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Melissa Wallace
Professor Hubbard
WRI 102-07
February 22, 2008
A Bad Case of Meatpacking Injustice
In a report issued in January of 2005, author Lance Compa writes, “Meatpacking
is the most dangerous job in America. Dangerous conditions are cheaper for companies –
and the government does next to nothing” (Greenhouse). Social justice comes into
question when discussing the meatpacking industry. The term refers to the notion of a
society in which justice is achieved in every aspect, including politics, religion, and civil
society, rather than simply the administration of the law. Within social justice, everyone
has the right and opportunity to be treated equally and fairly, obtaining equality both
through equal rights and through proper treatment, following the laws of the constitution.
The meatpacking industry violates human rights by forcing the workers to perform their
jobs under cruel and dangerous conditions, denying the workers fair treatment in the
work place, specifically among women, and ignoring the workers’ rights to protest and
unionize under the United States Constitution.
In an effort to reduce the cost of labor, meatpacking corporations are hiring
primarily Mexican and Central American immigrants, who will work for wages about
one third lower than those of regular production employees (Schlosser 176). The
employers are forcing their employees to partake in heinous and hazardous jobs. “Inside
those walls is a different world that obeys different laws,” Schlosser writes in his book,
Fast Food Nation. The danger lies in the heavy machinery being used repeatedly, causing
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serious injuries and accidents, such as the severing of a limb. In some cases, death may
even occur.
The sanitation crews in charge of cleaning the slaughterhouse face the cleansing
of a building that has slaughtered between three and four thousand cattle, using a high
powered hose that exerts a mixture of water and chlorine heated to about 180 degrees. In
an article published in the Columbia Journalism Review titled “A Meat Story, Well
Done: How the Omaha World-Herald Inspected a Tough Local Industry,” Laurie
Kelliher, assistant director at the journalism company, uncovers the harsh and demeaning
ways the workers who sanitize and clean the meatpacking plants are treated. As part of
the job, workers have to climb into gigantic blood tanks and gut bins in order to unclog
the drains. The men are pushed to work so hard and fast because of the strict time
schedule they are under, making it more important to get the job done on time, than to
provide them with a safe working environment. Kelliher explains that if a worker cleans
his area by the end of his seven-hour shift, then he receives a bonus. However, if he falls
behind for even just one night, then the worker could lose his bonus for the entire week.
To completely sanitize the plant, the night workers have to get around and behind the
safety barriers that protect the daytime workers. Kelliher writes, “What makes cleaning
so dangerous is that it exposes workers to ‘pinch points’ of industrial plants. Bits of meat
and grease stick to the teeth of the grinders; they drip behind safety guards, and they
dangle from gears and chains” (Kelliher 14-16). The health and safety of the workers at
the meatpacking plant lie at risk with dangerous jobs such as these.
The treatment of the workers is inhumane –working under dangerous and fatal
conditions for lower than minimum wage and for hardly any compensation for injuries.
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The conditions are not only socially unjust, but also the whole meat-packaging job in
itself is unjust. The workers are exposed to dangerous working conditions, and there is
little effort being put in by higher authorities to change these conditions. According to
Eric Schlosser in his article titled “The Chain Never Stops,” “the strict regimentation and
division of labor in slaughterhouses means that workers must repeat the same motions
again and again throughout their shift. Making the same knife cut 10,000 times a day or
lifting the same weight every few seconds can cause serious injuries to a person’s back,
shoulders, or hands” (Schlosser 38-47, 86-87). Workers are forced to maximize the
amount of cattle produced in as little time as possible, meaning that the workers rarely
have rest, and are susceptible to severe injury. Workers are fired because they are injured
or sick. No one deserves to be treated the way that these workers are treated. “We are
human beings, more than one person told me, but they treat us like animals,” Schlosser
writes (186), emphasizing the feelings of the workers in the meatpacking plants.
What are the meat packaging plants and the government doing to prevent these
accidents from happening? Absolutely nothing. Most cases of injury or death go
unreported and rarely leave the vicinity of the slaughterhouse. Compensation is rarely
paid to the workers who have been injured. If a worker does become injured, he or she is
usually fired within a few days. Eric Schlosser writes on injured workers, “From a purely
economic point of view, injured workers are a drag on profits. They are less productive.
Getting rid of them makes a good deal of financial sense, especially when new workers
are readily available and inexpensive to train” (Schlosser 175). The employers do not
care about the workers in their slaughterhouses, as long as the job is getting done in
record time. The workers are easily replaceable, after all.
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Women in the meatpacking workforce are being subjected to objectification and
sexual harassment. Many women have been fondled or grabbed while working on the
production line by the supervisors, thus setting the trend for other male workers. Female
workers subject themselves to relationships with their superior in hopes of gaining a
secure place in American society, such as a green card or even a husband. In February
1999, a female employee was awarded $2.4 million dollars as compensation for the male
factory workers screaming obscenities at her and rubbing their bodies up against hers.
Sexual harassment occurs often in meatpacking plants, with male coworkers groping
them or kissing them in an unwanted manner (Schlosser 176).
Women are objectified in the meat packaging industry and are treated as inferior
beings to the male workers. They are basically forced into having relations with their
bosses in an attempt to gain a place in American society. Not only are these acts unjust,
but also morally wrong. Women should be treated equally as men and should be given
the same rights and opportunities as men. Women should not be scoffed at or fondled, or
made to feel inferior in any way. The meatpacking industry denies women the right to
equality in the workforce, one of the main articles in the United States Constitution
(“ERA”), and also prevents workers from unionizing for better working conditions.
In an article published in The Nation titled “The Shame of Meatpacking” writer
Karen Olsson provides a detailed article summarizing meatpacking unions. She
concludes that workers at the meatpacking factories are not given the right to unionize in
groups, and if they do make an attempt to form a union, then they are usually fired. The
industry knows that there will be hundreds of other immigrants lining up to get the jobs
the other men and women got fired from. Olsson writes at the end of her article, “the way
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to change the industry is by ‘people being informed and spreading the word to the public”
(Olsson 11-14,16). Most of the employers at the meatpacking companies have
connections with Congress, paying them off when necessary to do so, and therefore,
making it nearly impossible for the government to have a say in what goes on in the
packaging plants. Workers in the meatpacking factories do not have the same rights as
other typical men and women.
Ultimately, the meat packing industry denies its workers social justice in the sense
that the workers are forced to work under harsh, dangerous, and even fatal conditions,
and are treated unjustly and unfairly, thus disregarding their rights under the United
States Constitution to complete and total equality. The government chooses to disregard
what is going on inside the walls of these plants and is doing little to nothing in an effort
to make changes. Schlosser writes, “Filing a claim, challenging a powerful meatpacking
company, and placing faith in the American legal system requires a good deal of courage,
especially for a recent immigrant” (Schlosser 185). The workers lack the courage to stand
up to the legal system and fight for what is rightfully theirs –social justice and equality
among a working environment.
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Works Cited
"The Equal Rights Amendment: A Brief Introduction." The Equal Rights Amendment.
11/12/2007. Alice Paul Institute. 2 Feb 2008
<http://www.equalrightsamendment.org/overview.htm>.
Greenhouse, Steven. "US: Meat Packing Industry Criticized on Human Rights Grounds."
25 Nov 2005. CorpWatch. 11 Feb 2008
<http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=11806>.
Kelliher, Laura. "A Meat Story, Well Done: How the Omaha World-Herald Inspected a
Tough Local Industry." Columbia Journalism Review 42.5Jan/Feb 2004 14-16. 17
Feb 2008
<http://vnweb.hwwilsonweb.com/hww/results/results_single_fulltext.jhtml;hwwil
sonid=IM4QOZOWTIKNZQA3DILCFGGADUNGIIV0>.
Olsson, Karen. "The Shame of Meatpacking." The Nation 816 Sept 2002 11-14,16. 17
Feb 2008
<http://vnweb.hwwilsonweb.com/hww/results/results_single_fulltext.jhtml;hwwil
sonid=IM4QOZOWTIKNZQA3DILCFGGADUNGIIV0>.
Schlosser, Eric. Fast Food Nation. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2001.
Schlosser, Eric. "The Chain Never Stops." Mother Jones 26.4Jul/Aug 2001 38-47, 86-87.
12 Feb 2008
<http://vnweb.hwwilsonweb.com/hww/results/results_single_fulltext.jhtml;hwwil
sonid=IM4QOZOWTIKNZQA3DILCFGGADUNGIIV0>.