about 9,000 workers, including hospital workers at University Medical Center of Southern Nevada in Las Vegas.
A spokesperson for University Medical Center told the Guardian “due to the rapidly evolving nature of this global pandemic, we simply do not have time to delay urgent decisions”.
The Teamsters union has filed federal unfair labor practice charges of unlawful termination against CORT furniture, a subsidiary of billionaire Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, accusing the furniture rental company of retaliating against workers for supporting unionization just as the pandemic broke in the US.
Anthony Salcedo, a driver at the warehouse for nearly four years who was laid off, said: “They’re telling us the reason why they terminated us is because of work reduction, but how is there work reduction if you are hiring contractors to do our work? It’s obvious why we were terminated. It wasn’t because of work reduction, it was because we were supporting a union.”
CORT furniture declined to comment, citing pending litigation.
Several other companies have been accused of opposing union organizing efforts among workers during the pandemic. Amazon-owned Whole Foods is using a data-powered heat mapping tool to monitor unionization risks among its over 500 stores throughout the US, as workers have held sick-out protests in response to a lack of protections for workers during the pandemic. Workers at the online clothing retailer Everlane and the art logistics company Uovo have filed federal labor charges accusing the companies of firing workers during the pandemic for union organizing.
“It’s an absolute disgrace they would take advantage of a pandemic to frustrate workers’ ability to organize and get better representation for themselves so they’re not risking their lives to perform essential services,” said Celine McNicholas, government affairs director at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).
According to a December 2019 EPI study, in over 40% of union organizing campaigns an employer violates the law.
“This is an extreme moment we’re in, but unfortunately this is the traditional employer playbook in opposing workers’ efforts to organize and collectively bargain for better pay and better health and safety provisions,” added McNicholas.
Companies, including grocery chains Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods, airport concession operators, local authorities and even a furniture company owned by the billionaire Warren Buffett have moved to control efforts to unionize as workers become increasingly concerned about workplace safety during the emergency.
The Trader Joe’s chairman and CEO, Dan Bane, sent a letter to all employees on 31 March opposing labor unions, and calling attempts to recruit staff “a distraction”, the latest in a series of memos and actions taken by the company to suppress union organizing efforts calling for hazard pay and adequate protections for grocery store workers during the pandemic.
“It’s a blatant anti-union letter,” said a Trader Joe’s employee in New Jersey who requested to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. “It’s in bad taste and shows the greed this company has instead of taking proactive measures to keep the crew and customers safe.”
A Trader Joe’s spokesperson told the Guardian in an email, “Because a union has chosen to inject itself into the lives of our crew members during this time of crisis – even as we follow and lead in best practices in compensation, benefits, safety and sanitation – we have no alternative but to remind and share the facts with our crew members.”
As workers on the frontlines of the coronavirus pandemic have organized protests and strikes, several employers have responded by stepping up attempts to oppose unionization, repeal workers’ rights won in bargaining, and fire workers en masse who had recently publicized intent to organize a union in their workplace.
Concession workers at Orlando international airport have filed official complaints against their employer, HMSHost, over the lack of coronavirus safety protections, which included continuing to hold anti-union captive audience meetings during the pandemic. A union election for workers to join Unite Here scheduled for late March was delayed and is currently being rescheduled due to the pandemic.
“I tried to refuse to go because we were short-staffed,” said Rosanny Tejeda, a Starbucks barista at Orlando international airport for about one year before recently being furloughed. Tejeda claimed the meeting did not adhere to social distancing or take into account any coronavirus safety precautions, and she was targeted throughout the meeting for wearing a union pin.
“They didn’t care about our health when they sent us to those meetings,” said Tejeda. “To them, the union was a more important issue than the coronavirus. They made sure to give us papers about the union, but didn’t give us training or protective equipment for us in the stores.”
A spokesperson for HMSHost said in an email: “During these difficult times, we continue to prioritize the safety and well-being of our teams and travelers. As we try to serve the few passengers that are still traveling, we are educating our associates daily with updated guidance according to the CDC recommendations.”
Citing the pandemic, the manager of Clark county, Nevada, unilaterally suspended all union contracts with the county. The decision affects about 9,000 workers, including hospital workers at University Medical Center of Southern Nevada in Las Vegas.
A spokesperson for University Medical Center told the Guardian “due to the rapidly evolving nature of this global pandemic, we simply do not have time to delay urgent decisions”.
The Teamsters union has filed federal unfair labor practice charges of unlawful termination against CORT furniture, a subsidiary of billionaire Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, accusing the furniture rental company of retaliating against workers for supporting unionization just as the pandemic broke in the US.
Anthony Salcedo, a driver at the warehouse for nearly four years who was laid off, said: “They’re telling us the reason why they terminated us is because of work reduction, but how is there work reduction if you are hiring contractors to do our work? It’s obvious why we were terminated. It wasn’t because of work reduction, it was because we were supporting a union.”
CORT furniture declined to comment, citing pending litigation.
Several other companies have been accused of opposing union organizing efforts among workers during the pandemic. Amazon-owned Whole Foods is using a data-powered heat mapping tool to monitor unionization risks among its over 500 stores throughout the US, as workers have held sick-out protests in response to a lack of protections for workers during the pandemic. Workers at the online clothing retailer Everlane and the art logistics company Uovo have filed federal labor charges accusing the companies of firing workers during the pandemic for union organizing.
“It’s an absolute disgrace they would take advantage of a pandemic to frustrate workers’ ability to organize and get better representation for themselves so they’re not risking their lives to perform essential services,” said Celine McNicholas, government affairs director at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).
According to a December 2019 EPI study, in over 40% of union organizing campaigns an employer violates the law.
“This is an extreme moment we’re in, but unfortunately this is the traditional employer playbook in opposing workers’ efforts to organize and collectively bargain for better pay and better health and safety provisions,” added McNicholas.
‘Minority report union-busting’ tactics at Whole Foods decried following reporting on company’s labor activism heat map
April 20, 2020
By Common Dreams - raw story
The company, which is owned by Amazon, uses factors like race, turnover, and “loyalty” to determine each store’s score.
Progressives on Monday criticized Whole Foods, the grocery chain owned by Amazon, for using a heat map to track potential union activity at its stores across the U.S.—relying on data around racial diversity, “loyalty,” and labor complaints as indicators that affect how the corporation scores the sites.
“This is infuriating but it’s also a testament to the urgency and importance of essential workers unionizing,” tweeted The Atlantic‘s Adam Serwer.
Business Insider‘s Hayley Peterson on Monday broke the “legitimately explosive news” of the heat map and scoring system being used at the company’s 510 stores nationwide.
According to Peterson’s reporting:
The stores’ individual risk scores are calculated from more than two dozen metrics, including employee “loyalty,” turnover, and racial diversity; “tipline” calls to human resources; proximity to a union office; and violations recorded by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
The map also tracks local economic and demographic factors such as the unemployment rate in a store’s location and the percentage of families in the area living below the poverty line.
Whole Foods and Amazon have resisted unionization efforts even as the coronavirus pandemic has amped up worker frustrations and led to strikes and actions around the country. Workers are increasingly fed up with inadequate safety standards and access to protective equipment at the essential grocery stores and retail distribution centers.
As Common Dreams reported on April 15, Whole Foods and Amazon owner Jeff Bezos, the richest man in the world, has already made $24 billion in 2020 as the pandemic rages around the country and the world.
Progressives reacted to the news of the heat map with outrage, with Vice reporter Ashwin Rodrigues referring to the tactic as “minority report union busting.”
Journalist Ben Norton on Twitter echoed the apocalyptic fiction theme.
“We are living in a real-life dystopia,” said Norton, adding, “This is some evil science fiction shit.”
Progressives on Monday criticized Whole Foods, the grocery chain owned by Amazon, for using a heat map to track potential union activity at its stores across the U.S.—relying on data around racial diversity, “loyalty,” and labor complaints as indicators that affect how the corporation scores the sites.
“This is infuriating but it’s also a testament to the urgency and importance of essential workers unionizing,” tweeted The Atlantic‘s Adam Serwer.
Business Insider‘s Hayley Peterson on Monday broke the “legitimately explosive news” of the heat map and scoring system being used at the company’s 510 stores nationwide.
According to Peterson’s reporting:
The stores’ individual risk scores are calculated from more than two dozen metrics, including employee “loyalty,” turnover, and racial diversity; “tipline” calls to human resources; proximity to a union office; and violations recorded by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.
The map also tracks local economic and demographic factors such as the unemployment rate in a store’s location and the percentage of families in the area living below the poverty line.
Whole Foods and Amazon have resisted unionization efforts even as the coronavirus pandemic has amped up worker frustrations and led to strikes and actions around the country. Workers are increasingly fed up with inadequate safety standards and access to protective equipment at the essential grocery stores and retail distribution centers.
As Common Dreams reported on April 15, Whole Foods and Amazon owner Jeff Bezos, the richest man in the world, has already made $24 billion in 2020 as the pandemic rages around the country and the world.
Progressives reacted to the news of the heat map with outrage, with Vice reporter Ashwin Rodrigues referring to the tactic as “minority report union busting.”
Journalist Ben Norton on Twitter echoed the apocalyptic fiction theme.
“We are living in a real-life dystopia,” said Norton, adding, “This is some evil science fiction shit.”
stupidity and greed!!!
EMPLOYEES SAY SMITHFIELD PLANT IN WISCONSIN CONCEALED COVID-19 INFECTIONS, PRESSURED THEM TO WORK ELBOW-TO-ELBOW WITHOUT PROTECTION
Lee Fang - the intercept
April 19 2020, 3:30 a.m.
SMITHFIELD FOODS, the meat industry giant facing mounting questions over its handling of the coronavirus crisis, repeatedly failed to protect its workforce at a Wisconsin plant, according to workers who spoke to The Intercept.
The workers at the Patrick Cudahy factory, in Cudahy, Wisconsin, faced a Covid-19 outbreak weeks ago, but say managers initially concealed the number of infected, pressured employees to avoid quarantine measures, and failed to provide any face masks or dividers.
A recent outbreak at Smithfield’s pork processing plant in Sioux Falls, S.D., is now one of the largest Covid-19 hotspots in the U.S., with 644 confirmed cases tied to the facility. The Smithfield outbreak represents nearly half of all confirmed cases in that state.
Now, the Wisconsin plant, which employs more than 1,000 workers, has more than two dozen confirmed cases and closed down on Wednesday for cleaning and sanitation. Workers at the plant, who spoke to The Intercept under condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal, say much more should have been done.
One plant worker with asthma said that when he asked for a mask last month, an official at the company declined his request because if he was provided one, Smithfield would “have to do it for everyone else.”
He said that one of his coworkers had brought his own mask and was reprimanded to Smithfield’s human resources department, which told him that wearing his own mask would result in a suspension.
After days of back and forth between the plant managers and workers, the Cudahy plant allowed its workforce to bring its own masks. Some appeared at work with homemade cloth masks, but most continued to work without basic safety equipment, such as N95 masks.
“Eventually they tried to do some social distancing in the cafeteria, but actually, they’re working elbow-to-elbow on the line, so there’s no social distancing there,” said the sister of another plant worker. There are currently no plexiglass dividers between workers, though UFCW Local 1473, which represents workers at the plant, has called for such safeguards to be installed.
“There’s been people sick at the plant. I know at least three people I know at work are sick,” said another worker, who explained that the company first refused to release information about infections at the plant and those who have been in contact with them.
Last week, Fox6 News, a local news affiliate, reported on rising tensions within the Cudahy plant, with many workers expressing fear that the company was not doing enough to prevent an outbreak. Fox6 News obtained records from the Cudahy Health Department showing at least 28 cases at the facility. William Garron, a former union rep, also told Fox, “They really trying to hide the number.” Following the report, Smithfield announced plans to close the plant for cleaning, and said only partial crews would work intermittently.
Wisconsin currently has over 3,555 confirmed cases of coronavirus. Gov. Tony Evers has promoted telework and stay-at-home policies for non-essential businesses. The state’s response to the crisis has been the focus of national attention in recent weeks after Republicans on the state Supreme Court ruled that the state must proceed with April 7 in-person voting over protests from public health advocates and the governor.
Smithfield, which is owned by Chinese conglomerate WH Group, did not respond immediately to a request for comment.
The Cudahy plant and the town in which it is located is named after Patrick Cudahy, an industrialist who pioneered mass pork production across Wisconsin in the late 19th century. The company, which became a subsidiary of Smithfield in 1984, produces branded bacon and dry sausage at the plant, which is near the Milwaukee airport.
Smithfield, which owns meat plants across the country, has a long history of worker injuries and fatalities. The company often uses foreign guest workers, many of whom have reported abusive treatment. In 2007, a number of guest workers from Thailand working in Smithfield plants reported slave-like conditions. The workers later reached a confidential settlement with Smithfield and a recruiting company called Global Horizons.
In response to national attention to the spread of the disease at the South Dakota plant, Smithfield announced last week that it would temporarily close some plants in Missouri and North Carolina.
In a statement published on the Smithfield Foods website, Chief Executive Kenneth Sullivan struck a defiant tone.
“We have a stark choice as a nation: we are either going to produce food or not, even in the face of COVID-19,” wrote Sullivan. The current push to temporarily close plants for cleaning, he added, “is pushing our country perilously close to the edge in terms of our meat supply.”
The workers at the Patrick Cudahy factory, in Cudahy, Wisconsin, faced a Covid-19 outbreak weeks ago, but say managers initially concealed the number of infected, pressured employees to avoid quarantine measures, and failed to provide any face masks or dividers.
A recent outbreak at Smithfield’s pork processing plant in Sioux Falls, S.D., is now one of the largest Covid-19 hotspots in the U.S., with 644 confirmed cases tied to the facility. The Smithfield outbreak represents nearly half of all confirmed cases in that state.
Now, the Wisconsin plant, which employs more than 1,000 workers, has more than two dozen confirmed cases and closed down on Wednesday for cleaning and sanitation. Workers at the plant, who spoke to The Intercept under condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal, say much more should have been done.
One plant worker with asthma said that when he asked for a mask last month, an official at the company declined his request because if he was provided one, Smithfield would “have to do it for everyone else.”
He said that one of his coworkers had brought his own mask and was reprimanded to Smithfield’s human resources department, which told him that wearing his own mask would result in a suspension.
After days of back and forth between the plant managers and workers, the Cudahy plant allowed its workforce to bring its own masks. Some appeared at work with homemade cloth masks, but most continued to work without basic safety equipment, such as N95 masks.
“Eventually they tried to do some social distancing in the cafeteria, but actually, they’re working elbow-to-elbow on the line, so there’s no social distancing there,” said the sister of another plant worker. There are currently no plexiglass dividers between workers, though UFCW Local 1473, which represents workers at the plant, has called for such safeguards to be installed.
“There’s been people sick at the plant. I know at least three people I know at work are sick,” said another worker, who explained that the company first refused to release information about infections at the plant and those who have been in contact with them.
Last week, Fox6 News, a local news affiliate, reported on rising tensions within the Cudahy plant, with many workers expressing fear that the company was not doing enough to prevent an outbreak. Fox6 News obtained records from the Cudahy Health Department showing at least 28 cases at the facility. William Garron, a former union rep, also told Fox, “They really trying to hide the number.” Following the report, Smithfield announced plans to close the plant for cleaning, and said only partial crews would work intermittently.
Wisconsin currently has over 3,555 confirmed cases of coronavirus. Gov. Tony Evers has promoted telework and stay-at-home policies for non-essential businesses. The state’s response to the crisis has been the focus of national attention in recent weeks after Republicans on the state Supreme Court ruled that the state must proceed with April 7 in-person voting over protests from public health advocates and the governor.
Smithfield, which is owned by Chinese conglomerate WH Group, did not respond immediately to a request for comment.
The Cudahy plant and the town in which it is located is named after Patrick Cudahy, an industrialist who pioneered mass pork production across Wisconsin in the late 19th century. The company, which became a subsidiary of Smithfield in 1984, produces branded bacon and dry sausage at the plant, which is near the Milwaukee airport.
Smithfield, which owns meat plants across the country, has a long history of worker injuries and fatalities. The company often uses foreign guest workers, many of whom have reported abusive treatment. In 2007, a number of guest workers from Thailand working in Smithfield plants reported slave-like conditions. The workers later reached a confidential settlement with Smithfield and a recruiting company called Global Horizons.
In response to national attention to the spread of the disease at the South Dakota plant, Smithfield announced last week that it would temporarily close some plants in Missouri and North Carolina.
In a statement published on the Smithfield Foods website, Chief Executive Kenneth Sullivan struck a defiant tone.
“We have a stark choice as a nation: we are either going to produce food or not, even in the face of COVID-19,” wrote Sullivan. The current push to temporarily close plants for cleaning, he added, “is pushing our country perilously close to the edge in terms of our meat supply.”
Workers at Warren Buffett’s furniture rental company were given bad gear and dared to complain about it
By Joe Maniscalco, DC Report @ Raw Story
April 15, 2020
Walter Infante drove into the coronavirus “containment zone” in New Rochelle, N.Y., last month to make a delivery for Cort Furniture Rental, a Warren Buffett company.
Infante’s bosses back in North Bergen, N.J., insisted he had to make they delivery. They didn’t care about the National Guard-enforced quarantine or Infante’s lack of personal protection equipment.
But that’s not surprising, given the standard of care for workers and customers that has made Buffett the third richest American with a fortune of at least $75 billion.
“I was told, ‘Just go—just do the job. It’s just eight people sick in the country,’” Infante told me. “I had no choice [but to make the delivery].”
Buffett’s Berkshire-Hathaway conglomerate employs more than 370,000 people, few of whom are represented by unions who could negotiate for safety conditions as well as pay and benefits.
Miserly Wages
Buffett is known for paying his senior managers well, the rank-and-file not so much, a common practice among big firms with few if any union workers including Wal-Mart, FedEx and most infamously Boeing which ruined its reputation for safety by hiring $9-an-hour coders for the grounded 737 Max.
Of course, the companies and those who control them insist their policies in no way are contrary to the interests of their workers.
“We have no anti-union agenda whatsoever, and we think we have sensational pilots.” Buffett said last year after reaching a new contract with 2,500 pilots of his NetJets private air service.
Buffett also buys services from companies that pay miserly wages, including the $9-an-hour wages paid by the firm running the Chicago rail yard for his BNSF railroad.
At Cort Furniture Rental barn in New Jersey, Infante and the rest of the guys moved to unionize. They also protested the continued lack of safety masks, gloves and hand sanitizer. Buffet’s managers fired them all even though that’s blatantly illegal.
No Labor Board
On April 2, the Professional Movers Union, as Teamsters Local 814 is also known, filed unfair labor practice charges against Cort Rental Furniture with the NLRB. The union says Infante and at least 18 other workers at the North Bergen warehouse were sacked in retaliation for unionizing and speaking out against poor safety practices that put them all at risk of contracting the COVID-19 coronavirus.
The NLRB cannot act on the complaint because it lacks a quorum. That’s because Trump has failed to appoint replacements for those who left the board, just as he has done with some other federal boards and commissions.
Julian Tysh, a Teamsters organizer, points to the coronavirus combined with the lack of an NLRB quorum as evidence that Trump is acting in bad faith. The result is “unprecedented action against workers and COVID-19 whistleblowers.”
“This is just a naked and brazen attempt to squash the rights of workers,” Tysh told me. “This is the same thing that just happened at Amazon, where workers on the front lines keeping us safe and healthy and fed as much as possible, are the workers [companies are] trying to exploit.”
From Amazon to Tipsy
Cort Furniture Rental is among a growing list of companies being accused of terminating workers who speak out against unsafe working conditions and a lack of proper protective equipment during the pandemic. They run the gamut from retail giant Amazon to Tipsy, a tiny wine shop in Brooklyn.
“It’s very difficult to stand six feet away from somebody when delivering to their home,” Anthony Salcedo told me. Salcedo, 28, is a Cort delivery man. “The majority of our pickups and deliveries come from [New York City]—the epicenter [of Trump’s COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S]. I have a family—my biggest fear was coming into contact with someone with coronavirus and passing it onto my wife and kids.”
During Manhattan delivery runs Cort drivers sometimes got a heads-up from a friendly doorman warning them that certain people in the building had tested positive for COVID-19. Still, protective masks and gloves weren’t forthcoming from Cort management.
When workers approached management about getting proper equipment, Salcedo says employees were told they had the option of taking a leave of absence, using their vacation days, if they felt unsafe or just staying home without pay.
Salcedo said one manager told him, “Unless you plan on living the rest of your life in a bubble—keep on working.”
When the Gloves Won’t Fit
Much later, when the company did provide gloves. The workers say the gloves were often so small they tore when slipping them on.
Julio Perez, a Cort Furniture Rental team leader, was well-versed in federal job safety rules, protocols and potentially dangerous hazmat situations. Perez has spent the better part of two decades in the moving business, working around dangerous and volatile substances like ammonia and hydrochloric acid.
“I never had an issue” with safety at previous employers,” Perez, 50, said. “I took those qualities to Cort—when they hired me, they knew what they were getting. The whole time I was there I was afraid for the workers.”
A Smelly Cafeteria
Working inside the Cort Rental Furniture warehouse, where the pungent odor of cleaning fluid and touch-up solution hung thick in the air, wasn’t any safer, according to workers. Many opted to eat lunch in their cars rather that cram into the building’s smelly cafeteria.
An unused conference room was available to allow for better social distancing—but workers say that management wouldn’t open it up so they could eat lunch safely.
Infante drove for Cort Rental Furniture for more than 10 years before he was sacked for exercising his rights.
After he began speaking out about the lack of proper safety attire and other workplace issues, the married father of two from Richfield, N.J., found himself relegated to the warehouse most of the time. When Infante asked why, he says management told him, “We’re trying to protect you from coronavirus.”
Neither Cort Rental Furniture nor Berkshire Hathaway has responded to repeated requests for comment.
Exploiting the Pandemic
The fired workers insist that management is attempting to blame their terminations on a lack of business during Trump’s pandemic. That’s easily proven to be false.
“If that were true — why were you hiring subcontractors for the last three weeks?” Salcedo asked.
Indeed, workers say that a few days before they filed a petition seeking a March 10 vote on unionizing Cort managers began bringing in subcontracted drivers to do their work.
Cort management’s true aim, the fired workers insist, is union-busting, plain and simple. And Buffett’s managers employed a number of strategies to harass workers.
Back in January, just prior to the widespread outbreak of coronavirus in the U.S.—Cort Furniture Rental introduced a new app ostensibly designed to increase delivery crew productivity.
But Infante says drivers couldn’t stop for a two-minute bathroom break without the boss calling them up and demanding to know why their truck had stopped. Drivers who balked at having to alert managers anytime they had to relieve themselves were ultimately called into the office and chewed out, he said.
“Answer with an attitude, and the next day, you’re in the warehouse,” Infante told me.
The company also started varying the time when drivers had to begin their delivery runs. As a result, workers were unable to fulfill familial obligations because they were never knew for sure when they might get off work.
“They would keep our drivers in the dark and not let us know what the [daily] routes were or where they were going,” Perez told me. “Not letting drivers see where they are going is a blind way to work—you don’t know where you’re going or how long you will be out. [Management] said drivers were not ‘entitled’ to know.”
Local 814 successfully organized the Uovo Fine Art shop in Queens, N.Y., last fall. But its workers, too, soon suffered from the toxic mix of coronavirus, union-busting management and Trump’s neglect of his constitutional duty to faithfully fulfill his office by appointing NLRB members.
Not long after Cort Rental Furniture fired its pro-union workers in New Jersey, Uovo Fine announced it was putting its Local 814 movers on “stand-by” due to the pandemic. Uovo also fired seven unionized employees outright.
“This is clear retaliation,” permanently laid-off union supporter Peter Mackay said in a statement. “Just because you wait six months and do it under the cover of a global pandemic, doesn’t make it any less obvious. It just makes it more heinous.”
Silver Lining, Maybe
Tysh, the Teamsters organizer, said if there is a silver lining in Trump’s pandemic, it is that the entire country is coming to realize the “profound disconnect between the value workers produce and what they get in return.”
At the same time, Tysh believes it’s time for trade unionists to invoke their militant history, eschew the politics of the least worst option, and once again realize the power of withholding their labor.
Tysh calls the pandemic and the crushing economic realities it has exposed a “definite wakeup call” for the working class.
“We definitely have to push the envelope,” Tysh said. “Organized labor and workers not formally organized need to come together to put a real plan into action. The power of the strike is something a lot of people have forgotten about.”
At Amazon, Instacart, Whole Foods and other companies without unions “all these workers see the injustices in society and they’re willing to do something about it,” Tysh told me. “Maybe [workers are] going to be back in the street the way it was done in the old days.”
Infante’s bosses back in North Bergen, N.J., insisted he had to make they delivery. They didn’t care about the National Guard-enforced quarantine or Infante’s lack of personal protection equipment.
But that’s not surprising, given the standard of care for workers and customers that has made Buffett the third richest American with a fortune of at least $75 billion.
“I was told, ‘Just go—just do the job. It’s just eight people sick in the country,’” Infante told me. “I had no choice [but to make the delivery].”
Buffett’s Berkshire-Hathaway conglomerate employs more than 370,000 people, few of whom are represented by unions who could negotiate for safety conditions as well as pay and benefits.
Miserly Wages
Buffett is known for paying his senior managers well, the rank-and-file not so much, a common practice among big firms with few if any union workers including Wal-Mart, FedEx and most infamously Boeing which ruined its reputation for safety by hiring $9-an-hour coders for the grounded 737 Max.
Of course, the companies and those who control them insist their policies in no way are contrary to the interests of their workers.
“We have no anti-union agenda whatsoever, and we think we have sensational pilots.” Buffett said last year after reaching a new contract with 2,500 pilots of his NetJets private air service.
Buffett also buys services from companies that pay miserly wages, including the $9-an-hour wages paid by the firm running the Chicago rail yard for his BNSF railroad.
At Cort Furniture Rental barn in New Jersey, Infante and the rest of the guys moved to unionize. They also protested the continued lack of safety masks, gloves and hand sanitizer. Buffet’s managers fired them all even though that’s blatantly illegal.
No Labor Board
On April 2, the Professional Movers Union, as Teamsters Local 814 is also known, filed unfair labor practice charges against Cort Rental Furniture with the NLRB. The union says Infante and at least 18 other workers at the North Bergen warehouse were sacked in retaliation for unionizing and speaking out against poor safety practices that put them all at risk of contracting the COVID-19 coronavirus.
The NLRB cannot act on the complaint because it lacks a quorum. That’s because Trump has failed to appoint replacements for those who left the board, just as he has done with some other federal boards and commissions.
Julian Tysh, a Teamsters organizer, points to the coronavirus combined with the lack of an NLRB quorum as evidence that Trump is acting in bad faith. The result is “unprecedented action against workers and COVID-19 whistleblowers.”
“This is just a naked and brazen attempt to squash the rights of workers,” Tysh told me. “This is the same thing that just happened at Amazon, where workers on the front lines keeping us safe and healthy and fed as much as possible, are the workers [companies are] trying to exploit.”
From Amazon to Tipsy
Cort Furniture Rental is among a growing list of companies being accused of terminating workers who speak out against unsafe working conditions and a lack of proper protective equipment during the pandemic. They run the gamut from retail giant Amazon to Tipsy, a tiny wine shop in Brooklyn.
“It’s very difficult to stand six feet away from somebody when delivering to their home,” Anthony Salcedo told me. Salcedo, 28, is a Cort delivery man. “The majority of our pickups and deliveries come from [New York City]—the epicenter [of Trump’s COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S]. I have a family—my biggest fear was coming into contact with someone with coronavirus and passing it onto my wife and kids.”
During Manhattan delivery runs Cort drivers sometimes got a heads-up from a friendly doorman warning them that certain people in the building had tested positive for COVID-19. Still, protective masks and gloves weren’t forthcoming from Cort management.
When workers approached management about getting proper equipment, Salcedo says employees were told they had the option of taking a leave of absence, using their vacation days, if they felt unsafe or just staying home without pay.
Salcedo said one manager told him, “Unless you plan on living the rest of your life in a bubble—keep on working.”
When the Gloves Won’t Fit
Much later, when the company did provide gloves. The workers say the gloves were often so small they tore when slipping them on.
Julio Perez, a Cort Furniture Rental team leader, was well-versed in federal job safety rules, protocols and potentially dangerous hazmat situations. Perez has spent the better part of two decades in the moving business, working around dangerous and volatile substances like ammonia and hydrochloric acid.
“I never had an issue” with safety at previous employers,” Perez, 50, said. “I took those qualities to Cort—when they hired me, they knew what they were getting. The whole time I was there I was afraid for the workers.”
A Smelly Cafeteria
Working inside the Cort Rental Furniture warehouse, where the pungent odor of cleaning fluid and touch-up solution hung thick in the air, wasn’t any safer, according to workers. Many opted to eat lunch in their cars rather that cram into the building’s smelly cafeteria.
An unused conference room was available to allow for better social distancing—but workers say that management wouldn’t open it up so they could eat lunch safely.
Infante drove for Cort Rental Furniture for more than 10 years before he was sacked for exercising his rights.
After he began speaking out about the lack of proper safety attire and other workplace issues, the married father of two from Richfield, N.J., found himself relegated to the warehouse most of the time. When Infante asked why, he says management told him, “We’re trying to protect you from coronavirus.”
Neither Cort Rental Furniture nor Berkshire Hathaway has responded to repeated requests for comment.
Exploiting the Pandemic
The fired workers insist that management is attempting to blame their terminations on a lack of business during Trump’s pandemic. That’s easily proven to be false.
“If that were true — why were you hiring subcontractors for the last three weeks?” Salcedo asked.
Indeed, workers say that a few days before they filed a petition seeking a March 10 vote on unionizing Cort managers began bringing in subcontracted drivers to do their work.
Cort management’s true aim, the fired workers insist, is union-busting, plain and simple. And Buffett’s managers employed a number of strategies to harass workers.
Back in January, just prior to the widespread outbreak of coronavirus in the U.S.—Cort Furniture Rental introduced a new app ostensibly designed to increase delivery crew productivity.
But Infante says drivers couldn’t stop for a two-minute bathroom break without the boss calling them up and demanding to know why their truck had stopped. Drivers who balked at having to alert managers anytime they had to relieve themselves were ultimately called into the office and chewed out, he said.
“Answer with an attitude, and the next day, you’re in the warehouse,” Infante told me.
The company also started varying the time when drivers had to begin their delivery runs. As a result, workers were unable to fulfill familial obligations because they were never knew for sure when they might get off work.
“They would keep our drivers in the dark and not let us know what the [daily] routes were or where they were going,” Perez told me. “Not letting drivers see where they are going is a blind way to work—you don’t know where you’re going or how long you will be out. [Management] said drivers were not ‘entitled’ to know.”
Local 814 successfully organized the Uovo Fine Art shop in Queens, N.Y., last fall. But its workers, too, soon suffered from the toxic mix of coronavirus, union-busting management and Trump’s neglect of his constitutional duty to faithfully fulfill his office by appointing NLRB members.
Not long after Cort Rental Furniture fired its pro-union workers in New Jersey, Uovo Fine announced it was putting its Local 814 movers on “stand-by” due to the pandemic. Uovo also fired seven unionized employees outright.
“This is clear retaliation,” permanently laid-off union supporter Peter Mackay said in a statement. “Just because you wait six months and do it under the cover of a global pandemic, doesn’t make it any less obvious. It just makes it more heinous.”
Silver Lining, Maybe
Tysh, the Teamsters organizer, said if there is a silver lining in Trump’s pandemic, it is that the entire country is coming to realize the “profound disconnect between the value workers produce and what they get in return.”
At the same time, Tysh believes it’s time for trade unionists to invoke their militant history, eschew the politics of the least worst option, and once again realize the power of withholding their labor.
Tysh calls the pandemic and the crushing economic realities it has exposed a “definite wakeup call” for the working class.
“We definitely have to push the envelope,” Tysh said. “Organized labor and workers not formally organized need to come together to put a real plan into action. The power of the strike is something a lot of people have forgotten about.”
At Amazon, Instacart, Whole Foods and other companies without unions “all these workers see the injustices in society and they’re willing to do something about it,” Tysh told me. “Maybe [workers are] going to be back in the street the way it was done in the old days.”
Robert Reich: Here are the 5 biggest corporate lies about unions
Robert Reich / Robert Reich's Blog - salon
September 3, 2019
Wealthy corporations and their enablers have spread 5 big lies about unions in order to stop workers from organizing and to protect their own bottom-lines. Know the truth and spread the truth.
Lie #1: Labor unions are bad for workers. Wrong. Unions are good for all workers – even those who are not unionized. In the mid-1950s, when a third of all workers in the United States were unionized, wages grew in tandem with the economy. That’s because workers across America – even those who were not unionized – had significant power to demand and get better wages, hours, benefits, and working conditions. Since then, as union membership has declined, the middle class has shrunk as well.
Lie #2: Unions hurt the economy. Wrong again. When workers are unionized they can negotiate better wages, which in turn spreads the economic gains more evenly and strengthens the middle class. This creates a virtuous cycle: Wages increase, workers have more to spend in their communities, businesses thrive, and the economy grows. Since the 1970s, the decline in unionization accounts for one-third of the increase in income
inequality. Without unions, wealth becomes concentrated at the top and the gains don’t trickle down to workers.
Lie #3: Labor unions are as powerful as big business. No way. Labor union membership in 2018 accounted for 10.5 percent of the American workforce, while large corporations account for almost three-quarters of the entire American economy. And when it comes to political power, it’s big business and small labor. In the 2018 midterms, labor unions contributed less than 70 million dollars to parties and candidates, while big corporations and their political action committees contributed 1.6 billion dollars. This enormous gulf between business and labor is a huge problem. It explains why most economic gains have been going to executives and shareholders rather than workers. But this doesn’t have to be the case.
Lie #4: Most unionized workers are in industries like steel and auto manufacturing. Untrue. Although industrial unions are still vitally important to workers, the largest part of the unionized workforce is workers in the professional and service sectors – retail, restaurant, hotel, hospital, teachers–which comprise 59% of all workers represented by a union. And these workers benefit from being in a union. In 2018, unionized service workers earned a median wage of 802 dollars a week. Non-unionized service workers made on average, $261 less. That’s almost a third less.
Lie #5: Most unionized workers are white, male, and middle-aged. Some unionized workers are, of course, but most newly-unionized workers are not. They’re women, they’re young, and a growing portion are black and brown. In fact, it’s through the power of unions that people who had been historically marginalized in the American economy because of their race, ethnicity, or gender are now gaining economic ground. In 2018, women who were in unions earned 21 percent more than non-unionized women. And African-Americans who were unionized earned nearly 20 percent more than African-Americans who were non-unionized.
Don’t believe the corporate lies. Today’s unions are growing, expanding, and boosting the wages and economic prospects of those who need them most. They’re good for workers and good for America.
Lie #1: Labor unions are bad for workers. Wrong. Unions are good for all workers – even those who are not unionized. In the mid-1950s, when a third of all workers in the United States were unionized, wages grew in tandem with the economy. That’s because workers across America – even those who were not unionized – had significant power to demand and get better wages, hours, benefits, and working conditions. Since then, as union membership has declined, the middle class has shrunk as well.
Lie #2: Unions hurt the economy. Wrong again. When workers are unionized they can negotiate better wages, which in turn spreads the economic gains more evenly and strengthens the middle class. This creates a virtuous cycle: Wages increase, workers have more to spend in their communities, businesses thrive, and the economy grows. Since the 1970s, the decline in unionization accounts for one-third of the increase in income
inequality. Without unions, wealth becomes concentrated at the top and the gains don’t trickle down to workers.
Lie #3: Labor unions are as powerful as big business. No way. Labor union membership in 2018 accounted for 10.5 percent of the American workforce, while large corporations account for almost three-quarters of the entire American economy. And when it comes to political power, it’s big business and small labor. In the 2018 midterms, labor unions contributed less than 70 million dollars to parties and candidates, while big corporations and their political action committees contributed 1.6 billion dollars. This enormous gulf between business and labor is a huge problem. It explains why most economic gains have been going to executives and shareholders rather than workers. But this doesn’t have to be the case.
Lie #4: Most unionized workers are in industries like steel and auto manufacturing. Untrue. Although industrial unions are still vitally important to workers, the largest part of the unionized workforce is workers in the professional and service sectors – retail, restaurant, hotel, hospital, teachers–which comprise 59% of all workers represented by a union. And these workers benefit from being in a union. In 2018, unionized service workers earned a median wage of 802 dollars a week. Non-unionized service workers made on average, $261 less. That’s almost a third less.
Lie #5: Most unionized workers are white, male, and middle-aged. Some unionized workers are, of course, but most newly-unionized workers are not. They’re women, they’re young, and a growing portion are black and brown. In fact, it’s through the power of unions that people who had been historically marginalized in the American economy because of their race, ethnicity, or gender are now gaining economic ground. In 2018, women who were in unions earned 21 percent more than non-unionized women. And African-Americans who were unionized earned nearly 20 percent more than African-Americans who were non-unionized.
Don’t believe the corporate lies. Today’s unions are growing, expanding, and boosting the wages and economic prospects of those who need them most. They’re good for workers and good for America.
funnies
