Reading Log n23

Date:August 16th,2007
Title: The Worst Jobs In America
Link to the Article: http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1648055,00.html
Date of Publication: July 30th,2007

Vocabulary

1-uptick:1. a rise or improvement in business activity, in mood, etc.

2-fringe:3. an outer edge; margin; periphery: on the fringe of the art world.

3-salon:a shop, business, or department of a store offering a specific product or service, esp. one catering to a fashionable clientele: a dress salon; a hair salon.

4-perilous:involving or full of grave risk or peril; hazardous; dangerous: a perilous voyage across the Atlantic in a small boat.

5-bio-hazard: A biological agent, such as a virus or a condition that constitutes a threat to humans, especially in biological research or experimentation.

6-stride:12. a step forward in development or progress: rapid strides in mastering algebra.

7-untoward:1. unfavorable or unfortunate: Untoward circumstances forced him into bankruptcy

8-axe:Informal A sudden termination of employment: My colleague got the ax yesterday.

9-tally:1. an account or reckoning; a record of debit and credit, of the score of a game, or the like.

10-lag:1. to fail to maintain a desired pace or to keep up; fall or stay behind: After five minutes of hard running, some of them began to lag.

11-onus:1. a difficult or disagreeable obligation, task, burden, etc.

Summary

People who works in jobs related to the industrial laundry, supermarket staff and others in the USA receive low wages and they have to work under poor conditions which risk their health. The worst jobs in America are related to these three industries: laudry services, supermarkets and nail salons. The problem is the bad conditions in which people have to work and that the domestic unions that protect them have not a very stromg presence.
Laundry and dry cleanind workers have to manipulate everyday bio-hazard substances that can be very harmful for their health, some of them are waste that comes from hospitals, where you can find needles,blood and body parts between other things.Dry-cleaning workers, too, are at risk from prolonged exposure to chemicals: the dry-cleaning chemicals used in this industry contain high concentrations of PCE.The prolonged exposure to this chemical can harm the central nervous system.
The supermarket staff have to be on their feet all day, repeatedly lifting loads as heavy as 80 lbs., which puts them at risk for musculoskeletal disorders. They also receive low wages because they are paid only in tips.However,the spokeperson for the United Food and Commercial Workers Union claim that this kind of job provides financial security and that they are stable enough to support a family.
In spite of this, there are institutions that control and prevent labor violations.Worker advocates argue that broader enforcement of existing regulations nationwide could help improve conditions for more than 2.5 million supermarket workers.

Personal Reaction

What this article shows is not new,because this problem has been here and in other parts of the world since a long time ago. It is sad and it is not fair that people who have to do these kind of jobsm which are not nice and very dangerous for their health,receive low wages and in the vast mayority of the cases they don´t have an insurance.
The ones who are blamed for the bad conditions in which these people work are the owner of these industries. They only care about improving their business and financial situation, while people who work for them do their jobs in poor conditions. I think that the only solution to this problem is that institutions and the government must control these industries and investigate the way in which workers do their job and their financial situation.