Ehrenreich On Women, Workers And Walmart
Friday, March 4, 2011(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO)
"I'm still waiting for my check" from Walmart, author Barbara
Ehrenreich (at left) said at a panel discussion Tuesday night at Busboys and
Poets on the first night of Women's History Month. Ehrenreich, author of "Nickel
and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By In America," said Walmart was "something of a
totalitarian environment to work in." While writing her book, which has sold
more than 1.5 million copies, Ehrenreich worked at a Walmart in Minnesota in
2000. Ehrenreich explained that it was not uncommon for a Walmart manager to
tell workers to "Punch out. I've got a lot of work for you to do." Sandy
Carpenter, a former Walmart employee in Laurel, Maryland, said she experienced
the same thing in 2009. "I had to work an average of two hours a day off the
clock," said Carpenter, who claims she was fired for organizing. "They have not
stopped their old ways," Ehrenreich said of Walmart.
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report/photo by Pete Tucker, TheFightBack.org