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Unsung heroes
| | | Foodies: Meet the tomato pickers who changed the industry | Have you ever checked whether the person who picked that organic arugula was paid a fair wage? The foodie movement often pays greater attention to environmental impact and animal welfare than to worker rights, even as there are more than a million people who pick and pack produce in America’s fields. These folks are often invisible to the broader population, who enjoy the fruits of their labor. Such workers are vulnerable to all kinds of abuse, including outright slavery, and typically earn a pittance. But there’s a spot of good news: Over the course of a decade, a small group of tomato pickers in southwest Florida forced corporate megaliths like Whole Foods to change how they do business. |
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| | Where forced labor is … good? | Twelve times a year, the president of the country chooses a project — picking up trash, painting houses, caring for the elderly — and then, on the last Saturday of the month, every able-bodied citizen pitches in. This is not just goodwill; it is mandatory. Fines and ostracism await those who do not participate. And it works, at least in President Paul Kagame’s Rwanda. But could it work elsewhere, including the U.S.? |
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| | César Chávez: Not a one-man movement | Mexican-American civil rights leader César Chávez is a hero of the U.S. farm labor movement. But the historical narrative has largely erased a crucial cast of characters: the Filipino farmworkers — aka the Delano Manongs — who ignited the movement’s first spark. |
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| | They risked their lives | Speaking of sparks, phosphorus first grew in commercial importance through its use in friction matches, invented by the English chemist John Walker in 1827. But the highly toxic process of making white phosphorus matches would take the lives of untold numbers of match workers, primarily young women and girls. The brave “matchwomen” who in 1888 protested conditions in the leading London match factory — and won — helped usher in a new era of labor unionism. |
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Laboring for change
| | | Labor unions see youthful surge | From nonprofits to digital newsrooms, and from Silicon Valley cafeterias to Hollywood writers’ rooms, unions are cropping up across industries that have little or no history of such activity. These unions advocate for better working conditions and compensation for their members, and speak the language of a generation hungry for activism. Millennials are driving the growth in union membership, upending stereotypes that younger workers don’t identify with labor movements. |
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| | Social media helps Australia’s laborers | Australia’s sagging union movement is trying to reinvent itself. Once a powerhouse of Australian political life with a legacy vital to the country’s history, unions in Australia have been unable to buck the global trend of declining memberships. Each successive Aussie generation is less inclined to join a union. For young activists, however, the present time has never been more important to attract the next generation — and for this goal, social media is their key. |
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| | Champion of a vital workforce: Guest workers | Saket Soni has led laborers with guest-worker visas in the U.S. to some of the ballsiest collective actions in recent history, with protests that involved crawfish peelers and welders, among others. Typically, guest workers keep a low profile; because their visas bind them to one employer, quitting can mean deportation or worse. Stories about abused guest workers once elicited sympathy, Soni says. Now they elicit recognition. |
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Trafficked
| | | Still enslaved in America | Forced labor in the U.S. is far more common than most people think. California has the most reported cases of human trafficking in the country, according to National Human Trafficking Hotline statistics, and is trailed by Texas, Florida, Ohio and New York. Forced labor in the U.S. is most prevalent among domestic workers, farmworkers, restaurant and food service workers, as well as beauty and health service providers. |
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| | African laborers in the Middle East | There is a widespread pattern of labor exploitation involving thousands of African migrant workers in the Persian Gulf States. While continued international pressure on Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates has managed to improve working conditions for many South Asian and Southeast Asian migrants, recruitment agencies are now moving on to Africa. Many of the workers flooding the Persian Gulf states are from Ethiopia, Somalia or Uganda — countries with limited capacity to guarantee the fair treatment of their citizens abroad. |
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Community Corner
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Who are the unsung workers where you live? Tell us their story and OZY may cover them next! |
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ABOUT OZYOZY is a diverse, global and forward-looking media and entertainment company focused on “the New and the Next.” OZY creates space for fresh perspectives, and offers new takes on everything from news and culture to technology, business, learning and entertainment. Curiosity. Enthusiasm. Action. That’s OZY! | |
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