Now hiring… a job we wouldn’t wish on anyone
October 25th, 2008 by admin
This week Perdue Farms, one of the country’s largest poultry companies, came to Broward County looking for people willing to move to Delaware to work long hours cutting apart chicken carcasses. Starting pay would be $9 an hour, and the company will put you up in a hotel for the first month, drive you to and from the plant and give you one meal each day. Perdue spokeswoman Julie DeYoung told the Miami Herald that the company came to south Florida because of the large pool of potential applicants. It is a sad fact that unemployment in Florida is at its highest rate in 14 years, and that the jobless rate in Broward County in particular is up sharply from a year ago. But before you pack your bags for Delaware, please continue reading.
What explains Perdue’s apparant desperate search for workers? In the Herald article, DeYoung admitted,”Perdue needs workers because turnover in its processing plants is high — more than 50 percent.” It is well-known that workers in poultry processing plants face serious dangers from machinery and stress injuries like carpal tunnel syndrome. But in addition to the physical health hazards, employment at chicken plants often does not bring out the best in people. In September 2004, the Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group Compassion Over Killing conducted an undercover investigation at a Perdue processing plant in Showell, Maryland where over 25 million chickens were killed each year. “From the very first day our investigator worked, he saw animal cruelty on a regular basis,” explained Compassion Over Killing.
The investigator’s job was to hang live chickens by their legs in shackles. He described the screaming of the chickens as workers hung the birds as quickly as possible, often resulting in broken legs and wings. Birds who somehow escaped the conveyor belt were ignored and left to suffer from their injuries. Dead and dying birds littered the grounds outside of the plant. The investigator wrote that at the Perdue plant, “throwing and kicking birds are normal occurrences.” Click here to read more about the investigation, and to view hidden camera footage from inside the plant.