Grocery workers protest safety concerns amid virus outbreak

Описание: CNBC's Contessa Brewer reports on growing protests from grocery store workers as they try to remain healthy amid the coronavirus outbreak.

Adam Ryan, a Target worker and liaison for employee coalition Target Workers Unite, said Friday that hourly wage earners have been forced to make an impossible choice during the coronavirus pandemic: Skip their paycheck or risk getting sick.

In an interview with CNBC’s “Squawk Alley,” he said even before the global crisis, hourly workers in the U.S. struggled to make ends meet with low wages and few, if any, benefits. He said many lived paycheck to paycheck and some were even homeless. Now, he said, they’re putting their lives at risk.

“We were constantly told before the pandemic that we don’t have real jobs,” he said referring to a general societal message toward hourly wage earners from some U.S. politicians, employers and even customers. “We’re not real workers. We shouldn’t expect things like health care — or even respect or dignity. And that’s still the situation in the middle of a pandemic.”

Ryan is a participant in a nationwide strike against some of the country’s largest retail and delivery companies, including Walmart, Amazon and Instacart, that planned a walkout Friday to call attention to the hazards they say they’ve faced on the job during the coronavirus pandemic. The protest was planned for International Workers Day. It coincided with the lifting of many states’ stay-at-home orders.

Along with asking workers to call in sick or walk out on their jobs, protest organizers asked customers not to patronize the businesses on May 1.

“All of these companies are failing workers and have been failing workers,” he said.

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