Massive worker strike, coronavirus & childcare, the NCAA, Justin Amash
it’s 3 am and i’m honestly pretty hammered!
Good morning friends! If you’re anything like us: aosjdanjfiosafgdfhgaiosdhgaishodgpioasdfghasdf! You made sense of that, right?
A historic mass strike between Amazon, Whole Foods, and Instacart: and let’s be honest, cool? Fuck these companies. They use their workers up like near-disposable nothingness when in reality they are people with families and bills—and perhaps more importantly to the blood and oil that keeps these companies running, they are competent and capable people who allow for enterprises like Amazon to even exist.
Child care providers are stretched thin: and with coronavirus on their plate, things have never looked grimmer for them.
College athletes are very close to being paid: provided that the NCAA board accepts a new plan allowing for student athletes to benefit from name, image, and likeliness. Whoa, is that...good news we hear?
Justin Amash is running for president, probably: and no one who knows anything about anything should care at all. Unless you’re a libertarian, in which case uh, stop?
...well, you made sense of THAT, right? If not, try to figure all this out, because we’re gonna use the “F word” a whole bunch!
ECONOMICS
A Historic Mass Strike Will Happen on May 1st
Amazon, Instacart, Whole Foods, Target. They’re all massive fuckin’ companies who are deserving of no pity in these dark times. The storm that hardest strikes the most vulnerable is here and let me tell you: these companies ain’t it. Now, employees across these companies and more are planning to strike on May 1st.
Striking, Hell Yeah
As a low-level employee for some massive faceless corporation, you probably don’t care about their bottom line. Them doing well is well, inevitable: but you paying your bills, feeding your kids, or just not wanting to feel like a totally-used-up trash rag is a low priority. These kinds of things only come if demand them, and in light of COVID-19, now is a better time to make demands than ever.
Amazon, Instacart, Walmart, Target, FedEx, Whole Foods, and more: their employees are walking off the job on May 1st as a result of insufficient basic protections against coronavirus.
Some of the leaders of this walkout include former employers of some of these companies, who were specifically let go for organizing.
May 1st, or May Day, is a historic day. In the past, it’s been celebrated by the global left as a day for workers to express their demands.
Fuck ‘Em
Truth be told, when writing this, we often try to stay...well, certainly not neutral, but neutral to a point. Here’s a story, here’s what we kinda make of it, what do you think? In the name of transparency, though, we want to be clear that this is just our opinion: fuck these companies.
All of these titans of capitalism have enough money to survive. They aren’t afraid of weathering the storm, they’re trying to corner the market.
If you can’t protect your workers when doing more than you ought to, do you really count as “essential?” (hey, Amazon, we’re looking at you: what makes you different from Walmart or Target? You’re primarily online, so you seem to think you’re exempt from the rules because you don’t come in direct contact with customers, but your employees come into contact with one another, the virus may survive on packages, whatever, whatever!).
Bottom line: striking is hard and scary. For some workers, it can mean the difference between paying bills or not. For others, they must lean on their local communities for support in times when they can’t rely on their employers.
We won’t lie. Everything is scary right now. Your boss may fuck you over at any given moment. Nonetheless, we think you should choose to strike if you can; if enough folks do, it makes these insanely bloated companies realize just who they rely on. What’s the alternative, working regardless and putting yourself and your family at risk?
You deserved better, as an employee, before any of this began. In the midst of a global pandemic, you deserve basic human decency. Demand it.
(and if you don’t work at Amazon, Target, Instacart, Walmart, FedEx, WholeFoods, or Shipt: stop fucking buying from them, because whatever risk it costs employees, it’s a fraction of the cost for you to withhold on a purchase or find a more ethical seller).
ELSEWHERE
You Know What? We’re Tired!
Truth be told: we’re so fuckin’ fed up. We can’t help but drop an F-bomb here or there; we can’t help but feel an absolute disgust for the CEOs who are so incredibly out of touch with what life looked like for a regular working person before all of this, let alone what it looks like now. We don’t wanna leave you hanging, but we also don’t wanna deal with this nonsense, so here’s a lightning round.
GO GO GO
Childcare workers are stretched thin: it was already a difficult field to work in, but now? Well, those razor-thin margins just got thinner—and they involve keeping the children of frontline workers healthy.
The NCAA is likely going to let student athletes profit from their name, image, and likeness. And it’s about goddamn time. The big bucks wouldn’t exist without them, so we ought to cut them a slice.
Justin Amash is probably running as a Libertarian: and no one should care nor be offended. This guy has always been committed to weird libertarian beliefs about small government. Whatever stands he took against Trump were never indicative of actual anti-Republican sentiments. Besides, if the Biden camp strategy was to go after the same people Justin Amash can possibly win over? Ha hah ahahahahah ha ha ha idiots stupid idiots.
END OF THE LINE...
That’s it for today.
That’s what we’ve got. Fuck, sorry it wasn’t much. Remember, we’re only able to do this every day because of readers like you. Drop your friends and family a referral link and help us grow. We’d truly appreciate it.
Have a good one,
The Bread Line
we’re listening to: