There is good news on the employment front, even though 30 million Americans are out of work. (Yes. That is the real number, including people who have given up looking for work, or people who are making ends meet with part-time or off-the-books labor.) They are still firing all the Mexican janitors so we can do their jobs! For instance, ABM Industries, which is an immense corporation that had annual revenue of $3.6 billion in 2008. How do they do it? The easy way-they employ undocumented labor which they then fire when the feds come around. So now they have disposed of 1200 janitors in Minneapolis. (That company's total labor force is 100,000 people.) Anyway, this is a great report and perhaps you can make contact with the ABM mothership to let them know that you are a citizen and you are so willing to scrub out those recession toilets now.
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
13
Those weren't shit jobs either. Some of them were making $13 a hour, I personally know people people who are at risk of losing their house who would love to have a $13 an hour job right now.
Wow. I would have guessed $9-10/hour.
Right? The pay rate is not terrible!
What if I'm a Mexican AND a citizen? Win-win or lose-lose?
Depends on whether it's before or after 6. Like, most days you'll be challenged for ID--but after dark, you'll be the life of the party!
How did I not see THIS coming!?
Plus, maybe they'll get to stay at comfy Varick Sreet, Homeland Security's "W":
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/02/nyregion/02detain.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1&partner=rss&emc=rss
Where I live in the U.S., I've noticed more and more people going around on recycle-day taking redeemable materials out of the bins to cash in for themselves. They're almost all Hispanic, almost surely Mexican immigrants who are here illegally.
On the one hand, the practice of stealing recyclables sucks, because the redeemable materials are supposed to fund the recycling service. The more the people steal, the less revenue; the less revenue, the higher my taxes to pay for the service.
It's illegal to pilfer from the recycle bins, and yet I could never bring myself to tell someone to stop rifling through my recycle bin, let alone call the cops.
On the one hand, it makes me sad that another human being has to wander from waste bin to waste bin to make ends meet. Why would I add insult to injury by asking or forcing them to stop?
But I'm less sorry than I am impressed by the hard work. It's messy, it takes all day, and it's a lot more dignified than begging. On top of it, probably all these folks are also working or trying to work odd jobs elsewhere (cleaning, busing tables, whatever): how can I not want people with that work ethic to be here?
Finally, I suspect my great grandparents did similar things to make ends meet when they came here around the turn of the last century. I love myself so much, how could I not love this idea? That I might be helping the future (browner) me emerge on this soil, in due course and good time?
There are entire swaths of India, China, and Africa where this the sole means of self preservation, and instead of recyclables its toxic garbage and computer parts.
The lengths to which human beings will go to survive is impressive, admirable, and also extremely depressing in its necessity.
Yeah. Those people aren;t doing so well anymore
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/12/business/worldbusiness/12recycle.html
Wouldn't this make ABM the most despicable company you've never heard of?
I'll bet ABM totally forwards those janitors' last paychecks to their INS holding cell, though, right?
One of the ways that many are apprehended is when they show up to pick up their last paycheck. It's not like the sweatshop raids in the films. In ABM's case, it actually told all its workers that they had a period to show proper documentation... But do they get to keep that last paycheck?