I'm pretty sure that an Executive Decision like that would be against the law (then again, with this Supreme Court, who knows). Still...why would the unions sign off on this without getting something in return or at least having proper PPE to work in the plants.
I assume that workers will be required to wear full protective gear, and that it will be paid for, one way or another, by the Federal government? That, or they are certified immune to the virus. You can't force workers to put their lives at risk, and they sure as hell shouldn't be "blackmailed" in order to coerce them.
Does the power of the DPA extend to workers? The government cannot force people to work, but what can it do to make the life of workers difficult for refusing to work out of safety concern? And what about the liability? If companies are shielded from liability, will the government cover the workers' getting ill, dying or disabled in the long term or are workers just left to fend for themselves? Also, it's the meat workers today, what could it be tomorrow? Public school teachers?
This is very weird. Do we all need our meat so badly that we don’t mind that line workers doused it w their last COVID-filled breaths? just seems unappetizing. speaking of, isn’t there enough spam to tide us over?
The reason all these plants are closing down is because they've become disease clusters because they cant protect workers in the abbetoirs as designed and with the industrial processes as theyve been configured and on top of that dont really care. Watched a story somewhere on the Smithfield Foods plant in Iowa that shut down and they were basically doing nothing to protect workers outside of a little lip service until so many people got sick that Tyson foods (who own Smithfield) decided they were a lawsuit liability. On top of that, the city kept trying to get them to shut down but the state governor was pushing them hard to stay open, worker's health be damned. I understand the same was true for the one in South Dakota that shut down earlier. If they force them open and on top of that give them liability protections the managers will be perfectly happy to let their workers get sick in the name of profits and keep on working any that dont happen to keel over.
Oh, my bad... that was a picture of russian workers being forced to go back into Chernobyl nuclear plant after it melted down by the russian government... not American workers being forced to go back into a meat plant where COVID-19 outbreak happened.
I’m willing to bet the DPA can’t force a company to open, and I bet Trump knows that. how many times does he use the tactic of saying he’s going to do something soon, rather than announcing that he has done it. He does “I plan to do, blah blah” on highly debatable actions, or otherwise downright not allowed. this is a tactic to create a debate, to get it to happen or not with no responsibility on his part.
I'm not against the government resuming operations if it prevents meat shortages. I'm assuming worker protection is top priority for this to happen.
Similar to what @Ottomaton said, this may be more about removing the liability from the companies if they stay open by designating them as essential rather than actually forcing them to stay open. But who knows.
We as a society eat way too much meat. I encourage Americans to goto other countries and (not China) and see that meat is a luxury that people don’t eat every single day, yet alone multiple times a day.
