From The Nation: http://www.thenation.com/blog/171382/occupy-walmart-workers-plan-black-friday-protests#
Allison Kilkenny
on November 20, 2012
Walmart workers are planning to mark Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving and one of the biggest shopping days of the year, with pickets outside of stores and warehouses across the country.
Former and current employees of the giant corporation describe systemic abuse and harassment by management at Walmart stores and warehouses. When asked about their demands, many workers talk about the desire for management to respect and listen to the workers. OUR Walmart, a protest group seeking justice and accountability from Walmart, also wants to see the minimum wage raised to $13 an hour and for full-time jobs to made available to “associates” who want them. Other demands include a dependable, predictable work schedule, affordable healthcare, no discrimination and wages that ensure no Walmart worker has to rely on government assistance to survive.
Walmart is one of the biggest recipients of government subsidies, receiving tax breaks, free land, cash grants and other forms of public assistance, in addition to paying some of its workers so little that they also turn to the federal government for programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
However, even Walmart employees who make better wages complain about abuse on the job. An employee at a Walmart distribution center in Gas City, Indiana, initially decided to work at the big-box chain because his job pays almost $20 an hour, and he couldn’t find another job that paid that well in his area. The worker, who asked to remain anonymous because he’s afraid of being fired for going public with his complaints, says that Walmart has the attitude that because they pay workers well the employees are “required to be their slaves.”
His job is to load heavy boxes, sometimes weighing up to seventy pounds, onto pallets stacked six feet tall in a freezer that has a temperature of minus-twenty degrees. He is also given very short time limits for each pallet to be completed, so he normally ends up running down aisles with heavy boxes to make his rate.
One day, he cut a fairly large gash in his leg by scraping one of the wooden pallets and his leg started bleeding. When he asked his manager for a bandage, he was told that if he were given one one, they’d have to write him up for not being careful enough on the job. Instead, he worked all day with an open wound because he was afraid that one more write-up could get him fired.
Continue reading at: http://www.thenation.com/blog/171382/occupy-walmart-workers-plan-black-friday-protests#
