Here’s one especially for the folks who, while vehemently attacking the Chicago teachers’ strike, insist that they generally love and support organized labor. Warehouse employees in southern California would greatly benefit from your outpouring of solidarity. Today, as they begin a 50-mile march from Inland Empire warehouses to Downtown Los Angeles, they could use everyone’s support.
Warehouse Workers United
Yesterday about three dozen employees of a Southern California warehouse that stores goods for Walmart walked out on strike. According to their organization, Warehouse Workers United:
Workers face inadequate access to clean water, work under scorching heat that reaches well over 100 degrees, and have little access to basic healthcare, regular breaks, and properly functioning equipment. Their wages are low –$8 per hour and $250 a week, or $12,000 per year. Workplace injury is common.
But when workers tried to offer solutions to fix these abuses, they have been met with illegal threats and intimidation by management.
Because of this intimidation, the fragmented nature of their employment, and the failure of the nation’s labor laws to protect the right to organize, workers have not been able to join a formal union, and their many charges of unfair labor practices are still pending before The National Labor Relations Board. Nevertheless, they bravely walked off the job and will march today joined by clergy members and labor leaders.
