Reminds me of how poor white folks were set against African slaves
AFTER THE STRIKE
Grocery Job Is Hard to Replace
A temporary worker earned more than he ever had before. A picket suffered a blow to his self-esteem.
By Ronald D. White
Times Staff Writer
March 10, 2004
The union member on the picket line and the replacement worker who took his job kept their eyes on each other during the 20-week strike and lockout.
As long as Tom Wilson could peer through the plate-glass windows and spot Demond Camper uncrating tomatoes or spraying lettuce in the sparsely supplied, infrequently shopped corner of Vons, he knew the supermarket chains were suffering and the union had a fighting chance to protect his wages and benefits.
As long as Camper saw that Wilson was outside in the parking lot, carrying his picket sign, he knew that he had at least one more day on a job that paid him more than he had earned in his life: $12 an hour, so much that he could buy his kids Christmas gifts.
"It's hard to say what I would have been doing without this job," said Camper, 27. "Probably temporary work at minimum wage. They treated me good here."
He pulled his last shift at the Vons at Lincoln Boulevard and Broadway in Santa Monica last Thursday, the day before Wilson, 45, walked back into the store for the first time in more than four months.
The strike and lockout that ended Feb. 29 put 59,000 people out of work when the union struck Vons and Pavilions stores Oct. 11 and Albertsons and Ralphs locked out their union members the next day. But the dispute between the stores and the United Food and Commercial Workers gave thousands new jobs.
