How the Temp Workers Who Keep Huge Corporations Running Are Getting Crushed

[xchrom]

http://www.alternet.org/labor/temps-who-power-corporate-giants-getting-crushed



It’s 4:18 a.m. and the strip mall is deserted. But tucked in back, next to a closed-down video store, an employment agency is already filling up. Rosa Ramirez walks in, as she has done nearly every morning for the past six months. She signs in and sits down in one of the 100 or so blue plastic chairs that fill the office. Over the next three hours, dispatchers will bark out the names of who will work today. Rosa waits, wondering if she will make her rent.

In cities all across the country, workers stand on street corners, line up in alleys or wait in a neon-lit beauty salon for rickety vans to whisk them off to warehouses miles away. Some vans are so packed that to get to work, people must squat on milk crates, sit on the laps of passengers they do not know or sometimes lie on the floor, the other workers’ feet on top of them.

This is not Mexico. It is not Guatemala or Honduras. This is Chicago, New Jersey, Boston.

The people here are not day laborers looking for an odd job from a passing contractor. They are regular employees of temp agencies working in the supply chain of many of America’s largest companies – Walmart, Macy’s, Nike, Frito-Lay. They make our frozen pizzas, sort the recycling from our trash, cut our vegetables and clean our imported fish. They unload clothing and toys made overseas and pack them to fill our store shelves. They are as important to the global economy as shipping containers and Asian garment workers.

[warrant46]

1. Moderrn Slavery

Done to feed the Pockets and Bank Accounts of their Corporate Masters

[raouldukelives]

5. And shareholders act like Alfred E. Newman. "What, me worry?"

Slavery ended when people decided even though the money was great, they couldn't rest peacefully knowing what was being done to others for it. That it was, and continues to be, an outrage. One where wide eyed students look back and say "How could someone treat another like that only for personal gain?"
Just as today, it will only end when good people decide they would rather live a life that has a possibility of being a net positive for humanity and the world at large, instead of assuring themselves a place at the continued misery table by being a supporter of Wall St over basic moral vaues. By profiting off assuredly making things worse instead of standing up for the most basic human rights, in much the same way as those in the past had to pass up fortunes to pass on liberty to all.

[abelenkpe]

2. K&R

[secondvariety]

3. Welcome to the New World Order.

[NoMoreWarNow]

4. terrible-- but how to fix this?

[geckosfeet]

6. Workplace regulation. Fair employment policies.

Right now the mega-corps hold all the cards and buy congress. Need to put power in the hands of the people who have to elect their leaders.

[Ron Green]

12. Not enough, IMO. it's going to require a replacement of Capitalism

with Workers' Self-Directed Enterprises.

[geckosfeet]

13. Maybe. But that's a big jump from where we are today.

[Ron Green]

14. A huge jump, but one we have to make

if we're going to really cure the boom-and-bust cycle that favors the rich (and lets them make the regulations) and screws everyone else.

[NoMoreWarNow]

18. Yes, I agree. But how to get this-- we need a sea change in politics.

[nashville_brook]

15. higher taxes for temp consumers, no incentives for co's using temps, proof that temp work is temp

in nature, mandatory hiring if temps are used more than x-number days for x-number jobs...

add your own.

[NoMoreWarNow]

17. right-- but seems like too much incentive for employers to skirt the rules and for the GOP

to block it. But I certainly support such regulations.

[East Coast Pirate]

7. Run a search on "temporary employment Union City, NJ"

There are at least 20 temp places, all sending overcrowded vans to warehouses where mostly undocumented workers work for $7.25 to $9.00 an hour.

[DainBramaged]

8. Or this place

http://www.kforce.com/Office-Locations/Parsippany-New-Jersey.aspx



Kforce is a professional staffing and solutions firm in Parsippany, New Jersey. Kforce provides flexible employment opportunities, permanent employment opportunities and experienced consultants for technology, finance, accounting, healthcare and government jobs.



Kforce Inc. (Nasdaq: KFRC), is a $1 billion professional staffing and solutions firm founded in 1962. Backed by our associates and consultants on assignment, Kforce is committed to “Great People = Great Results” for our valued clients and candidates. Kforce operates in more than 60 offices nationwide and one office in the Philippines.



And they drive in packed cars here.

[marmar]

9. k/r

[Starry Messenger]

10. k&r

[Javaman]

11. Xchrom, thanks for posting this alternet links everyday.

Cheers!

[chervilant]

16. It used to be

that temp agencies were the side door to a good, permanent job.

When are the sheeple going to wake up, and band together? Will it take a tiny match to start the conflagration?