Correspondent for more perfect union, the Real News Network and tv. Previously, she was a heavy metal editor. Advice and was a Founding Member of the vice union fight like hell the untold story of america is her first book, who. Accident maximillian alvarez, the editor in chief of the Real News Network in baltimore, the author of the work of living, the host of working people, a podcast, the lives of jobs, dreams and struggles. The working class today. Prior to joining the real news, he was an associate editor at the chronicle Higher Education and graduated with a dual ph. D. In history and comparative literature from the university michigan. His work has been featured in a range of outlets, including the nation, in these boston review, truthout and baffler and i also we lost panelist to the vagaries of covid. I read her book as i did the Angela Garbes cant be with. She is the author of essential change mothering as social change and as the primary caregiver for three daughters who are all now grown. I read this book really resonated with me for a whole bunch of reasons, but i, i made all these doubts, but i do think this is so important because taken as three. This is an essential trilogy. I had nothing to do with suggesting it, but it occurred to me it was i was looking for heres that word intersection now, adding that this had a really profound effect. I mean, reading these in quick succession because we had the sphere, the personal sphere, the thing we operate in our families, then we have the direct conversation. Were in a subway, were crossing people where we work. Were trying to make our lives. And then we have something that i dont think since howard zinn, weve had, which is an update about the working experience of American People that traces the of capital with a through line right through from slavery to covid not bad for three books so i dont know who suggested it together but it works me and i suggest someone adopted as a college course. So were to listen to them talk. And so one of the challenges for me to get out of their way, but also try to facilitate this, we have 50 minutes, which is like insane is kind of like if you listen to my whats on 55 Minute Program and by every monday 7 a. M. Except tomorrow, you will know that its a real challenge. Want to make sure we have at least 20 minutes to hear from you because we owe you that because were here and youre. And so this is also helping each other be motivate because the odds look pretty grim, right . Quite frankly, im running around the country trying to find where hazard pay is being paid. I find one county that does it and i try to make it a National Story because the powers that be capital really wants to move on. And so we have to turn to the visionaries like we have here today whove been keeping track of it, meticulous sleep. So there is an accountability. One thing you might realize is that on the Positive Side of the ledger, 47 Million People left their jobless last year. That is a movement if you and you can see from space and it is four times the size of the American Labor movement. On a good day is 12 Million People organized. The aflcio and whats happened is that because capital. Us and through the government and corporations theres been a profound anthropic logical realignment of our souls in real time about the value work, the value of family and that we as dr. Barber told at princeton, we all have 6 minutes. How we apportion is increasingly our and we want to talk about how we can organize and learn from the. So i want to start with you, kim. Were looking what you how do you think covid has changed this moment in terms of working people . Well, okay. So can guys hear me . Okay, i have a little mouse voice despite looking like this. So i got like i got to try, but i mean, thats a good question. Feel like thats a gift craft question, max but i will do my best just talking about like youre saying in the past year or couple of years, weve seen so many people leave their jobs and thats significant. But weve also seen so many people decide to stay and change jobs and make their workplaces better and kind of buckle down and be like, okay, kind of like, well, you like im going to make this better because i deserve better. And weve seen this wave of organizing happen kind of i think a lot of it comes from those days of the pandemic when we had this brief discourse of the essential worker essential work for a very brief moment, the folks who have always done essential and always made their society run, whether or not, theyre recognized often completely unrecognized and left invisible. People paid attention, said, oh, we really do need you. Lets lets give you a round of applause. Lets, you know, do some pots and pans. New york, you guys are really into that for a minute. You know, lets i live in philly, so its like, okay, you guys are fun. And there is that hazard pay. Theres a little hero pay. I think my partner was working in a Grocery Store and then on a farm, got hero pay for a little while and then all of that stopped. All of that went and everyone still had to keep to work. And i think that really shifted the way that people saw the value only of their labor but of their lives. You know, like why would you risk your life to go work at starbucks or at cvs or in your job as a hospital janitor. Youre not even being appreciated. Youre being sent into the jaws of the lion while. This Global Pandemic is devastating predominantly people, predominantly black and brown, working. Its the math just doesnt math. And i think weve seen i mean, we out of that, we you know the strike tober moment, we saw these massive very public strikes and we saw people paying attention to these strikes in, a way that, as a labor reporter, was of thrilling. So its like, oh, wait, theyre like theyre paying attention to weve been saying for all these years. Cool. Like weve seen it weve seen things change a lot in terms of Media Coverage and in terms of the types of workers who become involved, the movement and the wins and that have been made. Whether were talking about starbucks or amazon or something like. Home depot and philly vogue. Well, yeah, i do that right to me, but thats significant because if you think about like years ago like this, that has shifted, particularly with people where theyre really willing overthrow the conventional wisdom and the system is having a hard time keeping up with it really is kind of and its going i see a response in the Federal Reserve well get your back to work. Yeah crack the whip and there is when you hear about that thats what we do. Right. Like this is a technique. Yeah. I mean, well, i tricked them letting me do that, but. But so far, so good. Thats no other story. But honestly i would love to hear from max how he feels about this same question. If i can do that, because hes sort of like, this is, his sweet spot. So yeah, you can make you a shout out to angela. Really sorry. She couldnt be here. But thank you so much for braving the elements and coming out to hear us gab um, yeah. I want to, i guess sort of zoom out a bit more because before we even get to covid 19, it bears reminding where we were before that right the situation in that working people in this country have been toiling under for many, many years is what kim and i cover on a week to, week basis. And i think its important to remember that covid definitely accelerated a lot of these. But those trends have deep roots. All right. Let us not forget that, essentially since the 1980s, working people been more productive in this country than they ever been. They have been working longer they have been working harder while. Unionization has been plummeting while wages have largely stagnating. And while corporate profits have been booming, endless, including during the pandemic right. So so working people are working longer, harder, more, and they are seeing less. And of the fruits of that labor, that is the situation that we been in in this country for decades. That is the situation we were careening towards when we heard about covid. I think a lot of us, when we that oh , this isnt going away, this is coming here. We all had this kind of impending sense of dread for what we were in for because we knew how underpaid detected people were. We knew, how much the social safety net had rorted and deliberately dismantled by politicians, both sides of the aisle. Right. And so people were into this storm with. No life rafts, no life jackets. All we had was each other right. And i want to really emphasize that that things as bad as they got could have been a lot worse but as always like kim said it was people working people who the world up who kept us from falling completely into the abyss. And that is the moment that the great Molly Crabapple on the cover of my book, she i dreamed of having molly design the cover of the book. I didnt think shed be able to do it, but legend that she is she did and she immortalized that moment of people being pots and pans in. New york in the early days of the pandemic. I think there was a real recognition from all of us that while the bosses and corporate politicians, the rich, ran off to their second or third homes, it was us who delivered food. It was us who checked in on our neighbors. It was Health Care Workers who braved the elements, even though they did not get the proper protection that they needed it was people working at delivering our packages was gig workers who also not being given the proper ppe, making sure that people didnt starve right. It was it was working people who really showed their mettle during all of this. And i think that as kim said, when covid forced capitalism to finally admit that it needs us because for my entire lifetime, this has been working to us that we are expendable, that we are replaceable. Anyone whos worked a single low wage job knows that feels like ten years ago i was a temp worker at a warehouse in southern california. And every day, no matter how long had worked there, no matter good. Our record was every day the temps who made up around 80 of the workforce there were forced to line up dripping in sweat after working 12, 13, 14 hour days on the hard concrete floor, the managers walked by and, pointed to the people they wanted to come back the next day, every day that served as a reminder that you are replaceable, that the people standing the gate every morning, you know they can fill your spot if you dont up if you mess up one time, if you raise your voice one time, youre out of here. That is the situation that we were in going into the pandemic. And i think when that essential word floated out in the discourse working people latched on to that as they as well they should have right and i think as time wore on and this is why i did the book because, i realized how quickly we were starting to forget essential working people were and how much deserved better right just started to accept the un acceptable in a matter of months and i wanted to document that first year of covid through the voices of the working People Living through it so that we completely forget what working people had showed us, what the system had showed us, and what it showed us was that this whole economic understands labor as essential, but not treat our lives as essential. Right . I guess the that said, i am concerned that that moment of power is dissipating and looking the for instance, as speak. Now there is no registry of the people that died as a result of the pandemic. There is no actual quantification of it. The unions are struggling mightily, actually take account to hold capital account and the cdc is slow walking a study theyre supposed do that gives us a sense whats happened. But i guess im always struck whenever. I read, im writing about stories in york city, how were talking about the times city and state of places. My work has appeared where they dont reference to how many Civil Servants before there was a vaccine and its close to 400. And so thats all kind of out of the narrative and thats why its so important that youve documented it exactly in that period of time. But im wondering, the reality is all that being true, a democratic congress, a democratic president couldnt. Ways raise the minimum wage off of 725 and then cruelly lowered in an expanded tax credit for a couple of months and then pulled it out. So i just wonder like how do you process that and then if you could also im your coverage of the warrior call struggle if you could just bring us up to date on that just that that can go on in this country supposedly theyre essential work and at the same time it seems like the momentum is kind of going back other way. Well, in terms of the government not being helpful im an im an anarchist who have a lot of thoughts about that. But i will probably spare most of you, most them, i would say. Im not surprised. Get away with it. I dont think theres ever any use in being surprised when the powers be decide that we are worth investing in because we know what they want, invest in their selves and theyve done that well very, very, very handsomely over. The past couple them, you know, centuries. But im glad you mentioned warrior matt because i think im not sure how many folks know about the currently running strike in america. Its in rural alabama in tuscaloosa, where over a thousand coal miners were members of the United Mine Workers of america, umw have been on strike since april first of last year. So 18 months and counting which is a very long time to be on. And theyve been out on unfair labor practices strike basically. Theyve been trying to get a decent contract out of this company that they that they work for and theres theres a lot of back story but like the cliff notes version is a Company Named jim alter resources to own this mine for years and years they had decent relationship with the workers decent Union Contract as good as youre going to get for that specific context. And then they went under and room at coal this wall street back to Venture Capital fair and entity came in and they bought up the mine and they rehired most of the people that were laid off but they told them hey you know we were just a poor wall street backed billion company. We need a little time to get our feet. So. And you want those, right . Because its either this or walmart because you live in brookwood, alabama. So how about you just take this pay cut . We take away your personal data. We institute this draconian strike system and well just in five years, well get you back. You need to be well, negotiate a nice new contract for you. And youre like, well, okay and five years later, they the language in the contract they were offered was basically identical. And theyre like well, hang on, thats not fair. And they went out they voted down a potential contract that wasnt good enough. And they went on strike. And theyve been out ever since. And one of the aspects of this strike that keeps me coming down is ive been covering it very closely since the jump really was is the people and the women ive gotten really close to who run the womens auxiliary and have created this out of nothing, this incredible mutual aid network, the strike pantry, they feed hundreds of striking every week with donated they collect hygiene items and, baby items, because theyre strike babies. There are children who have never known other life than being on this strike. Its incredible. And there are a lot of historical precedents for like as much as coal mining is coded as this very hyper masculine whatever kind of job like women have always been there. And im sure other genders have been there too. We just dont know as much about them. But women have always been there and, theyve kept it going and thats whats happening in in in this war room. Might strike right now. And its honestly at a point where i think its going necessitate federal intervention because its just is this david and goliath fight and those folks those workers not going to give up. They are dug in and so are the bosses who have said on record before that have the money to pay them more they could get them anything they want but they dont want they want to starve them out, which sounds if youve ever seen harley county usa, you know about the mine wars. Theres a real long history of bosses trying to starve out coal miners, and it never goes very well for either side. So this is a strike. This meant a lot to me because i started i started covering it while i was supposed be writing this book. So whenever i tired of doing homework, i would fly alabama and see what was going on in the strike. So thats kind of my my come here, though. Ive covered stories where they show up in front of. Yeah. Theyll come in a nice connection and i, id see out there and it is a moment sarah nelson came. Oh sarah was always there. Yes. And for us to have like a local connection. Yeah. Because blackrocks headquarters is just in midtown. Theyve come up a couple of times and, you know, shot emily. Hello. Well, what do you do . Hello . We would like some acknowledgment and like you to step back in the book about. The challenge they have from a marketing standpoint that were in this kind of fuel thats theres some great passages in here that talk about that. Could you kind of talk about that . Yeah, its complicated. Like unless youre a person who follows labor or the connection to the area or follows me on twitter, you probably dont know that much about this strike because it hasnt gotten a ton of attention. The New York Times showed up a year end and talked to like one guy, theyre like, cool, were done. The real news has sent me down a couple of times and given me a platform to talk to them and do mini documentaries and really just dig into the story. But its been hard to sell it as a journalist because to is the most fascinating story in the world. This multiracial, multi gender group of Blue Collar Workers in the deep south, outside the civil rights capital of alabama, who are on to make things better for themselves and their coworkers going up against wall street capital. Theyre a politically diverse and ideologically diverse group, but they mined coal and thats complicated people because the world on fire is that and its a little hard to find the kind of sympathy for that group of workers that its a easier talking about teachers or health care or the kind of labor perform is environmentally complex, weighted, politically complicated, but still people and theres still workers are being paid 20 bucks an hour to go down thousand feet into the deepest underground coal mine in north america, which is full of methane gas, where there have been explosions where i know people who have gotten black lung, who have gotten injured, who have died, and they deserve to be okay. They deserve a decent life, too. And no republicans showed up for them because in a union, pretty much no democrats have showed up for them because they dig coal and because it is a majority conservative, it is a religious white group of workers and the democrats, oh, theyre not going to vote for us, so who cares . So who do they have . Turns they have the local socialist groups. They have the Labor Movement and they have the sarah nelsons and they have the mark perons have all they have. And is working people very much news. And then me, i just keep showing bothering them so its its been interesting seeing the to believe politically speaking some of the workers who when i first met them say oh im a conservative vote for trump all this but over the past 18 months after seeing who showed up, who didnt show up, who ignore them, who donated who sent money. Suddenly these guys are out here on twitter posting eugene debs quotes like and i think that matters. And if i was a political type person, i would perhaps Pay Attention to that. But all those type of people are not paying attention. So maybe ill just put it to you guys. If you know anybody whos up in politics would like to figure out how to get people who dont necessarily like democrats, give them another look, maybe do something so wanted to ask matt because real news came up and it was spontaneous who not as a plug but as part of the talk about that right now there is kind of a revisiting labor and there is a kind of tacit there stories are getting in. What is it like to be operating a organization in this period of time where you are driving, this narrative this is at odds with with the dominant theme, which is always putting capitalism first. I mean, youre up against these things where msnbc is supported by pharma and viking cruise and mercedes. I mean, so where is the space for people to see their. There is not we have to make it and i think thats were trying to do and you know just to be perfectly honest its not easy is it profitable . You know, if i was a better editor in chief, id be choosing stories that got way more traction than hour long interviews, human, humane know mini documentaries with coal miners. But its important. Its important to me. Its important to kim. Its important to everyone on our staff and. We hope that we are communicating why its important effectively to people, but it is always an uphill struggle. I mean, you know, same goes for the book, right no ones bought this book. There hasnt been a single of it. But i knew that kind of going in. Ive been interviewing workers for years years. Theres just not a big market for it. Its the kind of work that i think everyone to know is out there. But very few people support and its very hard to get visibility, which is why i wanted to circle back to the heroic efforts of kim, who has. I mean, shes being modest no. One in the country has covered that strike more than she has no one not not by a long shot. And she has almost single handedly lifted that story into public over the past year and a half and shes a little freelancer running around. Right a lot of times shes shes trying to find someone to send down there. So if we ever have the chance, im like, yeah get get your down there. And see what we get. But again on the on the other side of it, trying get lift and visibility and trying get people to care and also trying to. People to care for a sustained amount of time that something that i want to impress upon all of us. We all have a role to play if were asking about what the state of the Labor Movement is, where things are going to go, that question is as much up to as it is to the people that are reporting on and the stories that we are focusing on right because this is what the bosses at places warrior med know. They know exactly what Mitch Mcconnell knows, which is you wait long enough, people will forget, right . But the people walking the picket line, babies that have been born during strike, the women running the strike pantry, they havent forgotten. Right. But i think that a lot of us have forgotten them. And applies across the board because Digital Media ecosystem has rewired our brains to the point where we all have the long term memory goldfish and we need to fight against that because the moment looks like public attention, like the eye of sauron is moving away. Thats when bosses come down hard. That is why starbucks is firing Union Organizers left and right, because theyre like, oh, people have moved on to the next store. Thats to unionize. They dont give a about whats going on in buffalo. So were going to keep firing people. So i ask you, what have done about that . What have any of us about that . Whatever it is i include myself in this. Its not enough, right . We need to show to picket lines. We need to donate to strike funds. We need to keep sharing updates and keep reminding people working, people that we are there for them because the Mainstream Media is not right. And so thats also what makes this really exciting, right . Because, again, mainstream doesnt doesnt care about this. They may do one, one off story about it and then move on, but which gives us the ability to kind of drive the narrative if we are all doing it together. Right. And so i think that is one of the exciting parts about the past two years, right . Its been very bleak two years. And i remember kim and i discussing this after the amazon union drive in bessemer, alabama, because thats where a lot of this kind kicked off. Right. All eyes were on bessemer. Kim and i were down there and it was she was in bessemer that she took a little jaunt down to brookwood and these miners. And then here you go. You know, shes been covering it, you know, endlessly since since then. But i think lot of people had their eyes on bessemer, though the Union Election failed, it really started to galvanize lot of people. Then we had starbucks, then we had amazon union here in staten island. Since then, weve had trader joes, weve had chipotle right there. There have been folks, the gaming industry folks in the media industry, 60 increase in the number labor petitions filed the First Six Months of this fiscal year the year before. So there are over and the be for the first time in a very long is starting to at least let unions make their so theyre not being because for years entire apparatus of labor was in the hands of scalias son people like that they were driving the train so people would go to try to get redress in the system. I to ask you one of the things is a common you talked about. I feel remiss whenever in a room this with so many people that have clearly progressive values and interests. One of the things its curious to me is that here we are going into this election 2022 and everything is on. And im looking through here. Health care shows up and the of Peoples Health black theres a lot in here about your book about the chronic issue and i was feeling analogous with my work as a chief leader my book stagnation about the world trade and how that has gone on and on and on and its treated as a provincial story. So when you go and interview people, the site, if theyre from london, they have no idea that people are continuing to die and that weve lost more people from the epas. Why . That there safe to breathe. Then we died the day of attack. The media successfully created discrete event that is memorialized in the militaristic history as people died on that attack when, were attacked and the reality that the occupational system failed First Responders and that were going to see many, many more people die from government lying about the conditions in the air because they wanted to open up wall street and so imagine im covering congress and now in the back better bill remember that build back better we were ambitious we know 3 trillion to 1 trillion it just shrunk one of the sickest things of all was the black lung restoration bill. And restoration of the World Trade Center health fund, which needs to have to 2090. Why . Because we ordered tens of thousands of schoolkids back into dozens of schools that they had no business being in and the middle of the reproductive years are getting illnesses. Thats why. And so as we speak right now mansions mass you get the black lung refunded backed up but still are with the banking cop for the 911 World Trade Center health program. So i just it seems to me that in a pandemic that we should be talking universal Health Care Like why dont even see any about this at all like its been agreed. Were going to have a few issues. Were going talk about reproductive rights and donald trump and anything else were a simple minded people have been used to death. I mean, you can talk about that disconnect between which your reporting about the searchlights of working people and the National Political debate. Theres a disconnect that seems to be growing, oh, boy, well, 5 minutes or less. And it was a little above my pay grade, honestly. Oh, i mean. Well, i mean, honestly, everyone have health care. I think a lot of people are talking about it agitating for. It doesnt get necessarily the headlines. It did at one point when the government for a second was like maybe no. And honestly, when it came to my book, i didnt even really write about Health Care Workers. And because its such a huge, sprawling universe, a galaxy of complications that, i was like, i am not equipped for this, but i can write about black lung. So wrote a lot about black lung and i guess i can speak to that a little bit just because i dont want to. Im not going to you guys, but i can talk about black lung. And since you mentioned it and you mentioned that in the black i did get reauthorized and it is permanently thank god. I just want to mention as are talking about health and talking about people who are forgotten and about things that arent part of the discourse, black lung, which i think a lot of people think back and think of like coal miners with their little like little smudges or little pickaxes, like back in the 1900s. Oh, they got the black lung, that whole thing is not funny. Is thing. And is that a 25 year high . I have friends who are only a few years older than me they have black lung and is a vicious, horrible, cruel disease that leaves you gasping like a fish. As one man who has it described to me, and its kind of just been left in the shadows because it impacts a smaller of workers like said is like a circumstantial occupational thing. And its a disease that does not need exist is purely because occupation purely because of the coal dust and the silica and the lack of regulations and the mine who dont care and the ill fitting respirators. So theres a million reasons why its still a problem is becoming more of a problem and actually my way to appalachia and a couple days weeks pretty soon to do some reporting on this for a new a new reporting project but in terms of the health care debate, mean it shouldnt be a debate. Health care is a human right. The fact that our government has not recognized that is an indictment on that. And the social structures that have allowed that to happen. But honestly, i feel like this is more of a max question really, since you spend so much time reporting on covid specific things like during covid, i was mostly just in my Little Office and in the library writing my book 300 years of labor history, and then going alabama to bother the coal miners. But max is like in it in it. Well, okay. We got a lot thoughts in here. Im going to try to focus them because i know we got like we got a couple of minutes here and then i know we want to get to q a. So. Ill spoil one of the interviews in the book which is an interview with norman, a retired silver miner in idaho who when the pandemic hit was himself in a two plus year strike at the luckey mine strike, silver mine in idaho, which they lost. And rick retired soon after that, the middle of covid and. Its one of i mean, its hard to pick a favorite interview. I love all of them and im so tremendously honored that all the folks that spoke with me for, the book shared so much of themselves with me, even though many of them had never met in person. Rick included but we spend 95 of the interview you never mentioned covid. We just talk his life growing up in idaho all the different parts of what they up he grew up in the different types of mine work hes done over the course of his career. And i remember my my editors saying like, should we keep this . Because it doesnt really mention i was like, no, because the last page is so because he finally starts talking about kobes like, yeah, you know, its it hasnt been that bad here because theyre kind in a small mining town, but coeur dalene, you know, its a little worse. And what he says is hes like, honestly he silicosis is a much concern here. People are dying from silicosis way more often than they are of covid. And then interview ends. Right. And like what . I mean when i say the problems that existed before covid got here, you know, like a lot of that has factored to the kind of growing labor consciousness and a lot of that, you know, stems from problems that are very systemic and run very deep in this country. And heres the thing right . Know, i think we need to get angry this because i grew up conservative conservative were fox news was on the time once it came about in the nineties every Election Year i remember republican you know politicians going to coal country right i. Look, you know right wing media loves talking about the humble coal miner or any type of miner around election season. But for a year and a half, these miners, deep red alabama, have been on strike. Right wing media has not said. Fox news has done more stories on a dumb fluff story of a couple of coal miners like pushing a hybrid car that had stalled out because. It was like a culture war narrative they could paint. Theyve done stories on that than theyve done on the warrior coal strike. I would say what my you know, one of my favorite podcasters, a David Parsons of the nostalgia trap, would say they do not give a about you. That is the enduring lesson from covid they do the politicians people on wall street, they do not give a about any of us pardon my french. It needs to be said as plainly as possible. They will drop us like a bad habit. The second it is not profitable for them. The second it is not beneficial for them. That is what we have seen borne out the past two and a half years. You mentioned hero pay. There is a very specific reason that Companies Like amazon chose to call it hero pay and not hazard pay. They call it hazard pay. You have to keep paying it as long as the hazard persists. If you if you call it hero pay, then its just out of the goodness of your own heart and you can rip it away weeks later without anyone having to do about it. And this the other thing that i would say in answer to your question, i remember interviewing the great labor organizer, cooper caraway out in sioux falls, south dakota, a year ago when workers at the smithfield pork Processing Plant in sioux falls were prepared to go on, voted overwhelmingly in favor of going on strike. Why were . They prepared to go on strike. And i remember hearing that name and cooper reaffirmed this in the interview, he said this pork plant was the had the largest civilian outbreak, covid anywhere in the country. A lot of people died. Hundreds of people died. Over a thousand people got infected. And these are not just numbers, right . These are fellow workers. These are tball coaches. These are people in the pews of your church who are no longer there. Right. Every year, my family. Its a wonderful life at christmas. And the entire message of that movie, one of the most enduring and celebrated movies in American Culture is that you cannot measure the worth of one persons life. Now, magnify that by the millions lost. We have not reckoned with that. I dont think and the political establishment the Economic Establishment is trying to just, you know, drive full steam past it and put all those lives in the Rearview Mirror and what cooper said to me, this is a time the then ill shut up is workers at that plant who had suffered immeasurably to keep the supply running to keep people fed, who got sick. And a lot of people died it at contract. Negotiations were up and managers were trying to take more from them. They were trying to eliminate one of their breaks. So how can you have that . How can you have people sacrificing this much for a company that that made so much money during the pandemic and that company is trying to take more just like warrior met tried to take more like the Railroad Companies now are trying to squeeze more blood from the stones that are their workers. The stones have no more blood left to give. They want their blood back. Workers at smithfield were prepared to go on strike over it. And when i asked cooper, i was like, what is management even thinking . And said, heres what you have to understand. The bosses are coming out of covid feeling like they are the victims, feeling they had to provide ppe. They had to cut into their Profit Margins to keep workers marginally safe. They feel like the aggrieved party is coming back to take what has been stolen from them. Thats what were up against. I would say one of the things and were going to open up just just want to make this point what i from covering it when i was the chief leader the tick tock of because it was primarily we did private but Civil Service it was very frustrating to cover nurses and their press conferences in the beginning when they were told to violate or ignore their clinical training, remove an n95 mask after clinical encounter and told there was a national imperative to manage and that they needed to adopt it as a pet in their lunch and bring it back and forth for a week. And they said things will happen. We die, our families will become infected, and the hospitals will become a vector for the disease. Exhibit. A elmhurst thats exact what happened consistently when workers have addressed this issue. Ive covered it granularly similarly in may, when the cdc said were going to reward you with taking your mask off, youre vaccinated. Only 40 of people were vaccinated. Retail people, transit workers, flight attendants all begged them not to. They said not enough people been vaccinated. Youre put us in the position of having to administer the vaccine threshold tollbooth and youll have variance off helo delta. So what im trying to say at every step of the way, were care workers, trans workers. I asked mayor de blasio in the beginning of the pandemic in the blue room about transit workers who read the newspaper like the Financial Times and the wall street journal and knew that there was an Infectious Disease and they were wearing masks. They were threatened with being written up because it didnt match the uniform. And they were scaring the population. And mayor de blasio said to me in a press conference, were following the cdc guidance. Lets keep masks for people that need them. So the whole thing has been run by scarcity t that is what they the Health Care System in this country, profit driven is about as much as possible. And if people get well, that is a happy accident. Well, then well just just start. I realized didnt answer your question about Health Care Workers. And this is the last thing ill say, because i do interviews and cortez set you up. Yeah, well, ill have panels, guys. You all you are know deep down what im about to say. But again, it bears repeating is like we are not prepared for the crisis this in the Health Care Industry that is health. If you talk swing a dead cat and you will find a Health Care Worker who burned the hell out. All of them are burned out. People quitting in record numbers, leaving profession. There are folks are staying and fighting the longest nurses strike in massachusetts history happened during the pandemic at st vincents hospital in, worcester, massachusetts. What were they fighting . They were fighting against the investor owned company that owns the hospital. And theyre in texas, trying to push nurses to have a worse nurse to patient ratios, basically doing what every other employer is doing. I mentioned the railroads, the Railroad Workers are driving these three mile long trains and the railroads to get it down to one person running those trains and they are burned the hell out. They are also quitting in record numbers because the great brain genius idea that the capitalists have had over the over, you know, these past decades is lets cut costs and force workers to do more with less scarcity. That is that is the that is the modus operandi. That is that is that is what people are giving themselves . Fat bonuses over . That is what is happening in health. Nurses are telling me over and over we cannot provide the care that weve been trained to give when are juggling so many patients, just like educators are saying, we cannot provide the education that kids need. When we have 35 of them in a poorly ventilated class, just like railroaders are telling me, we do everything that we need to. When theres only one person on this massive vehicle. This is a crisis that happening across industries. And i think the hopeful thing is that workers are starting to see the connections of their plights and struggles and they are reaching out to each other and they are building solidarity with one another. So lets hear from you all. Is there a microphone there. Yes. In the back of the room. Yes. Hi. I wanted to ask him if shes got an anecdote from labor that she feels like is applicable to this moment. Just something really fascinating. She found a book, but research for her amazing book, fight like hell. Hi, tall. Thank you. Yeah. Funny hear you guys because my book is very a history book. Theres current its its history its present passed its kind of all melded together. And the one thing i didnt really write about was covid. So. One thing, the one thing that i love to talk about when i do these of things is just something that shows how much has changed. But how little the most potent tools we have it. So in 1946, in hawaii in the hawaiian islands, which at that point were owned that agricultural economy was controlled by white colonies dues in the mainland. And it was worked by a mix of asian native hawaiians, puerto rican folks and black workers. Just a whole hodgepodge of different cultures and language hung. They are indeed asian. Yes. So, so this. Yes. Okay. So this is the context there. Theres a. Right. So this is what was happening at that and that place at that point in time, the were making all the value the bosses were all the profits. The classic case. And those workers were organizing of the Ilwu International LongshoreWarehouse Workers Union and throughout the course of that that history like there would be strikes, there would be work actions. There be attempts to to change their conditions. But something that happened quite often the bosses would pit different of workers against one anothers. For example, Filipino Workers being in the brought japanese workers strikes, korean workers breaking japanese chinese worker strikes things like that their their differences were used as a wedge to keep them apart, heat them from Building Community in solidarity. So in 1946, when it came time to strike, the organizers, their union realized, okay, well, we cant we cant let that happen. We cant give in to that this time. And they they won basically by very just very simply making sure that everyone could understand what was going on. They had translators every meeting had different people that spoke to different languages, whether it was ilocano or japanese or korean what. They made sure everyone felt, heard and understood, appreciated. They built street kitchens, which is a very a time tested, a very useful tactic in which different groups of workers would cook for one another and share recipes and build community way. And they built such a strong sense of solidarity that the bosses couldnt break them and they won 70,000 people were out on that strike and they got the biggest raise they got in 20 years. At the end of they won because they embraced multiple multi gender, multilingual organizing. And thats something thats such a simple tactic. But the Labor Movement has not always gotten it right throughout the past 300 years of our organized and i love thinking about that example because were in new york. Were all out here being excited about the Amazon Labor Union and staten island, and they use some of those same tactics because there was another multiracial multilingual Multicultural Group of workers and they made sure the people spoke different languages and were able to communicate they had barbecues and had jollof rice and you know, shared other libations out by the bus. They built community, made it very clear this is our union, this is us against them. And it they happened. The bosses were unable to break that. And i just love pulling up that example that just shows how much stronger we are when we work together, embrace our differences and refuse. Let the bosses use these manufactured divisions to pull us apart. Because one thing that is always important to remember is that there are way more of us than there are of them. And dont like when we realize that because that just shows how powerful we are and how vulnerable they are in the back back. Yes, yes, yes, sure. Yeah so two quick questions. One is, do you think that the workers are starting to see through the culture battle and . The second one is, what do you make of fact that some of the striking a number of the striking right have gotten jobs at the amazon locally in alabama . And will that have any impact on strike on union in alabama . And i think some of them are even deciding to leave coalmining completely because they got of getting well that i dont know about people who are getting ready to leave the industry but youre right there have been some workers who are on strike or met have gotten jobs at the Amazon Warehouse down, the road in bessemer that max mentioned, this Historic Site of struggle and not only are they, you know, theyre picking up a shift because the uaw is like they they furnished strike checks, but 80 of the people involved in the strike are parents like they have bills. They have medical situations like you need money. So pick up a shift there and. Theyve got some of them have gotten really involved with ongoing amazon organizing effort the amazon union thats not they lost a couple elections but elections dont make break a union youre still a union whether or not you get, you know, the rubber from the government. So that is something thats happening and a lot of the other workers have up other side jobs because they have to support families. And theyve been on strike for so long but yeah, it is very interesting. Look at this one of the many fascinating little, little aspects of this strike like amazon and warrior met like these different types of workers are coming together and theyre seeing this common enemy. And to speak a little bit to this idea, the whole culture war thing, i think thats a thats a i want to hear what max has to say to that. I think it depends on the person and what they value and where theyre coming from like i come there and i look like this and. I have a guillotine tattoo. Im a like i clearly do not see world the same way as a lot of the folks ive talking to and getting to know. And theyve had really deep conversations with some of the with a lot of folks, mostly the women who are coming from a very conservative, like very world than the one i occupy. But were friends like were weve developed deep friendships and. Theres even weve had hard conversations around things like abortion, which like at this point, some them see that very differently, but not in a that is hurting anybody. You know, like one of my friends down there, i talk to her about it she was like, oh, this is what i think, christian. I dont really i dont really agree with abortion, but i dont think the government should be able to control our bodies. Its like, you know. I cant give me a second. And i was like, you know, i can work with that. You dont have the power to oppress people in the way that people above us have the power. So, okay, we can we can meet in the middle. We can figure out the Common Ground have and we can build and talk to that. And i think thats been one of the most interesting kind of productive things about this strike, is finding that Common Ground and building off of that and seeing ways that we can see eye to eye and working on the ways we cant, but also not ever accepting racism, bigotry. Like theres some things you cannot excuse us, but there are other conversations you can. Now, what were you saying . No, im saying that we have only 3 minutes because we have to be considerate. The oppressor is time. Did you want to comment on that . Well, real quick, i mean. I think you have a minute, kim. Kim put that beautifully. I would say what i said earlier. In a lot of ways, the answer to this question depends on us. Right . Because, you know, working are not dumb. Right i mean, i think thats like one of the like through lines our work is that were trying to constantly convince like workers have voices and thoughts and opinions and experience ideas that deserve to be heard and considered and listened to attentively what would say from that . Is that know, what would we do and kim, as an actual organizer so its like she she brings that organizing ethos to journalism and in a of ways thats what i do as well the kinds of conversations that i have with workers every week are just the kinds of conversations that a million different organizers never get their names on articles or books do every single day, which is a down talk to people listen to what they have to say without, you know, pushing an agenda on them. That is how you get people to start thinking differently about the narratives that are getting blasted at them on tv and radio and so on and so forth. If you want to combat the culture war from the ground up workers, whether theyre at a coal in alabama, whether theyre on the railroads, whether theyre at amazon, whether they are at a dollar store in louisiana, the way to get through to them is to to them and talk to them and actually show that you care about them and keep showing up because then you build those relationships. They start to see, oh, well, if this person who i like, who cares about me thinks differently from me, maybe like we can actually have a conversation about this. That happens a lot on shows. But again, like were talking off people, we need all of us doing that work. We need all of us to keep showing up for each other and keep talking to each other with grace. Right. And i think that there that way lies the path to salvation. There we go with grace. Thank you v