Divide and Rule: Notes From the Hidden Abode in Global Iowa
Paul Street, CounterPunch, 8 March 2016
P&G relies on a leading temporary or “contingent” worker agency to fill its large number of lower-paid – $10 to $11.85 an hour depending on shift – and casually employed production positions with primarily African immigrants, many of whom are quite highly educated. These mostly Black- workers speak Arabic (the Sudanese), French (the Congolese), some English (the Sudanese in the lead, followed by the Congolese, with non-Puerto Rican Latin Americans far behind) and wear long red t-shirts to make them visible to speeding fork-lift drivers who pose a constant threat to life and limb.
The temp firm is Staff Management/SMX, which describes itself as “a recognized leader in comprehensive staffing and contingent workforce solutions. I was told that it skims off $6 an hour for every lower-level “light industrial” working hour it delivered to P&G, making the manufacturing and packaging giant’s real wage bill for first-shift production workers $16 an hour. That’s no small rake-off for SMX.
