Hundreds of people gathered at a major Walmart distribution center
Monday in Elwood, Illinois to stand in solidarity with workers who have
been on strike since mid-September in response to unsafe working
conditions and unfair wages.
"No one should come to work and endure extreme temperatures, inhale
dust and chemical residue, and lift thousands of boxes weighing up to
250lbs with no support. Workers never know how long the work day will
be- sometimes its two hours, sometimes its 16 hours. Injuries are
common, as is discrimination against women and illegal retaliation
against workers who speak up for better treatment," Warehouse Workers
for Justice states at its official website.
The discrimination aspect of this list of grievances includes widespread sexual harassment
and intimidation of female warehouse workers, an epidemic largely
ignored by the establishment media, even among individuals, such as the New York Times' Nicholas Kristof, known for focusing on female worker equality and empowerment in other countries.
"When I worked at the Walmart warehouse in Elwood, I was sexually
harassed on a regular basis…I literally got locked inside a trailer
because that's what the men thought I was there for…I reported it to my
supervisor, but he didn't do anything about it," said Ulyonda Dickerson,
a worker at the Walmart warehouse in Elwood, in a report released by
Warehouse Workers for Justice.
Read on...
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Showing posts with label unions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label unions. Show all posts
Union Workers Replaced With Prison Labor Under Scott Walker’s Collective Bargaining Law
While Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s (R) law dismantling collective bargaining rights has harmed teachers, nurses, and other civil servants, it’s helping a different group in Wisconsinites — inmates. Prisoners are now taking up jobs that used to be held by unionized workers in some parts of the state.
As the Madison Capital Times reports, “Besides losing their right to negotiate over the percentage of their paycheck that will go toward health care and retirement, unions also lost the ability to claim work as a ‘union-only’ job, opening the door for private workers and evidently even inmates to step in and take their place.” Inmates are not paid for their work, but may receive time off of their sentences.
The law went into effect last week, and Racine County is already using inmates to do landscaping, painting, and another basic maintenance around the county that was previously done by county workers. The union had successfully sued to stop the country from using prison labor for these jobs last year, but with Walker’s new law, they have no recourse. Watch a report from Fox6 in Green Bay:
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