Bid for Worker’s Rights: Ode To A Humane Society

Women in sweatshop

A shot at humanity.  1 out of 18 employees who take part in union campaigns are subject to discharge or discriminatory practices.  Additionally, millions of employees are without workers’ fundamental rights to organize, bargain collectively, and strike.  Migrant farm workers, hotel workers, Mexican maids, undocumented immigrants are slapped with a rude awakening:  at the hoofs of an unfair advantage. 

 

 

Millions of U.S. workers have been excluded from labor laws that protect workers’ rights.  An unfair advantage companies have over handful of workers whose rights are frequently unvoiced, and left unprotected because of their labor, status, and the flawed system in our laws.  Just who is left out?  3 million farm workers, 1 million domestic employees, 1 million independent contractors, 4 million supervisors, 10 million managers, 300,000 college professors, 100,000 Indian casino employees, 500,000 employees of religious institutions —all excluded from exercising their rights.  

 

 

An unfair advantage companies have over handful of workers whose rights are frequently unvoiced, and left unprotected because of their labor, status, and the flawed system in our laws.  Hotel workers — cleaners, cooks, servers—cast aside despite their hard labor and left without pay.  New York City’s Garment districts employ sewers that are often not paid on time.  Manhattan sewing shops find themselves at the short end of back wages by negligent employers which includes brand names.  Not only are they not paid on time, but migrant workers labor under extreme heat, low pay, and severed facilities such as toilets, poor housings, and drinking waters; additionally, their labor comes with no rest, not even lunch breaks.  Young Mexican men arduously labor, harvesting tobacco, sweet potatoes, cucumbers, bell peppers, apples, peaches, and melons.  Workers in Washington pick apples but are not supplemented with equal rights under NLRA (National Labor Relations Act) because of their lack of requirement in meeting the standard of “employees.”  These hired workers bore a lack of protection of their wages, benefits, health and safety.      

 

 

Workers under protected labor laws are free to associate — strike or bargain collectively for quality standards.  However, other workers are left out in unfavorable circumstances which prevent them from surging forward; for example, an employed seamstress in the garment district may find work from the underground.  Thailand has employees from a branch office in California that manufactures their line abroad at sweatshops which employs young girls working a gruesome 17 hours a day at mere 70 cents per hour.  The apparel industry, a big industry in U.S. has roughly 700,000 workers.  Temp agencies offer no contact, no way to communicate; accordingly, perma-temps come with no rights, benefits, protection to form and join unions.  Workers whose employers deploy unfair labor practices are prevented from speaking out, voicing their opinions.  In fact, they fear deportation to their country from protesting.  The temps are excluded from FLSA, which means they are limited to 50 hours per week in overtime pay.  In February 2000, Microsoft Company made a new policy effective July 1, 2000:  limit temp workers to 1-year employment with 100-day break in between.  Progress has crawled inch-by-inch for these employees.    

 

 

Smithfield Foods Inc. and United Food & Commercial Workers is an example of a case of a plant that issued warnings to their employees for engaging in union activities.  The employees were prevented, discouraged from joining or associating by attenuated work conditions:

 

 

§  Closure of the plant facility for collective bargaining.

§  Stricter enforcement of disciplinary rules.

§  Loss of business and job

§  Discouraged from talking salaries with each other. 

 

 

Detroit, Michigan Snack Company neglected to provide sick pay, pension, and retirement benefits.  Eventually the workers protested on Labor Day after work for not being compensated working on a holiday.

 

 

Companies charged with unfair labor practices mistreat their employees.  Baltimore, Maryland packaging company employing 500 people paid low, minimum wage, and also discouraged employees from freely associating by employing these tactics:

 

 

§  Pending closure of the plant if majority of workers voted in favor of union representation;

§  Moving location to Mexico;

§  Production move to another country;

§  Pull business;

§  Fire workers for attending union meetings;

§  Replace workers with foreigners if union came in;

§  Transfer workers to lower-paying jobs if they supported unions;

§  Workers were told upper management was going to get them for supporting unions;

§  Employees asked to report to management on union activities;

§  Interrogated workers about union sympathies and activities;

§  Denied wage increases and promotions to workers who supported the union.

 

 

Agricultural workers

Up to 3 million agricultural workers are excluded from federal law which gives workers right to organize at the workplace.  These workers endure low wages, poor housing, inadequate healthcare, hazardous work environment, and unfair treatment.  Similarly, migrant and seasonal agricultural workers do not have the protected right to organize and bargain collectively.

 

 

Domestic workers in U.S. are without protected rights.  An example of a case is an Ethiopian worker in Maryland who had worked 8 years in the domestic sector and her working calendar offered no benefits — 7 working days, 13 work hours a day, no days off.  The pay?  A piddling at 3 cents per hour.  She was also told not to speak with people outside of the family and was required to ask permission prior to leaving the premise.    

 

 

Senior employees usually receive rewards for having worked at the company for years.  However, veteran workers actually lose their jobs; their jobs are not fully guaranteed.  Oregon Steel workers went on strike and were swiftly replaced with hundreds of new workers with managers in tow; subsequently workers missed out on their paychecks, pensions, medical plans.  Lifetime of their hard work at the company was lost at a flutter of a flame to a new young force of workers who had not the faintest idea of the steel mill.  That is unfair.  No, seniority cannot be always counted on for each and every occasion at companies.

The judge overseeing the steel case concluded the company practiced unfair labor by engaging in the following:

 

 

§  closing the plant if workers exercised the right to strike;

§  revoke contract if workers exercised the right to strike;

§  fire workers if they participated in a strike;

§  assign dirty jobs to union supporters because of their support for the union;

§  warning workers they won’t work at the steel if they went on strike;

§  promised promotions to workers for not supporting the union during a strike;

§  deny supplying information to the union on 401(k) and other retirement pay and benefit plans.

 

 

Judge also decided after the strike began on Oregon Steel management, they committed a new batch of unfair labor practices:

 

 

§          §  Hiring permanent replacements;

            §  Refusing to reinstate workers when they ended the strike;

            §  Denying workers access to loans from their 401(k) plans by implementing a new rule that loan repayment must be through payroll deductions. 

            §  Revoke contract proposal to union after the strike began;

          §  Enforcing final offer without bargaining in good faith.

Neither are they alone.  6,000 Greyhound bus drivers were permanently replaced during the 1990 strike.  1450 workers were replaced at the Continental General factory in 1998 strike.  Permanent replacements are used by companies and factory owners to frustrate workers at strike.  As part of the scheme between companies and workers in their rumble and tumble, the two parties go back-and-forth in an exchange where employees’ strikes are perpetually countered with management’s lock-outs.  

 

 

U.S. labor laws do not specifically state worker’s right to form unions, but their rights are protected by the cornerstone of our country’s foundation:  U.S. Constitution.  The First Amendment of U.S. Constitution protects people’s rights, “freedom of speech,” “freedom to assembly,” and seek payment for any grievances.  First Amendment rights protect workers to freely organize, bargain, and strike; thereby any regulations that say otherwise violate your constitutional rights and are deemed unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court.  The Fourteenth Amendment grants workers equal protection under federal and state laws, which delve more into workers’ rights — protecting, guaranteeing individual’s rights.         

 

 

 

Legislation in the U.S. have been passed on labor law which sets the framework to organize, bargain, and strike.  To form and join trade unions come forthright with bargaining for wages, benefits, safety conditions, and treatment. 

 

 

Nearly a century ago before U.S. economy sank in the few years shy of the Great Depression, The Railway Labor Act established the workers’ right to organize and bargain collectively in the railroad industry.  By their own choice of representation, the railroad workers were able to organize in an industry that monopolized the U.S. economy as an industrial giant.  During the Civil Rights movement, the RLA was extended to air transportation.  While Franklin D. Roosevelt was in office, The Norris-LaGuardia Act of 1932 outlawed contracts which enforced workers and told them they could not join a union.  Employers prevented workers from collectively bargaining by administering these yellow dog contracts.  The Labor Management Relations Act (LMRA or Taft-Hartley Act) of 1947 amended the NLRA, which set forth new provisions of unfair labor practices, establishing “employer free speech” clause, which permitted managers to campaign against workers from self-organizing.  The Taft-Hartley allowed states to enact right to work laws that bars voluntary agreements between workers and employers and required represented union employees in paying their dues.  The Labor Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (LMRDA or Landrum-Griffin Act) of 1959 established a bill of rights for trade union members which include right to leaders’ democratic elections.  It required unions to detail their financial reports and disclosure.  The Wagner Act, the Taft-Hartley Act, and the Landrum-Griffin Act make up federal laws that govern labor management in the private sector.              

 

 

However, federal laws do not extend its rights to the excluded millions.  Instead the workers without rights weather harsh tasks, long working hours, poor pay, unsanitary living and working conditions.  Their labor rights are shot down.  Their job security is fired down.  Conversely fears of arrests, loss of jobs, and deportation soar. 

 

My poem is based on humane rights and inspired from John Lennon's Imagine.  

Lulilai's Ode to A Humane Society

(My own rhyme theme:  a,b,A1,b,A2,c,c;  a,b,A1,B1,a,c,c;  a,b,A2,b,a,c,c;  a,b,A2,B1,a,c,c) 

 

 

Imagine prevailing to a circle of clemency,

Encourage our people to ally as chums, mates,

C’mon fellow comrades, let us join in unity,

Offer to associate to mend and make,

Fare well so we prevail under philanthropy,

But deny us benefits and we discuss countering,

Quit, we shall not, but risk campaigning,

 

 

Imagine blooming under a life of propriety,

Want our people not just rent, but imbue them til they sate,

C’mon fellow comrades, let us join in unity,

Agree to bind together fully as oneness at a future date,

Treat our people well under a human decency,

But risk exploiting us and we avoid working,

Put off pursuing, we shall not, but plan beating,

 

 

Imagine beating the system that curb with boundary,

Urge our people to reiterate our rights,

Fare well so we prevail under philanthropy,

By our plan to organize against those that oust,

Free our lives of struggles and swap it with surety,

But miss us when we are out bargaining,

Practice, we shall, til we appreciate spanking earnings,

 

Imagine reaching a haven at the end of our journey,

Allow our people their crowns at last,

Fare well so we prevail under philanthropy,

Agree to bind together fully as oneness at a future date,

Escape the toil and sweat for a lull on a holiday,

Enjoy resting where you ease and lighten, quelling,

Promise me you’ll meet us where charms delight in our own ring.