Wal-Mart Warehouse in Chile

Warehouse work, hidden by its very nature from the view of the general public, is increasingly a low wage job. Dave Jamieson, a reporter for the Huffington Post recently wrote an excellent piece on working conditions inside U.S. warehouses http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/20/new-blue-collar-temp-warehouses_n_1158490.html. While his discoveries about piece rate systems and subcontracting are not new, he shows how the industry has significantly changed in the last decade. The article reminded me a lot of my early work on the garment industry in Los Angeles, where mostly Asian and Latina workers toiled in sweatshops. It has become clear that warehouse work for corporations such as Wal-Mart, Target, and Amazon are examples of the new American sweatshop. Read More