Skip to main content

tv   Americas Pandemic Workers  Al Jazeera  June 19, 2020 6:32am-7:00am +03

6:32 am
by stacked is the can engage in this type of activity and it is created by strongly advise that we have received that this has been done by i started by stichter with very very significant capabilities students in hong kong are expected to protest against a new law which makes disrespecting the chinese national anthem illegal the former british colony has already been seen in several protests over another proposed national security law which many fear will limit freedoms for much our soldiers are helping to stop the spread of covert 19 in the central african republic they're drilling wells and promoting hygiene in rural villages alongside unicef the u.n. children's agencies says the project is supporting the rescue former fighters rehabilitation has counted more than 2000 corona virus infections and those were the headlines i'll be back with more news in half an hour here on al-jazeera next it's fault lines to stay with us. trade tensions could cut global economic growth
6:33 am
by $700000000000.00 we bring you the stories in developments that are rapidly changing the world we live in the united nations world food program is warning of multiple families at the local abortion is counting the cost on al-jazeera. in march much of america went on lockdown. the cove in 1000 pandemic was surging the number of dead from the virus growing exponentially. only workers deemed essential were asked to report to work. over the last several months it's all for them to open their lives to us through video diaries and interviews. today is going to be a busy day for me i picked up quite a few shops a mother who shops for people who don't want to risk going to the store there's only so much you can do whenever you're not aisle that's only like 4 feet across and scared for sure it sucks because we're not really getting what we need from shit my parents ask me all the time why do you do it because i don't have
6:34 am
a choice i have to i still have to pay. to use our very empty well you know something i'm more excited working got only one job of the kind of 41. i called bill and i like it it's $689.00 being out here being at the list of 2 options that i can ill join the last 60 or i can choose the. alicia a father who drives for goober and left in an empty city trying to pay the bills. start a 16 hour shift. this virus is throwing people's lives. to get some of. this virus when it's really something we're never seen before. feeling a little bit don't want to go to work. and i want to go to work we have to go to a 1st responder attempting to save lives fighting a novel virus that could kill him too. there was
6:35 am
a positive coronavirus case at amazon we were demanding that amazon shut down for 2 weeks and pay us all. these they are attacking us and having a complete disregard for our lives and that means we need to defend ourselves and we need to do everything in our power to change this system completely and an amazon worker who's fed up with corporate power. we want to inform you that last night we learned of a case of a contractor of ormoc. if i can be individual by march. the 5 have been undergoing a review. and we're. starting in late march workers at an amazon facility in chicago called a series of walkouts after hearing of coworkers testing positive for covert 19.
6:36 am
they were demanding the company shut down their warehouse until they could guarantee it was sanitized and safe for them to return we just got another come on katie why are they so resisting the claim is the only to make you think we are all born. we have people. we have people that love. we don't want to get anybody this job 7 is not lucky if we run this place to. say oh don't listen to any of us. we'll just be above that. place. man. that's all. right thank. you thank you it's really good i'm not working for now and i think the fault lines amazon site quote our top concern is ensuring the health and safety of our employees back if you're on our you know come on
6:37 am
a night shift here. which so many sheltering at home and shopping online workers like christian we're busier than ever at the money that is more valuable than our blood that's still greedy you know you. are not us in our help us and our safety nothing. amazon would later and up 26 percent over this time last year and their stock value hit an all time high most of the stocks are seen as non-essential goods you know their sam's was being opened. because it's an essentially actual business. they should only be shipping essential goods. in the company when on her inspiration bringing going to 175000 new people in mostly warehouse and delivery. just like solidarity of our neighbors our community. even scab you know rat showed on. fire break.
6:38 am
i'm exposed to. a lot on the ship shopper that i am in the grocery store every morning at 8 am and i don't leave until around 4 pm i hustle hard. business was booming for shopping services too like insta card and shipped. my husband is a mechanic he works for a ford dealership their commission he's making about half of his normal pay luckily i haven't been able to make up the difference even as an employment in the us had nearly 15 percent in april these companies were bringing on thousands of new workers each day it is totally up to us to take your clubs are expensive they're like $10.00 a box a box maybe you asked me 3 days so actually i'm going to pan over here to mine so i have my snacks and everything for the day i have a box of gloves over here my clorox wipes that i'm running low on but all of that
6:39 am
down there is just. i have this mask that a friend of mine made for me. this one i have as i think it's like 6 layers. in order to help protect me so i get it and try to get this done quickly today wish me luck. to. them. i have been a stay at home mom since before my daughter was born and so the 1st few days of shifting was so hard on me. this is where it gets really hard for me to talk about because it sucks. when i get home in order to protect my family the best i can i don't want my daughter hurt me when i come in the door. she would run up to me
6:40 am
and want to give me a hug and all i could do is no stop stop don't touch me baby i've got to go take a shower of germs on me what really sucks is that i could be doing that and still be caring cobe it is i'm in the store every single day. you know so they would listen or you could lose your numbers and we have in. i nor i have to come out i have to pay the bills when you miss the most forceful. recess he said has unfortunately lost. 3 to 4 hours i didn't even got a single job i'm missing school. missing school. he likes staying at all lets the only thing i can try to pay my balance to come out and work if i come
6:41 am
out and vote and there's no work. i don't know what to do i believe don't. as my life ali tries for hooper in but in philadelphia he and other driver saw work try up overnight stay at home waters went into effect . also have to make payments. for the least elisa's car and as an independent contractor like so many of the kicker economy they tell themselves with no safety net and still needing to pay high overhead cost. and i have not trusting i need to be any of them sold. us so saying. as you can see that is slow to leave no one out so all that i was sitting at home getting calls from them and they're asking me different postulates what they should do more so worried about p u n but not me on the bum or the systems all of the old meeting when it will come and
6:42 am
we delete all. so finally i got the job i got the job for 1.5 more thing it would take me about 10 minutes. the job promised them in the prices $3.80 what i would get. after driving for so long as your stance is super duper quiet i was not. see all this barton so i would just close. the cans on the off of it post people don't want to hear it and not i got another job leslie and hope that this one more good comes on. you know i'm in for another 16 i don't know what's expected things are. crazy. people are tired. by april the us was the epicenter of the pandemic and new york had the most dust of any state by far you have wonderful even seasoned
6:43 am
medics but they're also young and inexperienced. and i think about that because this is going to weigh on them. to see this much death. i might so woman's house just. this woman's husband must take care of his mom. passed away now the mother passed away you know or are these later. of course she's in them freeze all covered stuff. in this house where 2 people died. the mother and son. in about 2 months the number of deaths in new york was surpassed 30000. hospitals or more are overflowing with patients and bodies to be a paramedic this some of the most amazing people into paramedics in order to be one you have to have some type of reservoir who does something down there that. you're
6:44 am
able to dip into that keeps you hopeful. with this pandemic that reservoirs empty. you know your messages from people who say they're drinking too much when they go home but they can't sleep they have nightmares. and one this weekend tell me it with a march on themselves i'm sure there's others. there's a tough tore. through the tour just kind of sit on the beach and barely a 3rd. you know we get paid $35000.00 less than the firefighters and cops. e.m.'s over the last 4 years as lost 60 percent of its workforce they leave because they're that making any money here in the benefits and you need people with experience in regular times to manage this stuff.
6:45 am
why are the best members a struggle with their we're trying to you know fight this enemy that you know this is a losing so much against and then we. can't even pay the rent. in a room or any place where. there wasn't a not shutdown they're worried about making money they're worried about moving the packages. as the weeks went on the company began texting christian of his coworkers to notify them of the latest kovi cases in their warehouse. despite additional safety measures that amazon added like temperature checks thorough cleaning and protective equipment the techs kept coming doesn't feel great to go in but you know many of my coworkers are also in this same situation and so you know we need to go in here and and we need to fight and so here i am. that's it.
6:46 am
we have bad news today actually one of our coworkers that is a part of our organizing committee gentry's she just got diagnosed positive with called the 19. this is what we were trying to prevent now she has it be very angry as far as we've been told we have 4 no 4 come from cases but we know there's more we know than amazon is and timing is about everything this is completely unacceptable very angry and it's also it's also kind of scary you know. according to news reports there have been 8 known deaths of amazon employees in the u.s. from comfort 19. amazon did not give us an interview but in a statement they told us they've spent more than $800000000.00 in the 1st half of the year and coping $1000.00 related safety measures. these attacks point just being sent to workers in chicago recover. from it in fact bring you here are you taking the ground in protest or not only happening outside of amazon and that robot
6:47 am
i am at bankers across the country we're demanding more this is the time that we need to make changes this is the time that we need to get organized. and. when you go on the route instead of grass. i have took the day off yesterday to try to help my daughter wasn't home were trying to just get a little bit a one on one time with her. she's really missing me being at home with her it was a day of like normal for us which was nice. morning everyone so so this morning i woke up to the stimulus check in my bank account which makes me feel really good it just went straight into our savings account because i don't have health insurance and am putting myself at risk every single day. 7 40 in the morning ashley is also an independent contractor not an employee mind theory
6:48 am
for her contractors can help save companies money because they are required to pay a minimum wage overtime offer health insurance sick leave family leave for compensation if someone gets injured on the job. i'm foreigners. non-employees also don't have the legal right to form a union in the co shape for better contract so if they don't like the terms the companies can say they're free to go. i still do not have tracking on my protective equipment there's still no i am for many cars their pain so i can at least pay for my own equipment or not getting what we need or we're asking for and we're not really asking for a lot. on april 7th should home and protest asking for hazard pay $5.00 for water and company provided protective equipment p.p.d. for every shopper. and the we were we were going to get. a
6:49 am
provider. they're providing us. and a 6 hour ties or if i didn't have to do this for the money that i'm getting paid to do it i wouldn't be. just because of the risk that is going into it. has been ian's my health and that's going to do i would rather help my family financially and go through my day feeling unappreciated and underpaid then to lose everything that my husband has worked so hard for for our family. finally received. yesterday in late april ashley told us she got one box of gloves and 2 small bottles a hand sanitizer from shipped in the mail. she also got a small bonus but so far there's no hazard pay this is what we're getting shipped
6:50 am
to condor requests for an interview card we ship shipped as a same day service the instant heart grab. all these different services where somebody is working for a company and providing a special service to you is a typical service i am on my way. to chances are they're getting paid less than minimum wage the whole point of a gig service is that the company can make x. amount of dollars whenever they only have to pay their employees very very little because the tip of. the line. for google workers like ashley and ali some relief came with the passage of a law in late march called the cares act it allowed contractors to apply for unemployment insurance
6:51 am
a benefit they would normally be excluded from ellie was able to apply for this at the end of april so i'm here. on employment so it is. receiving $845.00 every week also the drivers have to make be clean car. shows so with this. kind of $45.00 i'm getting it we must need $500.00 just to pay for our cars then we left with $300.00 from this be us money. so the question is is that enough to pay mortgage bills and food until it's very simple no it's not enough. situation is critical we don't know what will happen in future keep our fingers crossed. i mean i. just finished
6:52 am
a nother 16 hour shift. and. it was busy another busy day. unfortunately this morning i got news last night when the e m t's in the bronx who has about a year and a half on the job another young kid dealing with an unprecedented amount of people dying in the streets killed himself. and his own life. just fine western queens and the medics who found him in the street transformed to bellevue it was nothing to do. with the last few months he tells about trouble coping with what he's seeing with cold but. he's probably not going to be the last there's going to be more.
6:53 am
work. on the edge of the bed now a few minutes trying to get a missile. feeling. mayors talking about leonore's. essential health care workers. but it sure seems such a term. as president is. talking about only 100000 people. and the number keeps going up. miracles must be the best ravenswood you told me and far from it.
6:54 am
all. by june more than 100000 people have died from the crown of ours in the u.s. . and one in 4 american workers have filed for unemployment. more than 40000000 people. what's of young. made it june 2020 it's the halfway point of this new year of the sun 3rd decade of the new millennium can hear helicopters. all day long to find out. the protests are going to happen not too far. just as chronic cases were starting to slow hundreds of thousands of americans lost their homes and
6:55 am
flooded the streets in a wave of civic actions demanding an end to police violence and justice for george floyd one of the latest unarmed black men to be killed by police. and we're still dealing with coded. the counting of coronavirus that's revealed that like the police it too was disproportionately killing black people. this moment also revealed that essential workers are disproportionately people of color and the lowest paid we've now had at least 10. cases that each one management has notified us about. by the time the pandemic guns we know that the country will be different. what we don't know is how. now. june amazon has decided to take away or true dollar house or face they have deemed we no longer need hazard pay because now they want everything to return to normal you
6:56 am
know this is making a lot of my coworkers angry and it's making a lot of folks saying. usually don't get angry you know. today's june 5th i have officially not been shipping for about 2 and a half 3 weeks that 1st i want to say 2 or 3 weeks of the pandemic tips were really good but then as the years started to settle and people were asking her to get out then started going down i'm getting paid are some of my shops only $7.00 and the shop took me an hour half so i got paid $7.00 which is not even minimum wage for an hour's worth of work it just became not worth it anymore. the walk out in my opinion was successful to a week we're not going to get all our demands at one time and still all
6:57 am
those things happen i won't go back unless i have to. because i will not be taken advantage of i will not be treated like i am disposable i will not work for pennies and i. have realized that. we are one of the big part of this is a call me but we didn't have any they were protection. because 5 will be against us all these big companies make sure we get our rights. for future. protests need to happen. to be reform maybe torn down so that we can start over. again because the system we have is being. called would happen people can go one paycheck. one paycheck that's a system that's failing america's you have to look at self in the mirror and do it
6:58 am
you know where when we want to as a country to be like chip you know. we can't do this because we on the to play our part in making this world a better place to live in power are these mass movements make and change right now they're getting out into the streets you're organizing marches that's the basis of how it is that we're going to create change in the society.
6:59 am
as protests rage over police brutality and coronavirus grips the nation campaigning on the election trail has been forced to take a back seat will the presidential candidates ever hit the road and sell their brand of politics to americans before the votes follow the u.s. elections on a. global pandemic mass protests demanding change economic recession and geopolitical tensions not to mention the small matter of a looming election join me steve clemons in conversation with leading voices on the bottom line your weekly take on u.s. politics and society on al-jazeera. is saudi arabia publicly championing women's rights something that is committed to empowering its most empowering women while privately. punishing those who step out of line they've been aided. and from they will if there was taken to the security pointed out is there a world examines the alleged detention and torture of saudis women activists the
7:00 am
only charges against them relate to their talking to foreign organizations like human rights watch and amnesty international saudi women reform or repression on al-jazeera. the u.s. supreme court rules against president double trouble for the 2nd time in a week this time in favor of young immigrants. but you want your just their allies one headquarters here in doha also coming up i don't think he's fit for of which i don't think he has the companies to carry out the job is also dealing with the fallout.

32 Views

info Stream Only

Uploaded by TV Archive on