Tag Archives: Workers on strike

Workers’ Woes in Brazil

10 Sunday Mar 2013

Posted by in Brazil, Social Injustice, Working Life

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Bus Strike in Rio de Janeiro - Brazil - March 2013Bus strike in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, affects 3 million people – 1 March 2013  Source: noticias.bol.uol.com.br

 

As a non-union worker and mother of two school-age children, I resented bus drivers and conductors when they went on strike. Like other workers who depended on public transport to get to work and get our children to school, I had to suffer the consequences of their collective action for better wages and working conditions. What about my right to get to work?

As an import-export manager, strikes at the ports posed other hassles. When dock workers or customs officials went on strike, import and export goods sat at the port awaiting clearance or shipment. Didn’t they care that they were affecting businesses and other workers?

Brazilian Dock Workers on Strike - Santos Port - Sao Paulo30 Thousand dock workers at Brazilian ports strike in protest against MP 595  22 February 2013 – São Paulo – Brazil

While I resented and complained about workers who went on strike, I realized how privileged they were to have a labor union defending their rights. When faced with exploitation in the workplace, the rest of us had one of two options: leave the company or suck it up. With little chance of finding another position during a recession with high unemployment rates, as was the case in the late 1990s in Brazil, there was really only one option.

At the pinnacle of Ceará Importers’ success, our warehouse workers often faced long working days unloading containers, stocking goods, and getting them out to the company’s wholesalers and retail stores.  Shipments of up to four containers were manageable. Until the day ten containers lined up along the street outside our business premises.

The Warehouse Manager stood beside me at the gate to watch the arrival of the container trucks. “It’s going to be a long night,” he told me. “No one is going home until we unload all the containers and add the goods to our stock.”

It took four days and four nights.

On the morning of the fourth day, a warehouse worker came to me for help. “We’ve worked three days straight with only one to two hours of sleep. We’re tired. Ask Doutor Ricardo* to let us go home early today.”

I promised to talk to Doutor Ricardo, the company’s Administrator.

“Don’t tell him I asked,” the young father of two children said. “I can’t lose my job.”

Doutor Ricardo viewed me with suspicion when I made my request. When asked, I refused to divulge the employee’s name.

“The workers are not your concern,” he told me. “Do your work and let me do mine.”

I retreated. I could not afford to lose my job. Openings in my line of work were also scarce and the competition fierce.

When business owners enjoy an excess supply of labor and their employees are afraid to refuse working extra hours for fear of losing their jobs, they have no need to hire additional staff and incur a rise in their operational costs.

Who was I to advocate fair treatment of our most vulnerable employees?  As a non-union worker, I had to concede that labor unions play a vital role in protecting the rights of workers without a voice.

* Fictitious name

 

Working in Retail in the USA: More Work for Less

25 Sunday Sep 2011

Posted by in United States, Working Life

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Source: Article Profits Before People by Stephanie Rogers, earthfirst.com

When my two sons and I arrived in Los  Angeles in October 2003, the State of California was bankrupt. Grocery workers at three major supermarket chains were on strike or locked out, clamoring for health care and an end to corporate greed. A week later, the mechanics of the Los Angeles Metro bus service also went on strike, leaving us without public transport. Then, before the month ended, my sister warned us of the firestorm raging across the San Bernardino
Valley not far from where we lived at the time. We had arrived in Los Angeles at a bad time.

My plans for starting up an import-export business with Brazil did not materialize. So when an opportunity arose to work in a retail store in West Hollywood, I took it. A fascinating workplace. I overheard conversations in diverse languages, unknown to my ears. American youth boasted tattoos of artistic skill and beauty. Some colored their hair purple and green. Gay men crossed paths with Jewish women and girls covered in cloth from neck to wrists to ankles.

As a former international trade professional, I was impressed by the corporation’s efficient and steady flow of goods from US and overseas suppliers to their stores throughout the USA. The retail store was an end-line in the export-import process: putting goods in the hands of the consumer.

But all was not well at the store-front. Time was crucial in the execution of our duties. Even the cash registers rated the speed at which we checked out each customer. But when there are only a few team-members on a shift, how do you help customers to find what they seek, keep the floor tidy, stock shelves, attend to telephone enquiries, and assist at the cash registers during peek hours? As workers, we were mere tools for getting the job done with maximum profit for the corporation. Our annual wage increases for job performance were measured out in quarters (25 cents). More work for less.

To compete with the slave-labor prices offered by America’s leading multi-national retailer and private employer, other retailers and supermarkets have to find ways to cut costs in order to compete and still maintain their profit margins. Like the renegade leader, they must also import goods produced at lower costs overseas and chop theirUS labor costs. The ripple effect.

To stuff us with their products, our corporations brainwash us with slogans of empty promises. Save money, live better. Expect more, pay less. They have made us believe that we can have whatever we want at little cost. We have yet to fully realize the real cost of our indulgences.

If workers want to live better, we have to stop expecting more for less and focus on what really matters.