'This is Poverty Row'
Jostling for jobs on Vancouver's Cash Corner.
Rudy on day two. Photo: T. Sandborn.
Under a weeping grey sky, about a dozen men huddle in doorways or hunch beneath umbrellas or improvised shelter along the run-down industrial block between 2d and 3d Avenues on Ontario Street on Vancouver's East Side. Cars and trucks cruise by slowly in the morning chill, occasionally easing to a stop.
As the rain falls, the waiting men rush out and talk to each driver in hopes he is one of the employers who regularly hire from the pool of low-cost day labour available on this block. The men call this stretch of industrial wasteland Cash Corner, and it has functioned as an outdoor hiring hall linking desperate workers to potential employers for well over a decade now.
One corner veteran told the Tyee that he had been coming there looking for work for nearly 15 years. He thought the custom began when a federal day-labour employment office at the corner shut down and men looking for casual work continued to come to the site.
This informal meat market plays to mixed reviews, both from the men who go there looking for a day's wages and from observers in the city's labour movement.
'Money for food'
"You have to run out into the street right away," Rudy said during a morning spent at the corner. "I didn't get out there fast enough and the guy in the car took some other guys before I could get to him."
Rudy is a stocky aboriginal man in his 50s. This is his second day at the corner. The first time out he got four hours of work moving furniture, and he is hoping for more work today. An experienced truck driver with air brake and first aid training, Rudy is currently unemployed and waiting for his employment insurance claim to be processed, a wait he has been advised will take up most of a month. In the meantime, he is grateful that Cash Corner exists.
"At least I got some money for food," he says.
Lucas, a 19-year-old with a scanty beard and merry eyes, offers a visiting reporter a toke from his morning joint and then over coffee discusses the Cash Corner experience.
"This is just my second week," he says. "I've got four days' work out of 10 so far. I think this has more long-term potential than Labour Ready. They take half of what you make and leave you with around eight dollars an hour. No way I'll work hard for that much money. But here you keep what you make. I've been working on houses that are being renovated."
'Extremely difficult to organize'
Lucas was not the only person at Cash Corner who saw the wait outside in the rain as a preferable option to the city's many labour contracting agencies. The Cash Corner guys are reluctant to get their work through an agency that takes a cut off the top of the wages they earn. (Labour Ready is only one of the many employment agencies that fill six pages of the current city Yellow Pages. Mike, who answered the phone at the company's Vancouver offices, confirmed that the firm pays labourers it dispatches to jobs between $8.00 and $9.50 an hour. He refused, however, to say how large an additional slice Labour Ready takes from the hourly rate paid by employers who obtain their day labourers from his firm.)
Commercial employment agencies and their bite of day-labour wages represent one downside to the casual worker scene in Vancouver, but there are downsides to the informal system at Cash Corner as well. Bill Saunders is a trade union veteran and current president of the Vancouver and District Labour Council. He says that the scene at Cash Corner reminds him of the bad old days on North American docks.
"Anyone who wants to understand this issue should watch the old Marlon Brando movie On the Waterfront, he said. "The foreman came out to a gang of workers and said 'You work...you don't.' It was rife with corruption and favouritism. You don't want a system like this. You want a seniority system that protects workers. People are at this corner because they're desperate.
"This is capitalism at its worst," Saunders said, "like the labour contractor system that still prevails in agriculture. A place like Cash Corner is an anomaly, an open sore of exploitation. I think it must draw on workers at the fringe of the labour market -- immigrants, older workers, people with irregular identification and paperwork issues. It would, however, be extremely difficult to organize these workers. To organize, you need a fixed workplace."
'I'm getting old'
Efrain, a grizzled 54-year-old Guatemalan immigrant who was waiting in the rain for possible work, is vividly aware of some of the disadvantages of day work for cash.
"Really, I don't like to work cash," he said. "I'm getting old. For people getting old, it is better to work for wages so you can get a pension."
Mark Olsen, business manager for local 1611 of the Construction and Specialized Workers Union (Labourers) agrees that it would be very difficult for unions to organize the workers at Cash Corner. Nevertheless, he has grave concerns about the situation at the corner.
"This serves the employers," he told The Tyee, "but it provides little to no protection for workers. If hurt on the job, they probably won't qualify for worker's compensation payments. This is a huge concern. The work these guys do is dangerous. They should have protection, and they should have the kind of medical, dental and pension benefits a union worker gets."
Union dispatch booming
Olsen went on to say that his union office at 3542 Kingsway was regularly dispatching labourers to job sites, and he encouraged those looking for work to come to the office.
"We're sending folks out on a regular basis," he said. "In 2006 we recorded the highest number of hours worked by workers we dispatched ever."
Some workers seeking day labour will no doubt take up Olsen's invitation and make the trek out to Kingsway to the union dispatch office. Many, however, will continue to show up at Cash Corner and wait for the slow-cruising vehicles with their promise of no questions asked and cash at the end of the day, despite the disadvantages and dangers attached.
Greg is a 15-year veteran of the corner scene, who has, when travelling, found work at similar informal settings in Seattle and Calgary. He has reason to be aware of the disadvantages, but still values what Cash Corner offers him.
"I popped hernia working for someone from here about six years ago," he said, "and the employer didn't care. All they care about is getting the job done. But most of the guys I work for are decent, and I get a lot of work unloading containers, digging drainage and cleaning out commercial buildings. At the end of the day, I'm not getting anything for it, really.
"This is poverty row. If I fall on a job site, I get nothing. But I'm getting too old to get work on high-rise construction, and this is an honest living.
"We hold the fort pretty good down here. See those garbage cans. Those are for our coffee cups and garbage, and some guys come down with brooms to clean things up on Sundays.
"For a poor man, this is good. I'd rather do this than go to an agency that takes half my wages. That's pretty shady. At least down here we can negotiate our wages a little."
Related Tyee stories:
- A Global Nanny's Story
- Does BC Really Need 20,000 Global Temps?
- Kids on the Job: Back to the Old Days?
![[Tyee]](http://thetyee.cachefly.net/ui/img/ico_fishie.png){kind=small}
- Shadow Workers of the World, Revolt!
- 'The Kids Are All Right'
- 'Leave Your Shoes On'
- Glaciers, BC Hydro's Melting 'Batteries'
- Frankie Rose Makes Life Tougher for Journalists
- Too Much Energy Used to Mine, Move Bitumen Says BC Firm
- Becoming the Ethical Hunter
- Could SOPA Pervade Canadian Copyright Law?
- Would You Buy a Used Car from These Libs?
- Economist Calls Gateway Pipeline an Inflationary 'Threat'
- Shadow Workers of the World, Revolt!
- Economist Calls Gateway Pipeline an Inflationary 'Threat'
- Bill Rees' Last Lecture
- Too Much Energy Used to Mine, Move Bitumen Says BC Firm
- Is Canada Ignoring Signs of a Coming Economic Collapse?
- How First Nations Are Gearing Up for Legal Battle Against Gateway
- Harper in China
- Eleven Oily Questions for Every MP
- BC Child Care Advocates in Geneva to Complain to UN
- Portrait of a Riot
- Shadow Workers of the World, Revolt!
- Make It the Canadian Webcasting Corporation
- Harper in China
- When the Prize Is a Chance to Toil on BC's Farms
- Three Ryan Gosling Pickup Techniques that Don't Work in Real Life
- BC, You Love You
- Would You Buy a Used Car from These Libs?
- Foreign Trade Zones Eyed for Vancouver, Prince Rupert, Prince George
- Skating into 2012, More Resolutions
- Glaciers, BC Hydro's Melting 'Batteries'
40
Login or register to post comments
Bluenose
4 years ago
Poverty
"If poverty is the biggest environmental challenge of our time, however, wealth is the biggest environmental burden. The consumption patterns of the nearly one billion people who live in the affluent world of Europe, North America, and other industrialized countries cause much more environmental damage - more greenhouse gas emissions, more forest cutting, more soil, air, and water pollution - than do the strivings of the impoverished human majority." (Julie A. Chao)
Too bad none of the individuals profiled above are really part of affluent North America. Maybe they should call Al Gore or Bono. "Buddy, can you spare a living wage?"
woody
4 years ago
Jobs available all over Canada
Rudy
If there are unemployed truckers out there, their unemployed because they want to be, there are trucking jobs going begging throughout Canada ,Only a horrendous drivers abstract ( driving record ) may cause difficulty in attain a driving job.
Bobbi
4 years ago
Woody
Woody, I thought the exact same thing about trucking jobs.
As for the union bossess, their words drip with so much self-interest is is hard to take them seriously. Come join the union boys, we'll take less off the top than the other guys. It is just a different power broker looking for his daily fix. They may try to dress it up nice, but do you notice how regular working guys get dental, but there is no mention of benefits for day workers going out of the union shop? How does that work? I wish the article made that clear.
alive
4 years ago
alive
One reason some may accept those kind of "under the counter" jobs is that there is no taxation on your income, or any deductions from any supplementary income!
Many seniors would gladly do part-time work in their fields if the wages were not diminished by claw-backs!
woody
4 years ago
hookers or drug dealers, don't pay taxes !
Bobbi your correct,
Many unions have written down casual- part time workers in their collective agreements, in fact in many instances their wages start at 75%-80% of the basic rate, with no benefits, no scheduled hours ,they sit by the phone, and they beckon to the employers wims and wishes, life gets even more intolerable if that employer has a 24 hour a day operation,they can receive a call at any time of the day or night,most times,these conditions are written into the collective agreement, want an example, look up the BCGEU collective agreements with their highways maintenance contractors. Employees are also privileged to pay, the union a percentage of their Gross wages which, the union takes from your check.
alive said,
That’s correct, this way, if someone earns only $8--$16 bucks an hour you get to keep that amount , who can any blame any one for taking this route or attitude, certainly not me. They don’t tax hookers or drug dealers do they.
maestro
4 years ago
Yep: Love them Union Bro's
While a Student...I got hired on at a Private Corporation which also had a Union representing its workforce.
NOTE: The Union was one of the biggest in the World, and the Private Sector Corporation also one of the largest Companies in the world.
We students worked cheek -to -jowl with many of the Union "Brothers" , often doing the dirtiest and hardest work....YET we were paid about 1/3 LESS than the Union Bro's entry level starting hourly rate.
The Union, however, somehow had no problem in collecting Union Dues from us Students...
To this day, I have no idea how that 33% wage discrepancy was legal under employment standards, under the " equal pay -for -work- of -equal- value" principle ...but the Union most certainly was aware of it...how could it not be ? It must have been negotiated by the same union.
Thus, negotiating, or allowing LOWER wages for us students.... AND yet the same gall to collect Union Dues and put us starving students even further behind the remuneration of the same companies' own full- time Union Members ?
So....in summary....we students paid union dues to the union as a reward to the same union for getting screwed by the very same union ?
Do I blame the company ???
Not really.
It is the UNIONS' role , duty and obligation to represent the workers and make sure they are treated fairly and equitably ...or so goes the propoganda " theory " .
Why wouldn't this HUGE Union with lots of power demand that Students be treated at least on par with the starting Union wage ?
Was there a side- deal cut with the Full Time Union members???? ..." If you, the Ful Time Union members agree to THIS..We, the Company , will agree to give you THAT " .
So much for Solidarity and Union Brotherhood .
That old bromide is simply the " bait and switch ".
PS Maybe that's one of many reasons why many Unions are deemed by Society- in -General as simply dying dinosaurs wallowing , if not already stuck, in their own increasingly fossilized Turds.
SharingIsGood
4 years ago
truck driving ads
I just went to working.com and found 15 truck driving jobs listed within 100km of Vancouver. Perhaps some of these people could use some education as to find work and how to present oneself to those offering it.
Also:
Having employed a number of casual labourers myself in the construction industry, I must say that it was rare that I found day labourers that I wanted to keep for long. As soon as I found one that I wanted to commit to long term employment (with a raise), I often found that person absent within the first week of the new arrangement. Alcohol abuse was the biggest factor that kept many of my day workers from being able to handle a long term commitment. I wish it hadn't been so. Construction projects do not move ahead if people are late or absent from work, so I learned to be very careful about requesting too many days in a row from day labourers.
thomas49
4 years ago
Quote:People are at this
NO SH!T EINSTIEN !!!
You figure my nephew that was hired by an employer that OPERATED like some of those described above and supposedly under the protection of a RAT UNION/TEAMSTERS because he needed to put food on the table wasn't desperate as well ???
DISABLED AT WORK AND SCREWED OVER BY THE EMPLOYER AND RAT UNION...THE WORKERS COMPENSATION BOARD,GLADLY LET THE EMPLOYER GET AWAY WITH LYING/COMMITING PERJURY...EVEN WITH EVIDENCE IN THE EMPLOYERS FILES...THAT THE WCB SAID THEY WOULD NOT LOOK INTO ???
The laws in this province and Canada are SADLY IGNORED BY THE PUBLIC until it affects them personally.
THEN THE SH!T HITS THE FAN...TOO LATE SUCKER !
YOU BOUGHT INTO THE SYSTEM,YOU SHOULD HAVE KNOWN !!!
There are few of you reading that know what working for these kinds of employers is all about and if you really want to know...CHECK THE STORIES FROM THE DISABLED WORKERS GETTING SCREWED OVER AND BANISHED TO ABJECT POVERTY...ALL WITH GRINNING POLITICIANS STANDING AROUND WITH THEIR FINGERS UP THEIR BUTT$.
Gordon KKKampbell was supposed to help my nephew,when he took over for that liar paul reitsma,but handed the case over to flunkies that did little more than hand him over to lesser flunkies and with that kind of help the RAT UNION and EMPLOYER got away with DUMPING a SEVERLY DISABLED MAN ONTO THE WELFARE ROLES,where the GOVERNMENT continues to screw him over KKKLAwing back EVERY PENNY they can from his FEDERAL DISABILITY PENSION and under the CANADIAN CHARTER ,THAT IS AGAINST THE LAW...
but hey,just DENY THE POOR ...LEGAL AID...
LIKE THE KKKAMPBELL GOVT.
Thank God my nephew has a caring family .
so much for how good workers got it in this province and those poor bastards on that corner are getting screwed over more than we can ever know.
Granite
4 years ago
From the 'hood
Sloppy reporting.
If a writer wanted to get the true story on cash corner he or she should come down on the last Thursday of every month. Most of the guys who hang out on cash corner are on welfare. If they went through an employment agency they would have to declare their income and their welfare would be cut. We all know by now that you can't survive on welfare in Vancouver. Towards the end of the month, as money runs out, the numbers of men standing on the block grows - often upwards of 40 men. Then suddenly, the day after Welfare Wednesday, boom, the number drops to about 10. The street transforms. Women feel comfortable walking down it without feeling like they are running the gauntlet of bored, ogling men.
But welfare and disability recipients aren't the only regulars. Some are here illegally. Some have mental health and addiction issues that make permanent employment a challenge. In the fall, after harvesting work ends, a lot of young Central and South American men appear and as the weather turns nasty they slowly drift away. South, I assume? All the little sub-groups have their "areas" and there is a definite pecking order. They also, thankfully, have their own internal policing system - they want to keep their precarious niche stable.
How do I know all this? I work right by cash corner. For Tom Sandborn to call it "a run-down industrial block on Vancouver's East side" and "a stretch of industrial wasteland" is an absolute joke. I guess it makes romantic storytelling too bad it's not true. In fact it is one the priciest industrial neighbourhoods in the lower mainland, full of thriving prosperous businesses with hundreds of us tax-paying, benefit-receiving workers pouring into it everyday. The renowned Argo Café, right in ground zero, serves up gourmet fare at diner prices. Legions of cycling commuters pass by using the Ontario bike route. In fact it is barely East Vancouver, with the west side of the block being technically on the West side.
So what is the solution? The reasons for being on cash corner are as varied as the men on it. They reflect many of the problems of Vancouver as a whole: lack of support for mentally ill and addicted, lack of affordable housing, inadequate welfare, and displaced migrants. There is also the will of the men themselves, who are perhaps afraid to break out of the familiar routine they have created for themselves. I don't think the unions are going to be much help with this, but hey, good on them if they want to try.
Today was relatively quiet on cash corner. The soup at the Argo was awesome. Tomorrow morning the guys will be drifting back. I like to think for them every day is a fresh chance at cash corner.
JIm
4 years ago
Quote:Having employed a
Although I'm in a different industry I've had the exact same experience. Every person we hired for full time work from the day labour pool has lasted a week at the most. Not one has made the next Monday. A 5 day work week is just too much for some people.
alive
4 years ago
student workers
Well if you were to ever hire a student you would soon observe that they have not yet learned any work-ethics.
They require a lot of supervising and in spite of being young and strong, somehow are never able to lift anything!
At half the going rate they are not a bargain unless the government chips in to create employement for these young future leaders of our country.
Gerhardius
4 years ago
hiring casual labourers
I have to echo the experiences of JIm and Sharingisgood regarding the hiring of full time workers from the casual ranks. I have worked on a number of sites where efforts were made to move some workers from Labour Ready or another similar company to full time employment with a large construction firm. Approximately 20% of the casual labourers we brought in were offered full time positions after showing ability and a work ethic. Unfortunately very few of those guys lasted more than a couple of weeks, leaving on their own or being fired. One guy I know of has lasted in the industry and is a site superintendent, but he is the exception. There is the guy who was caught masturbating in his car by a WCB inspector; the guy who returned from lunch his first day drunk and wanting to fight; the guy who was arrested one night while trying to break into the site with his friends; and all those whoe just stopped showing up for work before two weeks were up.
Cycling Commuter
4 years ago
Benefits for part-timers.
JIm wrote:
A 5 day work week is just too much for some people.
True enough.
When I was a production lead hand in the electronics industry during my early 20s, one of our workers wanted every weekend to be a long weekend to accommodate her partying. She never showed up on Fridays or Mondays. There was always an excuse about attending a funeral for her grandmother, aunt, whatever. The same relatives kept getting buried over and over again. Maybe she was related to Harry Houdini.
She was usually a bit hung over Tuesday morning, but she worked hard for most of Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. She had a great sense of humour and was well-liked.
Our production manager eventually fired the party girl. It's a shame the company was not able to offer her the 3-day work week she seemed to want. She didn't drink at work, so that gave her liver a couple of days a week to recover from weekends.
Part of the problem with absentee workers is the cost of paying full-time benefits to part-timers. This is one more reason why I would like to see a universal dental plan financed by a sugar tax. Since both the EU and the US heavily subsidize their sugar producers, a sugar tax equal to the amount of the subsidies would amount to Europeans and Americans paying for Canadians' dental benefits.
Cycling Commuter
4 years ago
Union seniority reduces job security for those who need it most.
Union seniority systems protect the wrong workers. Parents who are raising young families and struggling with heavy mortgage payments are the first to be laid off in a unionized environment. Older guys who are no longer supporting families and who have paid off their mortgages are the last to be laid off. A more rational approach would be to offer universal dental benefits and other benefits regardless of hours worked then offer the older guys without heavy financial responsibilities a part-time work week when things slow down. They can use the time off to catch up on their own home renovation projects etc.
Seniority systems in the construction industry also guarantee that women will be laid off first since women have only recently started working in that field.
In many cases, union rigidity and featherbedding cause an employer to lose market share, thereby causing mass layoffs. GM is a classic example of this. When consumer demand for the Camaro and Firebird fell-off, GM wanted to stop making these vehicles as soon as possible. But the union wouldn't let them. See http://money.cnn.com/galleries/2007/autos/0701/gallery.detroit1/8.html The union forced GM to manufacture products that customers didn't want to buy.
While tens of thousands of unionized auto workers are being laid off due to rapid erosion of their employers' market share, non-union workers' jobs at Toyota are very secure since their employer's market share is rising faster than the unionized companies' market share is plunging. Unions have repeatedly tried to infect, er I mean "organize" Toyota. But Toyota workers have repeatedly rejected the unions. Toyota workers are not blind and they're not stupid. They're smart enough to observe what's going on at the unionized companies and realize that joining a union will mean they will each wind up paying $100,000 in union dues for the privilege of letting union bosses reduce their job security by interfering with their employers' ability to manufacture the high-quality, fuel-efficient vehicles the public wants to buy.
DPL
4 years ago
So why did the government
So why did the government close the office?
Was it from lack of folks looking for work? I hardly think so. Samll companies troll for workers as they can get then cheap. I worked in that part of town now and again and always saw folks there looking for work at the office. My God, the ones rushing out on the street are desperate.
maestro
4 years ago
alive:
Sorry, but to clarify , I was referring to UNIVERSITY students.
The group I was with were pretty hard working...one had to be on the ball , and most of the Union bunch we worked along side with acted like they had dropped out of high school.
Mind you, this was a couple of decades ago, not sure what the current crop is like.
bentrider2010
4 years ago
Re: Truck Driver on Cash Corner
There are good reasons there are a lot of unemployed truck drivers, especially in Vancouver.
- The trucking industry is in a shambles. It’s deregulated, the trucks are poorly maintained and dangerous to truck drivers and the general public. Truck drivers can be held personally responsible for the condition of the equipment. Truck drivers can be fined, they can lose their license and they can even end up in jail. Truck drivers have been fleeing trucking, in droves.
- Truck drivers pay is very low (sometimes at or below minimum-wage). Minimum-wage and overtime standards do not exist in trucking (except in union trucking companies and the vast majority of trucking companies are non-union). Trucking company lobbyists in Ontario have challenged federal employment standards legislation for truck drivers. To put icing on the cake many trucking company owners are wildly unscrupulous and routinely short drivers on their paycheques.
- Canada has the worst truckers hours-of-service regulations of any country on earth. Truck drivers in Canada can be forced to work 15 –17 hours a day. Death by fatigue is a very distinct possibility for truck drivers in Canada. Why do you think there are so many truck crashes in BC? Law firms in Vancouver are advertising on television to solicit personal injury business from the victims of Vancouver truck drivers, for goodness sake.
- The many truck driver want-ads you see are invariably for the worst trucking companies with the worst pay and the worst safety records. That’s why they are advertising. They have very high turnover. There’s no shortage of truck drivers. Any supposed “truck driver shortage” is a complete fabrication cooked-up by trucking company lobbyists who want immigration standards loosened so they can fire their existing drivers and bring in low-wage “truck drivers” from developing countries (like Vietnam, for instance, which has one of the worst truck crash rates of any country in the world).
- Large sectors of the trucking business in British Columbia have already become immigrant ghettos – most notably container hauling and general freight. Punjabi-speaking trucking company owners are hiring recent Punjabi immigrants to work as virtual indentured slaves for low pay and even worse working conditions. Just take a look at some of the shitty, falling-apart tractors pulling containers around Vancouver (at breakneck speed – it’s piecework - the driver is paid by the trip so run for your lives if you see a container truck careening towards you).
- There is absolutely no job security in trucking. As a driver, if you complain about the pay or the unsafe equipment you will be replaced. There is intense pressure from low-budget trucking companies who are constantly forcing down freight rates simply because they can. The budget trucking companies can afford to cut rates because they don’t do truck maintenance and they hire low-paid, inexperienced and unqualified drivers (usually naive recent immigrants).
- Lots of trucking companies require truck drivers to supply the truck (also known an the Never-Never Truck Lease Plan because the driver will never make money and will inevitably end up in the poor house as the trucking company slowly but surely downloads their costs to him). What other job forces employees to assume so much personal risk for so little money?
It’s no wonder there are truck drivers looking for other work on Cash Corner. It may look like poverty row but $10 - $12/hr as an unprotected day labourer with no benefits is a better looking deal than being a truck driver in Vancouver.
snert
4 years ago
Toyota is not stupid either.
Cycling Commuter
You may want to give Toyota some credit for matching/bettering union shop conditions.
Of course you have totally ignored the fact that it is the unions that have dragged working conditions up to a respectable level in the first place.
Most successful non-union shops are reasonably close in both wages, benefits and working conditions to their union competition. Management is a humongous factor in the success or failure of any business.
Blaming Detroit's woes on the unions is just silly. Their demands are only one factor in long litany of screw ups that really make you wonder why there is any need for CEOs etc.
woody
4 years ago
Once again there are double standards being applied by Tyee
Once again there are double standards being applied by Tyee, last night it was Nightbloom. Today on this particular site its, bentrider2010, he names and disparages an identifiable group of people, he states very clearly that Punjabi-speaking truckers are the cause of ,indentured slaves, using Punjabi immigrants.
These remarks are racial profiling , to which the Tyee has allowed to exist and stand since approximately 1 pm, March 1/07, If these comments don’t reek racism, then what does.
There is something really out of tune with the Tyee organization, you censure my comments for naming a province, to which, there were no identifiable people. A province is a place, a thing, not a peoples, as the Tyee refers too in my censure. Then you leave these racial comments stand. You people had better open a window and let some of that smoke out.
bentrider2010 comments
Large sectors of the trucking business in British Columbia have already become immigrant ghettos – most notably container hauling and general freight. Punjabi-speaking trucking company owners are hiring recent Punjabi immigrants to work as virtual indentured slaves for low pay and even worse working conditions. Just take a look at some of the shitty, falling-apart tractors pulling containers around Vancouver (at breakneck speed – it’s piecework - the driver is paid by the trip so run for your lives if you see a container truck careening towards you).
htedrom
4 years ago
simply because you refer to
simply because you refer to people by their province doesn't make you any better or worse than referring to a people by race. Racism is completely contextual...I doubt you got censured just for naming a province...
better idea: run the shower and throw on some floyd.
woody
4 years ago
to put it in simple terms,
htedrom, to put it in simple terms, if I had used Alberta, instead of Quebec, in my comment, which was about 2 lines long, they would not said dick, guaranteed.
G West
4 years ago
woody my friend
That's not quite what you said, in fairness.
I happen to have kept a copy, as I do of a lot of things (including what went on Wednesday night by the way). Send me an email and I'll refresh your memory.
I'd actually hate to lose you too.
garthwest@hotmail.com
I think the key here is that this is a FIFA problem and that referee in Quebec was enforcing what he took to be FIFA policy. My understanding is that the subject is being taken up at the highest levels of the sport.
I can't blame the girl's team for walking off and showing solidarity with her mates, can you? I think that showed character and was an indication that these 12-year-old girls had already learned what it is to care about what happens to their friends - even though they might be very different in superficial ways.
That's the kind of thing I'd like all Canadians to demonstrate - not just ones in Quebec, Ontario, or Alberta.
zalm
4 years ago
Granite
Very well said indeed. I live in the area too, and in 1996 used the services of two of the more likable types we found there - oooooh, bad, bad, BAD for a union-believing guy like me. What can I say? I looked after them, I fed them lunch while they were on site (so we all got at least one good meal a day) and I just had a problem in principle paying for WCB to do their thing.
They were good workers but wholly incapable of showing up for a day or two after being paid. I enjoyed their company very much, and a friend later hired one of them legitimately into his business where he still works today.
Unions won't have much to do with them unless they pay the initiation fee, which for any union I'm aware of is at least $100, and who has money to spend on that if you're on cash corner? A few unions will try to help - IUOE, Heat & Frost, Labourers, anybody who has positions that involve a lot of on-the-job-and-not-in-school training, but many union members can't see the percentage in paying for union staff to hire-in and train people who aren't just like them.
One of the tragedies of our modern society - everybody who's "gotten somewhere" thinks he or she has gotten their on his or her own merits and hard work. That includes a bunch of union members, but tragically, it also includes a lot of people who spent a lot of money and time to acquire a good university education, and then waste it on the same level of thinking that the daily newspaper gives them.
zalm
4 years ago
Bentrider2010
Bang-on, for a lot of reasons. I've got dozens of stories about trucking in India in 1997 as well as here. Same people. Same incidents. Same results. India is now entering a significant period of deregulation even more sweeping than the last one which began in 1995, and you'll hear a lot more stories out of there (and here, because quite a number of owner-operators here have the same business interests there, using the halawa system to move funds between them) in coming years.
maestro
4 years ago
Agreed:
While the TYEE topic at hand is the sub culture of Cash Corner,there is another interesting one evolving and involving other groups mentioned in these comments....and our family having many friends who belong to this same group.
It is a very interesting side-bar sub - economy within our overall economy. Perhaps its existence contributes to why Cash Corner exists, and why Union organizers appear frustrated .
It is not necessarily illegal, but it is a phenomenon that likely wasn't predicted and hence not factored in previously.
I see it growing in the near future...and I am sure most know that to which I refer..as your previously posted comments have already inspired this comment.
woody
4 years ago
life goes on
Zalm said to Woody,
Zalm, I going to pass on your invite. Its pointless to involve anyone else in this discussion. To draw anyone else into this, would only muddy the waters. Im certainly not going to let this little spat consume my life. The Tyee made their ruling , I made my statement . That’s it, life goes on. I sure that Lynn and G West would agree.
G West
4 years ago
Well said Woody
And I just heard that FIFA has dodged the bullet and avoided making a real decision...
GO figure. I've had my battles with the Soccer authorities as well. They're no more inspirational, in anything but superficial ways, than the folks who run the Olympics. If that picture with the other story is accurate, I can't see how a tightly fastened scarf of that type is any danger or impediment to anyone.
A lot of people have forgotten that there's been a move to encourage women, including at the elite level, to wear some kind of head protection when playing the game. You may remember Charmaine Hooper of Canada's national women's team, who frequently wears such protecion in international games.
You can see a picture of her here:
http://www.canadasoccer.com/eng/nationals/profile_w.asp?id=9&sub=2
Much ado about nothing!
Now, how in the world did we get into the subject on this thread?
woody
4 years ago
Now, how in the world did we get into the subject on this thread
G West, don’t be so naive, you remember, you had my comment censured... Why,? because I was making a statement in favor of an 11 year old child, Who I felt and believed was in her rights. Regardless this whole site has been sham, your exposed for the phony you are .Good Bye
G West
4 years ago
woody
that's just not true.
This is what you posted:
woody
4 years ago
I rest my argument
I rest my argument. G West, why didn’t you replaced my comment back from where you had it censured from? The Head scarf Hoopla Site. At the very least now, the commentators can judge for themselves whether it was worthy of censure
G West
4 years ago
It wasn't me that took it down
If you want to repost it there Woody, go right ahead.
zalm
4 years ago
woody
Pass, or pass on - it doesn't matter to me. I'm just trying to figure out exactly what the sacred cows look like on this site. You obviously gored one. What colour was it?
VanIndymedia got destroyed by unmoderated non-thinkers and racists, to the likes of whom elliott is only a poor pretender, even if he does write exactly like one of them, down to the spelling mistakes and the usage.
Beers surely knows this. But it's important not to shut those sacred cows away in museums either - they still must be exposed to reasonable scrutiny. I'd like to carry the conversation onward. I'm not kidding myself that I'd often find myself on the same side of an argument as you, but it'll surely happen, if we're allowed to talk.
I agreed with Coyote, I disagreed with Coyote, I saw the post that got Coyote banned, but didn't copy it, and am at present very unclear as to what constitutes a sacred cow around here, because it was quite a harmless comment.
And I'm not sure what your problem with GWest is - I've gotten a heckuva education from him at times.
woody
4 years ago
OK GARF
Garf Zalm, it does have kind of a friendly tone, to it.
zalm
4 years ago
What's with this Garf sh!t?
What's with this Garf sh!t? You know, in the past couple of weeks, the level of name-calling has gone up astoundingly around here. Is it something in the water?
I mostly ignored Coyote when he got like that - couldn't be bothered reading what he had to say. Now I find myself ignoring Maestro most of the time because I can't make heads or tails of his stream-of-consciousness blather - I simply can't tell what his point is.
If this is a joke, sorry, you'll have to explain it to me. I simply don't get it. If you're going to start Garfing all over me, you'll have to explain why. I scarcely have time to read all the articles here, never mind follow the threads. And it's really too bad when the threads I AM interested in are largely discombobulated by all these personal attacks and left-right slurs.
I'm noticing that part of Grumpy's comments were cut on a new thread today. There's a heckuva lot of censoring going on, but the conversation isn't improving.
woody
4 years ago
What's with this Garf sh!t?
Hi there zalmboni.What's with this Garf sh!t you asked? Well, for starters Garf sh!t isn’t as slippery as your regular run of the mill dog sh!t, but it really sticks around for a long time. And its manufactured right here locally
zalm
4 years ago
woody
I see what's going on here now on the boy trouble thread. Whyn't you leave me out of your little vendetta?
woody
4 years ago
Zalmboni you invited yourself in
Zalmboni, you invited yourself into this little chit chat remember? Let me refresh you.
zalm
4 years ago
woody Peckerhead
Don't be an idiot. You're obviously taking this with extreme prejudice, and I don't know why. Straightshooter and I were both censored from a conspiracy thread for debunking conspiracies and I'm trying to figure out why. So just go back to la-la-land and stay out of the way of people who have real thoughts to think about important issues. I don't give a flying fart what you think of Quebec - I'm after bigger game.
Sheesh! You came up with one decent thought on the Kim Nixon thread which clearly expended every last vestige of rational thought you ever had, because from then on it's been all downhill. Insults, conspiracies and accusations - that's pretty meagre fare for a dickbag like Elliott and it's downright incompetent for you.
"He may look like an idiot and talk like an idiot, but don't let that fool you. He really is an idiot." - Groucho Marx
woody
4 years ago
Fair enough zalm .
Fair enough, you get the last word.
woody
4 years ago
You took to long to reply Zalmboni
You took to long Zalmboni ,I changed my mind about you having the last word your re regulated back to the 2an last word, Hope you don’t mind there Zalm a.k.a., G West a.k.a., Alcibiades a.k.a. Allan a.k.a. etc, etc, etc.. There just is no end to you, is there Garf. Your sure burning up the old bandwidth over there on the ‘Will BC Rail Bomb Explode ’ site. Fly right at er there Garth.