Thursday, April 02, 2020
Some states have designated grocery workers as essential personnel, but unions are asking for more benefits and precautionary measures.
The country’s largest grocery union, United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), is petitioning for their 1.3 million members to be classified as first responders. Logan believes emergency classification may be difficult to achieve, but he expects to see more rights granted to grocery workers as they increasingly test positive for COVID-19. “They are at considerable risk because of the number of people they deal with on a daily basis," he says, "and there’s so much you can do to make the job much safer.”