A recent article in The New York Times discussed deterioration in working conditions and safety levels in meat packing plants, whether the individual worker has equal bargaining power to the employer or not what are the disadvantages. Lets take a look at meatpacking industry in its relentless pursuit to cut labor cost, it is important for the workers to band together to protect themselves from resulting decline in wages and working conditions - sounds similar to our situation with our employer and the new boss.
Many of meatpacking plants are, unionized although these tend to be the older, high cost facilities. A question that bothers the mind is why the union that represents the meatpacking workers are unable to protect the wages and working conditions of its members?
Although modern machinery has changed the look and sound of packing house the industry remains one of the most grisly and hazardous. Meatpackers work in extreme heat or refrigerated cold often standing shoulder to shoulder wielding razor sharp knives and saws. Grease and blood make the floors and tools slippery and the roar of machines constant - sound familiar to the members in the maintenance.
After years of steady improvement in wages and working conditions, life in the packing house has become worse for workers in recent years. According to the article contributing factors are automation intense competition in the industry weakened unions and diminished health and safety regulation.
To illustrate the problems facing the packing house workers the reporter visited the Sioux Falls, SD hog slaughtering plant of the Morrell Company. One long time worker there said when he started they killed 365 hogs an hour at the plant, but that every time the company management gets a chance, they crank up the speed of the chain that carries the carcasses past the workers station. These days the union reported, the hog chain moves 1,065 head per hour allowing workers 3.4 seconds to do their job before they must start again.
Workers at the plant said that production got faster, attention to safety concerns slipped badly. One day 4 years earlier for example Richard Krier a mechanic in the plant went down into the pit of freight elevator shaft to make repairs. in the past he said the elevator would have been shut down. Now however with the production line racing so fast there was no time. He said to the reporter ‘They holler at you - you get that thing going, it’s costing us a lot of bucks to have that thing down.’ As Richard worked therefore the elevator next to him kept going. When the elevator went up a 10,000 pound counterweight came down, inches away from him. A mesh guard separating the two elevator shafts was missing and on one pass the counterweight crushed his left arm. Three and half months after the accident, the company had not yet put a guard on the counterweight.
Another worker, Tim Denherder, told a different story about dangers of working in the plant, at 28, he already has carpal tunnel syndrome, a blockage of the channel that carries the nerve to the hand that comes from moving parts of the body repetitively, at the pace of the machine, in many departments at Morell, half the workers say they have carpal tunnel symptoms. On the chain workers say it is not unusual to see people forcing their fingers open in the morning and then forcing them back to grip the handle of a knife or saw for the day. Denherder said his grip is so weak that he can not pick up his children and carry them up to bed.
As workers see it therefore, the competitive shake out in the industry is pressing down on their wages and working conditions. To an outside observer the solution for workers is a simple one - quit Morrell and get a different job. Sound familiar to our situation here in Local 100. The article explains however that for many of the Morrell workers this option is not as easy as it seems.
