The Jungle
What is an essential worker? Who gets to define what work is essential? Because as things look now, people that make minimum wage and are still being forced to work look pretty damn essential to me. Which creates an even more stark realization that these employees earn so little pay.
It’s no secret that the CEO wage gap is spiraling out of control, and politicians are making millions of dollars while in office. It seems that everyone is getting paid except the people actually doing the work in our society. In the face of this epidemic, workers are starting to realize that they are earning way less than they should be, and some are starting to organize and fight this systemic oppression.
Workers at Amazon, Instacart, and Wal-Mart are starting to organize strikes and “sick-outs” in protest of being forced to work during the Coronavirus outbreak without any real protective or compensatory measures being put in place. This is being treated as a regular day at the office, which is laughable at best and wholly offensive at worst. And now corporations are firing these organizers as a matter of retaliation.
I think everyone that has been deemed “essential” should receive pay increases and tax breaks for being heroes during this time. I think they should receive some form of special status, similar to active military personnel and military veterans. And I think we should all remember which politicians fought against free college, free healthcare and other forms of relief that were said to be too Socialist.
Similar to the 1906 novel “The Jungle” by Upton Sinclair, the true greed and exploitative nature of capitalism is being exposed. It’s up to us to do something about it and speak with our actions instead of our words. And it’s gonna take more than just voting in November to get true change in our country.
Amazon fires warehouse worker who led Staten Island strike for more coronavirus protection — www.cnbc.com
Amazon said it fired Chris Smalls for ‘violating social distancing guidelines and putting the safety of others at risk.’
