Walmart Warehouse Workers Forced To Sleep In Foreclosed Houses, Tents In The Woods

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/19/walmart-warehouse-workers_n_1989121.html?ncid=txtlnkushpmg00000029

Christina Wilkie
Posted: 10/19/2012

New details emerged Thursday about the living conditions endured by workers at a Walmart support warehouse in Elwood, Ill. who went on strike last month to protest their poor working conditions and alleged retaliation by management.

In a new piece by The Guardian, warehouse worker Phillip Bailey explains how he sleeps in a Catholic hostel in Joliet, Ill., after a long day of loading and unloading hundreds of boxes bound for Walmart stores.

Another worker, Mike Compton, says he regularly sleeps in foreclosed homes, explaining, "I found one abandoned house that had working electricity still. And a fridge."

A third warehouse worker, Bailey said, was forced to live in the woods. "He just set up a tent in there for a few weeks." Temperatures in Northern Illinois during the winter average 22 degrees Farenheidt, making situations like these potentially deadly.

The dire conditions in which the workers live are compounded by the fact that their jobs working for the logistics company Roadlink Workforce Solutions, moving goods on their way to Walmarts nationwide, are physically taxing, perpetually part-time, and often pay near minimum wage. Compton told the Guardian that if he were to work every single week of the year, he might expect to make about $15,000. "It is not easy to get by," he added.