June 16, 2017
By Brett Murphy
Los Angeles — Samuel Talavera Jr. did everything his bosses asked. (click here)
Most days, the trucker would drive more than 16 hours straight hauling LG dishwashers and Kumho tires to warehouses around Los Angeles, on their way to retail stores nationwide.
He rarely went home to his family. At night, he crawled into the back of his cab and slept in the company parking lot.
For all of that, he took home as little as 67 cents a week....
I can't imagine another profession in the USA that needs a strong union more. They will happily pay the union fees to realize they are experiencing human rights violations. This form of trucking is some of the most dangerous as well. I have to wonder how many deaths have taken place on those docks realizing the extent the drivers work through exhaustion.
...A yearlong investigation by the USA TODAY Network found that port trucking companies in southern California have spent the past decade forcing drivers to finance their own trucks by taking on debt they could not afford. Companies then used that debt as leverage to extract forced labor and trap drivers in jobs that left them destitute.
If a driver quit, the company seized his truck and kept everything he had paid towards owning it.
If drivers missed payments, or if they got sick or became too exhausted to go on, their companies fired them and kept everything. Then they turned around and leased the trucks to someone else.
Drivers who manage to hang on to their jobs sometimes end up owing money to their employers – essentially working for free. Reporters identified seven different companies that have told their employees they owe money at week’s end....
Personally, I see these drivers as an extension of the "Longshoremen." They need to work on the same priorities including any strike. They should be family to each other.
Shipping docks are dangerous by the nature of the business. Human beings should never be alone in that job.
