Stores are closing everywhere, nearly 8,000 store closures; the Dressbarn is the latest with nearly 7,000 employees losing their jobs. There doesn’t seem to be much written or said about this. Maybe the economy is not that great for these Americans who may have received better wages and benefits than what they will earn now. Amazon is a main factor with 45 percent of United States online shopping, one billionaire that pays his people too little, anti-union, sets quotas and monitors his workers’ every move. Thousands of delivery drivers wearing Amazon uniforms, but work for outside contractors, so they don’t qualify for $15 an hour. A man with all this wealth can’t even treat employees with dignity and respect. That seems to be corporate America.
We do have time to reverse this transfer of power and make it our world instead of Amazon’s and others. These retail workers deserve more, it’s time we take our country back, and it’s an opportunity we can’t afford to squander.
Paulette Ash
Cedar Rapids