Eric Wingerter
Broken Hearts & Severed Parts: Injuries at Smithfield Foods’ Tar Heel Plant
Donald Turner had only been on the job six weeks when a band saw sliced through two of his fingertips. One was severed completely while the other hung by a thread. At Smithfield Packing, the world’s largest hog processing plant in Tar Heel, North Carolina, injuries this severe are not terribly uncommon.
Sadly, what happened next was par for the course as well. Before releasing him to a hospital, the company clinic put his finger on ice and subjected Donald to a drug test. The test came back clean, but the process took so long that by the time Donald reached the hospital, the ice had melted and his finger could not be re-attached.
Donald’s story is one of many tales of injury and mistreatment among workers at Smithfield’s Tar Heel Plant. The video below highlights a few more, although these still represent just a handful of tragic stories from the plant.
In some industries, labor battles center around wages and benefits. But in the decade-long struggle to bring a union into Smithfield’s Tar Heel plant, workers are still dealing with the most basic issues of safety and health—issues that have changed distressingly little in the hundred years since Upton Sinclair outraged Americans with The Jungle, his classic meat packing industry exposé.
Pork processing is dangerous work, to be sure. And in a plant like Tar Heel, where five thousand workers slaughter upwards of 32,000 hogs each day (33 a minute!), injuries are to be expected. It’s not so much that injuries occur, say workers, but the way the company reacts to them.
Managers in Tar Heel make it clear that plant employees are easily replaceable. Workers have been fired while recovering from their injuries—sometimes even before they’ve returned to work. Smithfield frequently challenges workers’ compensation claims, so that injured workers must fight for years to recover thousands of dollars in medical bills from injuries sustained on the job.
The upshot is that workers are afraid to report injuries for fear of retaliation, which can lead, over time, to severe, even crippling, damage. The enormous turnover rates in Tar Heel mean an under-trained, inexperienced workforce, inordinately prone to work-related accidents.
Workers believe that union representation would mitigate many of these workplace problems. But the company has laid out an aggressive, expensive, and particularly brutal campaign to stop a plant union at all costs.
Next: The 15-year struggle to unionize Smithfield’s Tar Heel Plant.
Posted at 7:17 AM, Feb 21, 2008 in Civil Justice | Labor | Permalink | Comments (11)
Comments
Wow, thanks for the post. That video was really moving. I'm looking forward to reading more on the Smithfield campaign(I think--the subject matter is sort of brutal!)
Posted by: Barton | February 21, 2008 09:37 AM
This is outrageous! It's shocking and unbelievable that, in this day and age, American workers are still suffering this way. "The Jungle" was written in 1906 and workplace dangers and capitalist corruption are alive and well. These workers and many other like them need to have a voice in the workplace -- and protection.
Posted by: Jay Patrick | February 21, 2008 03:06 PM
As the person above me commented, the Jungle is alive and well. This story needs to be heard so the country understands what is happening and the way workers are suffering in plants like Smithfield.
Posted by: Mike | February 21, 2008 03:36 PM
I'm really shocked by Smithfield's callousness towards its own workforce. They seriously tested Donald for drugs before taking him to the emergency room?? Unbelievable.
Posted by: Miranda | February 21, 2008 03:36 PM
Thanks for the feedback, everybody. Yes, Miranda, they seriously made him take a drug test. There are so many things going on in the Tar Heel plant that are just jaw dropping.
And no worries. Barton. The next two postings in the series might shock you, but they don't involve violence ;)
The thing that gives me hope is the workers themselves. They are determined to take control of their lives and fight for a safer working environment.
Posted by: Eric Wingerter | February 21, 2008 04:20 PM
This is seriously appalling! To think that the same company is running ads about "How Great it is to Work for Smithfield."
Yeah right! If being maimed for life is how you see 'Greatness".
Posted by: Choucroute | February 21, 2008 04:28 PM
that's completely outrageous.
what can i do to support the efforts of these workers to unionize?
Posted by: emma | February 21, 2008 04:48 PM
This is so important. We need to see more stories like this. I had no idea that Smithfield Pork was being made in this way. The video was so compelling and moving. What can we do to support these workers? This story really points out how little attention critical issues like labor get on a daily basis. Kudos for running this story.
Posted by: Anna | February 22, 2008 09:21 AM
This is so important. We need to see more stories like this. I had no idea that Smithfield Pork was being made in this way. The video was so compelling and moving. What can we do to support these workers? This story really points out how little attention critical issues like labor get on a daily basis. Kudos for running this story.
Posted by: Anna | February 22, 2008 09:22 AM
What a compelling story. I have not heard enough about this. Kudos for running it. Please let us know what we can do to help these workers. It reminds us just how critical the labor movement is - still in the 21st century
Posted by: Anna | February 22, 2008 09:26 AM
How outrageous that workers are subjected to horrors that should have gone out a century ago. Smithfield should be ashamed, condemned and fined for their abuse.
Posted by: Agape Love | February 22, 2008 11:17 AM