[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

[IRI-L] Reaping Abuse for What They Sew (fwd)Sweatshops Once Again Commonplace in U.S. Garment Industry



IRI-L/CARE-L

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WParch/1997-02/16/136F-021697-idx.html

            Reaping Abuse for What They Sew

            Sweatshops Once Again Commonplace in U.S. Garment Industry

            By William Branigin
            Washington Post Staff Writer
            Sunday, February 16 1997; Page A01
            The Washington Post

            After an arduous trek across the border from her native Mexico,
            Aurora Blancas made her way to New York City and took the first
            job she could find: sweeping floors and packaging clothes sewn
            by other illegal immigrants at a sweatshop in the garment
            district.

            No experience -- or documents -- necessary.

            "I started working the same day I asked for the job," she said.
            "The boss asked me my name and how old I was. Nothing more."

            But unlike her fellow workers, Blancas, 28, did not accept
            quietly the exploitation and abuse that followed when she was
            hired last summer to work in the dilapidated Eighth Avenue
            building.

            Although her willingness to speak out makes Blancas unusual,
            the place that employed her and the conditions she found there
            are not.

            Despite a ledger of laws against them and periodic pledges by
            government and business leaders to crack down, sweatshops have
            made a remarkable comeback in America, evolving from a relative

[408 lines left ... full text available at <url:http://www.reference.com/cgi-bin/pn/go?choice=message&table=04_1997&mid=1020504&hilit=DESIGNERS+FOOD> ]
--------------------------------

Article-ID: 04_1997&1175413
Score: 78
Subject: new to a.s.d., need advice/support