rural

How Cuts to Unemployment Benefits Will Hurt Rural People

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by Stateline, an initiative of The Pew Charitable Trusts. Republican governors in at least 22 states are ending federal unemployment assistance. The cuts will hit hard in rural areas and communities of color. After Lisa Wilkinson, 54, got laid off from her factory job in December 2019, she knew it would be difficult to …

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Meatpacking Workers Say Attendance Policies Force Them to Work With Covid-19 Symptoms

In April, despite his fever, a meat­pack­ing work­er con­tin­ued to carve neck bones out of pig car­cass­es at a JBS plant in Iowa. Two weeks lat­er, he would test pos­i­tive for COVID-19. But in the mean­time, he said, he kept clock­ing in because of a puni­tive atten­dance sys­tem wide­ly used in meat­pack­ing plants: the point system. Under the pol­i­cy, work­ers …

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Building Power And Raising Voices Of Rural Women

Here in North Carolina, like many other rural areas around the country, reactionary forces have used trends like the decline of jobs, infrastructure, and public services to consolidate power, advance racist and misogynist narratives, and erode public confidence in the power of government to work for the common good. The impact is real: every day, …

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Trump targets USDA with some of the deepest proposed budget cuts

President Donald Trump ran on a platform of giving a voice to rural voters who felt forgotten by politicians in Washington. But his proposed budget, released on Tuesday, proposes deep cuts to crucial Department of Agriculture programs that many rural residents, and farmers, depend on. The budget proposes an almost 21 percent cut to the USDA, the third-largest percentage …

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Madeline Messa

Madeline Messa is a 3L at Syracuse University College of Law. She graduated from Penn State with a degree in journalism. With her legal research and writing for Workplace Fairness, she strives to equip people with the information they need to be their own best advocate.