The Centers for Disease Control gave employers the go-ahead to make essential workers who’ve been exposed to COVID-19 keep working right up until they get sick. That’s despite the well-established risk of transmission from people who don’t have symptoms. Under the policy, exposed workers should wear a mask and companies should clean and disinfect a lot, but still!
“Essential workers in food processing, agriculture, janitorial, and many other critical industries are disproportionally workers of color, who are underpaid and already at increased risk of serious complications if they become infected with coronavirus,” National Employment Law Project executive director Rebecca Dixon said in a statement. “With this new policy, the Trump administration has completely abandoned its responsibility to protect workers.”
Viruses — pandemics — expose and exacerbate the existing dynamics of a society — good and bad. They are like a fun-house mirror, grossly reflecting ourselves back to us. One of those dynamics is the burden we put on individual parents and families. We ask individuals to solve for problems that are systemically created.
Everything from the lack of paid sick leave and parental leave to the fact that the school day ends at 3pm when the typical work day goes several hours longer — yet aftercare is not universally available. And that’s saying nothing of the fact that we need universal healthcare, irrespective of employment. Parents pour endless energy into solving for systems that don’t make sense and don’t work.
? Workers don’t know who to turn to when employers won’t close down during the pandemic:
From crafts stores to custom closet installers to home-furnishing retailers, corporate lawyers have been arguing in letters to their workforces that they are too important to close even as the public-health crisis worsens. Employees who are dubious of those claims have been parsing the language of their stay-at-home orders and asking government officials why they are still expected to clock in.
While some states have moved swiftly to clarify the exemptions, several workers told HuffPost they reached out to their governors’ offices, their mayors, their local health or police departments and have waited days for definitive answers.
? The U.S. Department of Labor warned employers not to retaliate against workers for reporting unsafe conditions.
? The University of Chicago is paying its workers. Including subcontracted workers. This shouldn’t be unusual, but it is.
? Grocery store workers need frontline protections:
Black and brown workers are more likely to work in lower-paid, frontline positions like cashiers in retail stores, while white workers are more likely to be represented in management and supervisory roles. This means that the panic shopping that is resulting in lines out of the door and physical fights over supplies is being experienced disproportionately and most directly by workers of color. Shoppers are stocking up on supplies and food to stay home and to minimize exposure or risk, protecting themselves and their families. But what about the workers who are making the food and supplies available? Why isn’t their health and safety being better protected by their employers?
? Temporary SNAP benefit boost a no-brainer for more economic stimulus.
? The coronavirus crisis exposes how fragile capitalism already was.
This blog was originally published at Daily Kos on April 11, 2020. Reprinted with permission.
About the Author: Laura Clawson is a Daily Kos contributor at Daily Kos editor since December 2006. Full-time staff since 2011, currently assistant managing editor.
