farmworkers

The Climate Crisis Is Coming for Undocumented Farmworkers First

Leave a Comment / Climate Change / By max cyril

Facing deadly heat waves and few protections, undocumented agricultural workers are being pushed to their limit. In July 2020, Claudia Durán felt compelled to complete her shift harvesting blueberries in the fields of Allegan County, Mich., before driving to the local hospital’s emergency room to be treated for dehydration, where she arrived dizzy, with an acute …

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For Farmworkers, the Fight for the 8-Hour Day Isn’t Over

Leave a Comment / Farm Workers, immigration, Uncategorized / By max cyril

Federal labor laws exclude farmworkers from overtime pay and other protections. After years of advocacy by farm labor groups, lawmakers in Oregon, Washington and Colorado are working to change that. Oregon state Rep. Ricki Ruiz grew up the son of two farmworkers, and he remembers his family’s struggles vividly. “We almost faced eviction five times because …

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Texas and Florida, Defying CDC Guidance, Aren’t Prioritizing Vaccination of Farmworkers

Leave a Comment / Farm Workers, Pandemic / By max cyril

Despite Centers for Disease Control recommendations, a few states with large farmworker populations have not prioritized Covid-19 vaccinations for farmworkers. Because farmworkers risk Covid-19 exposure in the course of their jobs, the CDC proposed that they should be near the front of the vaccination line. But Texas and Florida, which have large farmworker populations, have not included farmworkers in their initial rollouts, …

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Toiling in the Marijuana Fields

Leave a Comment / Farm Workers, Legal Cannabis / By max cyril

Working People is excited to announce that, along with our ongoing partnership with In These Times magazine, we are now partnered with The Real News Network in Baltimore! In this episode, we sit down with Justin Whittaker for the first part of an ongoing series of interviews where we’ll be talking to workers on all sides of the marijuana industry?—?in states …

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How much would it cost consumers to give farmworkers a significant raise?

Leave a Comment / Farm Workers, wages / By max cyril

The increased media coverage of the plight of the more than 2 million farmworkers who pick and help produce our food—and whom the Trump administration has deemed to be “essential” workers for the U.S. economy and infrastructure during the coronavirus pandemic—has highlighted the difficult and often dangerous conditions farmworkers face on the job, as well …

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Migrant farmworkers are headed north from Florida, afraid of COVID-19 but with little choice

Leave a Comment / Farm Workers / By max cyril

Florida is hitting one daily high in positive coronavirus tests after another, and now some of the people in the hardest-hit communities are heading out for other states. Not wealthy snowbirds, but migrant farmworkers, who follow growing seasons north for the summer. The Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW), which fights for better wages and working conditions for farmworkers …

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Undocumented Farmworkers Are Refusing Covid Tests for Fear of Losing Their Jobs

Leave a Comment / Farm Workers, Undocumented Employees / By max cyril

As states reopen for business, the coronavirus is exploding among America’s 2.5 million farmworkers, imperiling efforts to contain the spread of the disease and keep food on the shelves just as peak harvest gets underway. The figures are stark. The number of Covid-19 cases tripled in Lanier County, Ga., after one day of testing farmworkers. All 200 …

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The Food Industry’s Next Covid-19 Victims: Migrant Farmworkers

Leave a Comment / Farm Workers, Migrant Workers / By max cyril

Outbreaks have begun at farms around the country, thanks in large part to crowded employer-provided housing. AVON, N.Y.—Luis Jimenez, 35, works 66 hours a week tending hundreds of calves at a dairy in upstate New York. He sends $800 home to his parents and eight siblings in Oaxaca, Mexico, every two weeks. “We want to …

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Trump deems farmworkers ‘essential’ but not safety rules for them. That could threaten the food supply.

Leave a Comment / Farm Workers / By max cyril

The Trump administration has deemed the millions of people who are cutting lettuce, picking cherries, packing peaches and otherwise getting food from farm to table to be “essential workers” but is doing little to keep them healthy during the pandemic. The lack of federal action has left state and industry leaders scrambling to shield their …

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The Other Victims of California’s Fires: Workers Inhaling Toxic Fumes

Leave a Comment / OSHA, Uncategorized / By max cyril

With the death toll now standing at 42 and with some 7,200 structures destroyed, officials are now calling the wildfire in Paradise, CA (dubbed the “Camp Fire”) the deadliest and most destructive in California’s recent history. Two other massive fires—dubbed the Hill Fire and Woolsey Fire are simultaneously scorching Southern California. As frontline firefighters—including many prison laborers—continue to …

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