At our summer membership meeting, three new members to the PSARA Executive Board were confirmed by the membership.
Jim Grayson is a retired business owner. Previously, he served as the NW Regional VP of American Library Ass. Trustee Assn. He also was a King County Library System Trustee and President of the Washington State Library Trustee Association. Jim is an activist in the 30th Democratic Legislative District and an ardent progressive activist.
Anita Nath is the youngest member of the PSARA Executive Board and the chief administrator of the excellent PSARA Facebook page. She is a graduate from Florida International University with a Bachelors degree in English. She is an organizer with the United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 21 and volunteer with Seattle nonprofit organizations. She has also contributed writing to the Retiree Advocate.
Magdaleno Rose-Avila, better known as Leno, has been a civil and human rights activist all his adult life. He was an organizer with Cesar Chavez, Peace Corps Country Director, Special Assistant to the Chairman of the Democratic National Committee, and has worked for a wide variety of non-profits. He is a gifted speaker and author.
Showing posts with label Anita Nath. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Anita Nath. Show all posts
Thursday, August 4, 2011
Demanding Respect From Walmart
By Anita Nath
A fundamental right of workers should be to work in a safe environment and to be treated with respect. Unfortunately, there are many retail employers – including the largest, Walmart – who do not always provide such a workplace, particularly in regard to the treatment of older employees.
Of the 1.4 million Walmart workers in the US, 300,000 are 55 and older. Many are hired on a part-time basis and paid a low wage.
Despite many older employees being cashiers and door greeters, they are repeatedly required to perform physical work outside of their job duties, including washing toilets, cleaning windows, and lifting heavy items. When refusing to complete these tasks, the employees are often reprimanded or fired.
It is reported by older workers that Walmart regularly violates their own policy of providing 15 minute breaks at regular intervals. These older workers report that their breaks, when they get them, are often not spread out over the shift but rather put at the end of their work day.
These are just some of the issues that older employees have with the retail Goliath that made billions in profit last year.
Change is clearly needed at Walmart for workers to get fair and respectful treatment.
OUR Walmart is a new organization made up of current and former Walmart “associates” who care deeply about providing good customer service and making Walmart better. The lack of respect of workers by Walmart led to the creation of OUR Walmart. There are currently 201 local OUR Walmart members in the Puget Sound area, 11 of whom recently went to Bentonville, Arkansas to corporate headquarters to demand respect on the job. OUR Walmart asserts that the treatment of older workers, in particular, has deteriorated at Walmart.
After launching their organization just last month, OUR Walmart is growing. It has served to empower Walmart employees to stand together. They are already seeing an impact. Some recent accomplishments include returning wrongfully fired employees to work, protecting employees from harassment from management, and being a resource when employees experience disrespect.
In order to support the local efforts to change Walmart, PSARA members voted to join the Making Change at Walmart coalition at PSARA’s July 7th membership meeting. The goal of that coalition is to hold Walmart accountable to local workplace and community standards. That means supporting OUR Walmart workers in the Puget Sound area as they organize for respect at their stores, and also support local communities as they organize for standards that promote good jobs and healthy communities.
If you would like to be more involved in the coalition work in your area, please contact Elena Perez at eperez@ufcw21.org, 206.436.6544.
(Anita Nath is a member of the PSARA Executive Board)
A fundamental right of workers should be to work in a safe environment and to be treated with respect. Unfortunately, there are many retail employers – including the largest, Walmart – who do not always provide such a workplace, particularly in regard to the treatment of older employees.
Of the 1.4 million Walmart workers in the US, 300,000 are 55 and older. Many are hired on a part-time basis and paid a low wage.
Despite many older employees being cashiers and door greeters, they are repeatedly required to perform physical work outside of their job duties, including washing toilets, cleaning windows, and lifting heavy items. When refusing to complete these tasks, the employees are often reprimanded or fired.
It is reported by older workers that Walmart regularly violates their own policy of providing 15 minute breaks at regular intervals. These older workers report that their breaks, when they get them, are often not spread out over the shift but rather put at the end of their work day.
These are just some of the issues that older employees have with the retail Goliath that made billions in profit last year.
Change is clearly needed at Walmart for workers to get fair and respectful treatment.
OUR Walmart is a new organization made up of current and former Walmart “associates” who care deeply about providing good customer service and making Walmart better. The lack of respect of workers by Walmart led to the creation of OUR Walmart. There are currently 201 local OUR Walmart members in the Puget Sound area, 11 of whom recently went to Bentonville, Arkansas to corporate headquarters to demand respect on the job. OUR Walmart asserts that the treatment of older workers, in particular, has deteriorated at Walmart.
After launching their organization just last month, OUR Walmart is growing. It has served to empower Walmart employees to stand together. They are already seeing an impact. Some recent accomplishments include returning wrongfully fired employees to work, protecting employees from harassment from management, and being a resource when employees experience disrespect.
In order to support the local efforts to change Walmart, PSARA members voted to join the Making Change at Walmart coalition at PSARA’s July 7th membership meeting. The goal of that coalition is to hold Walmart accountable to local workplace and community standards. That means supporting OUR Walmart workers in the Puget Sound area as they organize for respect at their stores, and also support local communities as they organize for standards that promote good jobs and healthy communities.
If you would like to be more involved in the coalition work in your area, please contact Elena Perez at eperez@ufcw21.org, 206.436.6544.
(Anita Nath is a member of the PSARA Executive Board)
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Why Should I Care? A Young Millennial’s Perspective
By Anita Nath
“Social Security? Retirement? Health Care? As a twenty-three year old, why should I care? I don’t have to think about these issues for at least another thirty years and besides, it is going to run out anyway, right?”
Wrong. Unfortunately, if I took a poll, this would be the response of a large portion of my peers today. Young people know that money is deducted from our paychecks every week, but many of us do not know why, what it is used for, or how the system works. Members of my generation have the mentality of “Oh just let the baby boomers take care of it.”
This just won’t do. I care about these issues, because maintaining these benefits may mean the difference between poverty and a life of retirement security for my generation. Yes, we are young now, but we are equal stakeholders in this system. The time has come for my generation to exercise our power, and harness our knowledge to establish what we have at stake. I for one would not like to work until I am 70 years old (which is a strong possibility if you ask the Federal bi-partisan deficit committee)!
My generation is known as the millennials, defined as those born between 1983 and 1998. According to research conducted by the Pew Research Center, a non-partisan fact tank, millennials are “More ethnically and racially diverse than older generations.
They’re confident, connected, open to change, and are on track to become the most
educated generation in American history.”
With these credentials, our generation brought to power the first African American president (with twenty-four million votes by those under 30) as we were reaching for a solution to the largest economic crisis in years, and searching to find a solution in the Middle East. We know we have power, now we must energize it to save a system that has been in place since 1935.
Taking on this challenge, millennials have to first educate ourselves on what is at stake – our future. Young people must learn that Social Security, also known as Old Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI), assists not only the retired and elderly, but those who lose a loved one or those who become disabled, as well.
Social Security is one of areas of public funds targeted to be cut ostensibly in attempts lower the country’s ever-growing deficit. Unfortunately, talk of insolvency of Social Security by 2042 or before, diminishes our desire to act, especially when the oldest members of our millennial generation will not even qualify for benefits by then!
Knowing what we stand to lose inspires us to action. Young people can play an important role in the movement to defend and extend social security by learning about the benefits of the system, realizing we are stakeholders, and flexing our often tech savvy power. A simple Twitter message or Facebook post can inspire a whole round of “comments.” An e-mail or text has the power to stop and allow one to become informed and continue communication about the issue. Just take a look at how social media and the technology-minded youth impacted the recent happenings in Egypt, Libya, and Wisconsin.
When lawmakers witness young people joining and advocating with the retired community and others in the voting booths and in the streets, positive change is inevitable. Millennials will then show lawmakers that this generation will not sit idly by while reform decisions of today destroy our country’s largest “Trust Fund” for us tomorrow.
Let’s face it, those in Congress now will not be around to feel the impact of their decisions, but we sure will. We must have a hand on the pen that writes these changes, because the bottom line is that this is our future, and we do have something to say, or “tweet”, about it!
Anita Nath is a student at the University of Washington and a member of PSARA.
“Social Security? Retirement? Health Care? As a twenty-three year old, why should I care? I don’t have to think about these issues for at least another thirty years and besides, it is going to run out anyway, right?”
Wrong. Unfortunately, if I took a poll, this would be the response of a large portion of my peers today. Young people know that money is deducted from our paychecks every week, but many of us do not know why, what it is used for, or how the system works. Members of my generation have the mentality of “Oh just let the baby boomers take care of it.”
This just won’t do. I care about these issues, because maintaining these benefits may mean the difference between poverty and a life of retirement security for my generation. Yes, we are young now, but we are equal stakeholders in this system. The time has come for my generation to exercise our power, and harness our knowledge to establish what we have at stake. I for one would not like to work until I am 70 years old (which is a strong possibility if you ask the Federal bi-partisan deficit committee)!
My generation is known as the millennials, defined as those born between 1983 and 1998. According to research conducted by the Pew Research Center, a non-partisan fact tank, millennials are “More ethnically and racially diverse than older generations.
They’re confident, connected, open to change, and are on track to become the most
educated generation in American history.”
With these credentials, our generation brought to power the first African American president (with twenty-four million votes by those under 30) as we were reaching for a solution to the largest economic crisis in years, and searching to find a solution in the Middle East. We know we have power, now we must energize it to save a system that has been in place since 1935.
Taking on this challenge, millennials have to first educate ourselves on what is at stake – our future. Young people must learn that Social Security, also known as Old Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI), assists not only the retired and elderly, but those who lose a loved one or those who become disabled, as well.
Social Security is one of areas of public funds targeted to be cut ostensibly in attempts lower the country’s ever-growing deficit. Unfortunately, talk of insolvency of Social Security by 2042 or before, diminishes our desire to act, especially when the oldest members of our millennial generation will not even qualify for benefits by then!
Knowing what we stand to lose inspires us to action. Young people can play an important role in the movement to defend and extend social security by learning about the benefits of the system, realizing we are stakeholders, and flexing our often tech savvy power. A simple Twitter message or Facebook post can inspire a whole round of “comments.” An e-mail or text has the power to stop and allow one to become informed and continue communication about the issue. Just take a look at how social media and the technology-minded youth impacted the recent happenings in Egypt, Libya, and Wisconsin.
When lawmakers witness young people joining and advocating with the retired community and others in the voting booths and in the streets, positive change is inevitable. Millennials will then show lawmakers that this generation will not sit idly by while reform decisions of today destroy our country’s largest “Trust Fund” for us tomorrow.
Let’s face it, those in Congress now will not be around to feel the impact of their decisions, but we sure will. We must have a hand on the pen that writes these changes, because the bottom line is that this is our future, and we do have something to say, or “tweet”, about it!
Anita Nath is a student at the University of Washington and a member of PSARA.
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