Speaker 1: Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here,
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Speaker 1: Breakingpoints dot com. Hi, I'm Matt Stoler, author of monopoly
Speaker 1: focused newsletter Big and an anti trust policy analyst. I
Speaker 1: have a great segment for you today on this Big breakdown.
Speaker 1: So this one's about something that anti trust enforcers just
Speaker 1: did to help you get a higher paycheck or make
Speaker 1: it easier for you to get a new and better job. Also,
Speaker 1: what I've noticed is that a lot of you like
Speaker 1: to get involved in politics in a meaningful way. So
Speaker 1: I actually have an action that you can take, and
Speaker 1: I'll have instructions in this video on how to do
Speaker 1: so to strengthen the law and help your liberty. Okay,
Speaker 1: so let's start at the beginning, because one has to
Speaker 1: do with the workplace from slavery and indentured servitude to
Speaker 1: minimum wages and unionization. The relationship between work and control
Speaker 1: have always been core questions in American history and frankly
Speaker 1: all human history. But I live here in America, so
Speaker 1: that's what I'm going to talk about, all right. So
Speaker 1: today we're in a modern society, and one way we
Speaker 1: ask these same questions about work and control is by
Speaker 1: talking about employment contracts, the agreements between workers and their employers.
Speaker 1: Now we've come a long way, generally. You don't see
Speaker 1: the kinds of abuses that used to be common in
Speaker 1: American history anymore. And I'm not just talking about slavery
Speaker 1: and segregation and all that stuff. For example, in nineteen
Speaker 1: oh seven, more than three thousand workers died in coal
Speaker 1: mine accidents, and that was pretty normal. Railroads, it was
Speaker 1: a total mess. In the nineteen twenties, the brother of
Speaker 1: the Secretary of the Treasury was caught saying that you
Speaker 1: couldn't run a coal mine without machine guns. So things
Speaker 1: have gotten a lot better today, but that doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that they are perfect. Today, forty million Americans are bound
Speaker 1: to something called a non compete agreement, which is a
Speaker 1: provision of an employment contract that stops people from leaving
Speaker 1: their job and going to work for someone else. It's
Speaker 1: a pretty good chance that some of you watching this video,
Speaker 1: many of you actually are bound by a non compete contract.
Speaker 1: It's a lot of people are bound by these things,
Speaker 1: and it's a weird restriction that is relatively new. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's called a non compete. How is that even legal? Right?
Speaker 1: Non compete? Non Competes are not totally new. They've actually
Speaker 1: been around for centuries, but traditionally they've been pretty rare.
Speaker 1: In the twentieth century, non competes applied to high level executives,
Speaker 1: the proverbial CEO with access to Coca Cola's secret recipe.
Speaker 1: But over the last twenty years this has changed. Let's
Speaker 1: take a listen to the chair of the Federal Trade Commission,
Speaker 1: Leeda Kan, who is the enforcer that took the action
Speaker 1: that I'm talking about on this video with regards to
Speaker 1: non competes. These clauses may have stole arded in the boardroom,
Speaker 1: but today what we see is that they've proliferated across
Speaker 1: sectors and across income levels. So we're talking about nurses,
Speaker 1: we're talking about fast food workers, janitors, but also physicians
Speaker 1: and engineers. And we've now seen that in the aggregate
Speaker 1: these clauses can really restrict competition, both in labor markets
Speaker 1: but also in product markets. And so our economists calculated
Speaker 1: that collectively American workers are earning around three hundred billion
Speaker 1: dollars less because of these non competes and that on
Speaker 1: the whole innovation and entrepreneurship are suffering. Okay, so what happened?
Speaker 1: Why did these things become more common? Well, the reason
Speaker 1: that it was the lack of usage back in the
Speaker 1: day was simple. Employment contracts themselves were rare. Contracts were
Speaker 1: expensive to produce and not really worth it. Today, putting
Speaker 1: forward employment contracts is as simple as copying and pasting
Speaker 1: text from a model contract found online there our computers.
Speaker 1: At the same time, stricter arbitration laws made written employment
Speaker 1: contracts more attractive to employers. So today, as Cher con noted,
Speaker 1: these agreements are now in almost every industry finance, medicine, printing,
Speaker 1: floor installation, title and escrowork software, NASA contracting, computer antivirus research,
Speaker 1: video game production, et cetera, etc. Thirty percent of hairstylists
Speaker 1: work under a non compete, as do forty five percent
Speaker 1: of family physicians. Okay, now there are some limits. The
Speaker 1: first geographical Let's take a look at a map. These
Speaker 1: contracts are already unenforceable or restricted in many states like California, Colorado, Illinois, Maine, Maryland,
Speaker 1: New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, Virginia, and Washington,
Speaker 1: and a lot of non competes are never enforced and
Speaker 1: barely noticed by the employer or employee. They're boilerplate in
Speaker 1: the contract and no one pays attention. But that's not
Speaker 1: always the case, and being bound by a non compete
Speaker 1: can be awful, especially if you live in a certain
Speaker 1: place and you have a very unique skill set. These
Speaker 1: contracts are written under the assumption that an employee and
Speaker 1: employer are bargaining in a relatively equal position over the
Speaker 1: terms of work, but it's usually the case that the
Speaker 1: employer has a lot more power. Sometimes employees don't even
Speaker 1: know they're signing or aren't in a position to refuse.
Speaker 1: You agree to a job and then on your first
Speaker 1: day you get a big packet of stuff to sign
Speaker 1: and in there as a non compete. You can't say
Speaker 1: no at that point. Now, in some states where non
Speaker 1: competes are legally unenforceable, employers still use them. They threaten
Speaker 1: employees who don't know any better. So, one former employment
Speaker 1: lawyer told the FTC in a comment, employers routinely use
Speaker 1: the burden of litigation to intimidate employees or seek revenge
Speaker 1: for the employees' perceive personal disloyalty, rather than to protect
Speaker 1: any legitimate employer interest. It's not all employers who do this,
Speaker 1: it's just some of them. But it's still really bad
Speaker 1: for people who have to deal with that. A lot
Speaker 1: of people are stuck at jobs where they're sexually harassed.
Speaker 1: Doctors are constantly complaining that they're forced to work in
Speaker 1: a bad practice but cannot move because their family is
Speaker 1: rooted in a particular area. Economists increasingly agree that non
Speaker 1: competes are bad. For instance, you know this is Florian editor,
Speaker 1: who's an economistic Yeah, but there's a ton of economic
Speaker 1: research at this point showing that how bad it is.
Speaker 1: One study, for example, showed that when Hawaii stopped enforcing
Speaker 1: non compete clauses for high tech workers, earnings of new
Speaker 1: hires increased by about four percent. But there's lots of
Speaker 1: studies like that showing kind of across the board. It's
Speaker 1: not just wages. Non competes also prevent would be entrepreneurs
Speaker 1: from starting companies or recruiting different talents. So we hear
Speaker 1: from a lot of small businesses, I can't hire people
Speaker 1: because the people I would hire are have non competes.
Speaker 1: And we have a historical example of how useful these
Speaker 1: bands on non competes can be. So California has not
Speaker 1: allowed the enforcement of non competes since the nineteenth century,
Speaker 1: and that is one of the key reasons historians think
Speaker 1: for the fostering of Silicon Valley Without that state span
Speaker 1: on non competes. For instance, top semiconductor engineers could never
Speaker 1: have left their original employment at the legendary company Shockley
Speaker 1: Semiconductor to formed fair Child Semiconductor or Intel. Now there
Speaker 1: is a real argument for non competes. It goes like this,
Speaker 1: if you're a business, why would you train someone if
Speaker 1: they can just leave your firm and take that's special
Speaker 1: knowledge in customer's worth customer list with them. And this
Speaker 1: is not an outlandish point. However, these kinds of possibilities
Speaker 1: are better covered with non solicitation agreements that prevent you
Speaker 1: from stealing customers or trade secrets law that prevent you
Speaker 1: from telling secret stuff to anyone but your existing employer. Now,
Speaker 1: other practices like paying employees more over time or treating
Speaker 1: them better, can stop people from leaving to go to competitors,
Speaker 1: or reduce them from leaving to go to competitors or
Speaker 1: setting up shop on their own. As for the idea
Speaker 1: that non competes would reduce investment in knowledge based industries
Speaker 1: because companies wouldn't want to train people anymore, well that's
Speaker 1: just empirically not true. California exists, Silicon Valley is in
Speaker 1: California because we doesn't allow non competes, and so that
Speaker 1: kind of undercuts that claim. Also, and this is kind
Speaker 1: of like a special thing that I think is pretty amusing.
Speaker 1: Non competes are banned among lawyers because they are considered
Speaker 1: unethical in the legal profession, and lawyers that's a healthy
Speaker 1: knowledge based industry. Imagine that lawyers writing special rules exemptions
Speaker 1: for themselves but not for everyone else. Two weeks ago,
Speaker 1: the government acted This is a picture of the Federal
Speaker 1: Trade Commission, the regulator that is supposed to police markets
Speaker 1: and ensure fair competition. I love this building. Now, the
Speaker 1: FTC just said that non compete contracts will soon be illegal.
Speaker 1: Under their proposed rule, all non competes would be unenforceable.
Speaker 1: Existing non competes must be canceled, and employers have to
Speaker 1: tell employees those agreements are null. Moreover, attempts to get
Speaker 1: around this rule by using non disclosure agreements or other
Speaker 1: similar kind of agreements and that make it basically make
Speaker 1: it impossible for people to leave are also banned. So
Speaker 1: this is a huge deal and politically, the reaction to
Speaker 1: this rulemaking was overwhelmingly positive. People across industries noted how
Speaker 1: helpful this change will be, and it's not just a
Speaker 1: pro worker initiative. A lot of business people were very
Speaker 1: happy about this change. I'm going to pick a random
Speaker 1: standard industry. There's lots of chatter across industries, but here's shipping.
Speaker 1: This is Steve Cox, who is the president of Steam Logistics,
Speaker 1: talking about what it will mean for his industry. I
Speaker 1: think is unbelievable for our industry, for our young people
Speaker 1: in the industry to retain talent. In logistics specifically, we
Speaker 1: see a lot of twenty two year old kids signing
Speaker 1: things that they don't know they're signing, and a couple
Speaker 1: years later, they want to go after a better opportunity,
Speaker 1: more money, and to improve themselves, and they can't do that, frankly,
Speaker 1: and then they have to spend a couple of years
Speaker 1: out of the industry and they're gone. They're in another
Speaker 1: industry making a living there, and we never get them back.
Speaker 1: So talent wise, we'd love to keep and retain people
Speaker 1: in logistics. So I love it. I absolutely love it. Really,
Speaker 1: what this rule is doing is it's getting out a
Speaker 1: philosophical question about how you're supposed to do business, whether
Speaker 1: business is about controlling people or whether business is about
Speaker 1: having the liberty to trade and make better products and services.
Speaker 1: And politically it resonated widely. The President and the Vice
Speaker 1: and chimed in, so did a bunch of senators from
Speaker 1: both parties, a lot of business people, workers, doctors. But then,
Speaker 1: of course there were opponents too. The big business lobbyists
Speaker 1: at the US Chamber of Commerce were hostile, and the
Speaker 1: Wall Street Journal called it Lena Kahn's non compete favor
Speaker 1: to big labor. And they will no doubt litigate in
Speaker 1: the courts to try to get judges, conservative judges in
Speaker 1: their estimation, to strike down the rule. For variety of
Speaker 1: procedural reasons and the promanopoly representative at the Federal Trade Commission,
Speaker 1: who's a Republican commissioner, Christine Wilson. I'm not saying all
Speaker 1: Republicans believe this, but Christine Wilson does. She opposed the
Speaker 1: rule and laid out the basic legal arguments that are
Speaker 1: going to be used against it. Essentially, the FTC doesn't
Speaker 1: have this authority to write a rule like this, a
Speaker 1: regulatory overreach. And also she said, the quote unquote scientific
Speaker 1: data isn't conclusive about the effects of non competes, all
Speaker 1: sort of procedural stuff that's refusing to take the arguments
Speaker 1: on the merits about whether non competes are good or not. Essentially,
Speaker 1: what she said is a long dia tribe that was,
Speaker 1: how dare you change something? Is Christine Wilson, Chamber of Commerce,
Speaker 1: Wall Street Journal editorial page. They're not in charge, Lena
Speaker 1: Khan is, so what happens now, Well, at this point,
Speaker 1: it's just a proposed rule, and when an agency accident
Speaker 1: proposes a rule, there's a window of time, in this
Speaker 1: case sixty days where anyone from the public can tell
Speaker 1: the government what they think, and the government has to
Speaker 1: take their feedback into account before finalizing the rule. So
Speaker 1: you should do that. You should tell the government what
Speaker 1: you think a lot of corporate lobbyists are. And we've
Speaker 1: set up a site that can help you do that.
Speaker 1: It's called ban Noncompetes dot com, and that should make
Speaker 1: it easier. We'll just show you how to do it,
Speaker 1: but you can also go to the government site and
Speaker 1: regulation dot gov and do it there. You do it
Speaker 1: anonymously if you want. Both links are in the description
Speaker 1: of this video. There's already about one thousand comments, even
Speaker 1: though the links just became live yesterday, and there's gonna
Speaker 1: be a lot more. Tell the FTC what your experience
Speaker 1: is with non competes or just whatever you think about them,
Speaker 1: and they'll take your comment into account. They'll finalize the rule,
Speaker 1: and then one hundred and eighty days after the rule
Speaker 1: is finalized and voted on by the commissioners, it'll go
Speaker 1: into effect. And when the rule kicks in, it'll have
Speaker 1: impacts immediately because thousands of employment lawyers will be explaining
Speaker 1: to their clients how to comply with the rule. Standardized
Speaker 1: contracts that include non compete sections by default will be
Speaker 1: edited to remove them, and business leaders will start to
Speaker 1: recognize that non competes are no longer lawful. As the
Speaker 1: rule kicks in, the fight will head to the courts,
Speaker 1: and that's a fight for another day. There's lots of
Speaker 1: other stuff that's going to happen as well that I
Speaker 1: can go into, but this is the beginning of a
Speaker 1: big fight about whether non competes are going to be
Speaker 1: in our economy or not. Now it's important to take
Speaker 1: a step back and recognize what Chair Lena Kahan, along
Speaker 1: with fellow commissioners named Rebecca Kelly Slaughter and Alvaro Bedoya,
Speaker 1: who voted for the proposed rule, just did. They took
Speaker 1: a blatantly unfair practice that affects tens of millions of
Speaker 1: people and they baned it. That is governing, that is
Speaker 1: wielding power in service of the public. They also took
Speaker 1: the idea that in employers are allowed enormous control over
Speaker 1: their employees and contractors and said that's not how we
Speaker 1: do business in America. The government no longer allows it.
Speaker 1: The government's job our government. The job is to ensure
Speaker 1: liberty from coercion in all its forms. And for the
Speaker 1: first time in a very long time, the Federal Trade
Speaker 1: Commission acted like it. Thanks for watching this Big breakdown
Speaker 1: on the Breaking Points channel. If you'd like to know
Speaker 1: more about big business and how our economy really works,
Speaker 1: you could sign up below for my market power focused
Speaker 1: newsletter Big in the description, Thanks and have a good one.
Speaker 1: Seven thousand nurses have been out on strike in New
Speaker 1: York over chronic massive understaffing that is putting the nurses
Speaker 1: themselves and also obviously the patients at risk. We do
Speaker 1: have some breaking news this morning that a tentative deal
Speaker 1: has been struck. Of course, the nurses themselves will have
Speaker 1: to then vote to approve that deal, so we'll see
Speaker 1: whether they ultimately do that. But in the meantime we've
Speaker 1: been very un fortunate. Two of our partners here at
Speaker 1: Breaking Points have done phenomenal reporting on this story. Let's
Speaker 1: go ahead and start with the lever and put this
Speaker 1: report up on the screen. That's from Matthew Cunningham Cook,
Speaker 1: fantastic reporter there. His headline is as nurses strike, hospital
Speaker 1: CEOs pocket millions And just to give you some of
Speaker 1: the details here, you know these hospitals that nurses were
Speaker 1: striking at, these are technically nonprofits, but they operate as
Speaker 1: if they are gigantic corporations, and as Matthew points out,
Speaker 1: their CEOs are making millions. So Mount Sinai CEO kind
Speaker 1: Of Davis made five point six million in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1: Montefiori CEO Philip Ozua made seven point four million in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty. They also provide first class airfare chauffeur limos.
Speaker 1: So the work. So the idea that these hospitals, which
Speaker 1: have been making huge profits in which by the way,
Speaker 1: we the taxpayership a lot of money to during COVID,
Speaker 1: that they could not provide additional salaries or staffing for
Speaker 1: these nervous nurses was always preposterous. At the same time,
Speaker 1: we had Jordan Sheridan Status KU, one of our other
Speaker 1: great partners, on the ground talking to the workers themselves.
Speaker 1: Let's throw to Jordan, who can give you a preview
Speaker 1: of what he was able to learn. Hey, it's Jordan
Speaker 1: with Status kup news. Right now, there's over seven thousand
Speaker 1: nurses on strike in New York City at Montefiri Medical
Speaker 1: Center in the Bronx and Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan.
Speaker 1: They're on strike for a lot of the same reasons.
Speaker 1: Nurses across the country have gone on strike in recent years.
Speaker 1: They are being flooded by double triple the amount of patients,
Speaker 1: but no staffing increases. On Monday, we went out on
Speaker 1: the ground to Mount Sina Hospital in Manhattan, where we
Speaker 1: spoke with nurses who talked about a toxic environment in
Speaker 1: their hospital where they are in many cases out of
Speaker 1: beds and treating patients in the hallway. They also spoke
Speaker 1: about normally they might treat one to three patients on
Speaker 1: their floors, but in the most recent years have been
Speaker 1: treating seven to nine patients. They spoke about not being
Speaker 1: able to go on break. They talked about having to
Speaker 1: apologize to their patients for the lack of quality care
Speaker 1: because they are overwhelmed and don't have the proper amount
Speaker 1: of staffing. Here is our reporting from Mount Seinni Hospital.
Speaker 1: Say staffing now, say staffing now, Say staffing now, Say
Speaker 1: scavvy now, say staffing now, say stavving now. Say that. Well.
Speaker 1: I've been working here for about three and a half years,
Speaker 1: and every year, essentially I always say that I'd rather
Speaker 1: work during the pandemic than now, because we are severely
Speaker 1: understaffing one now than we were in the pandemic. And
Speaker 1: so much so that we're taking double, if not triple,
Speaker 1: the amount of patients that we're supposed to beginning and
Speaker 1: we were over over five hundred vacancies at this hospital alone,
Speaker 1: and that's just unacceptable to take caring of New York
Speaker 1: City presidents. Yeah, so on my floor was supposed to
Speaker 1: have one to three, but we can go up to
Speaker 1: one to see one to seven, and it's it's just unbearable,
Speaker 1: and it's unfair for the patients, and it's unfair for us,
Speaker 1: and more importantly, it's just he's to catastrophic results. That's
Speaker 1: why union, you set town union, Union, Union, Why in
Speaker 1: the pot whales from the public guying of the steed
Speaker 1: New York and Northern crowd is staying there with you
Speaker 1: while you fight for what's right. After all, the high
Speaker 1: ups of Monstown, who's talking about the patients? The patients,
Speaker 1: That's what they've been talking out for all these years.
Speaker 1: They've been saying the same thing. And what we have
Speaker 1: known is that the high leups you don't want to
Speaker 1: make the most basic concession, has been abusing the lot
Speaker 1: that these nations have for their patients for thought you long.
Speaker 1: So if you caught the part if you call them
Speaker 1: a hero, if you set tags to show them some money,
Speaker 1: that's all they deserve it. They carry us through this
Speaker 1: pandemic and we're not over there wearing a tri deemic
Speaker 1: yet right now wearing a tri demic right now Mount Sina,
Speaker 1: you are people making lots of money off of health
Speaker 1: there in this hospital speak. Oh, we're saying a share
Speaker 1: of the debate with some of the people who make
Speaker 1: this place run, will make people feel better, who get
Speaker 1: people healthy. Why do they have to be out of
Speaker 1: here right now in the middle of a tridemic that
Speaker 1: so many other hospitals who made sure that we didn't
Speaker 1: get here. I want the meeting and make sure when
Speaker 1: you tell the tale that it is a higher up
Speaker 1: some amount Sina that we're standing there right now not
Speaker 1: because of these nurses. These nurses helped us for many
Speaker 1: many years. They risked their lives for many many years.
Speaker 1: Well we didn't know what the hell was going along
Speaker 1: with COVID. They were in there risking themsel out family pleading.
Speaker 1: But it can get one mask begging and please masks
Speaker 1: and not you have to make them stand in the
Speaker 1: street pull a contract in the plea of sign up.
Speaker 1: I work in the labor and delivering unit as well
Speaker 1: as the postpartum unit, and our staffing conditions fluctuate depending
Speaker 1: all the day. At some points we are completely full,
Speaker 1: patients don't have beds to go to UH and we're
Speaker 1: running around, you know, in unsafe working conditions. And then
Speaker 1: there's other days where everything's okay and we have we can,
Speaker 1: we can give the care. So I think the biggest
Speaker 1: thing is that I understand the difference of save staffing
Speaker 1: versus not save staffing, because we are in those days
Speaker 1: where we cannot provide the care when we're stretched to
Speaker 1: our limits. We feel that we are doing our patients
Speaker 1: and the dissert miss and we have the days that
Speaker 1: are good. We know that we can provide that care.
Speaker 1: We see the difference in our patients. We see the
Speaker 1: difference in what we can remind Hey SA no say
Speaker 1: saving O say saving O says God can't stop stop
Speaker 1: jack blot shop shop. I mean chronically understaffed every shift,
Speaker 1: we're protesting every assignment and there's no repercussions for management,
Speaker 1: no breaks, no breaks. Wis I am the nurse with
Speaker 1: seven months experience and I'm already exhausted. We want safe stopping,
Speaker 1: and we just want to make the same wages and
Speaker 1: benefits that the other hospitals have, and this hospital does
Speaker 1: not have that compared to the other hospitals. The sacenario,
Speaker 1: that's why we're striking. Do we need safer conditions for
Speaker 1: patients so we can spend time with them, attend to
Speaker 1: lots of things happening at once. We're pulled in a
Speaker 1: million directions, so we want safe nature cares. Somebody who
Speaker 1: selling me that California has the brain where they have
Speaker 1: to have the same amount of emotions your patients tack
Speaker 1: in New York City ES, I have no idea. I
Speaker 1: think that's why this is not being finalized because they
Speaker 1: don't want to agree to something that if they don't
Speaker 1: meet the grids they'll get unalized away. So I think
Speaker 1: that's why we're striking because the last contract they have
Speaker 1: this whole actually they had this whole thing and action,
Speaker 1: but nothing to make it actually work. So they said,
Speaker 1: we'll have these grids, we'll meet these whatever. We had
Speaker 1: these ra sihows. But we fill out courts of assignments
Speaker 1: every week, and what happens to it? We fill out
Speaker 1: the paperwork and nothing happens. It goes nowhere and it's
Speaker 1: a lost pot. I would really just love for everyone
Speaker 1: to know that nurses really do. We become nurses because
Speaker 1: we love people. We care about people, especially labor and delivery.
Speaker 1: It's not about the money they offered us the money.
Speaker 1: If it was about the money, we want to be
Speaker 1: out here, we'd be in there, we would be working.
Speaker 1: It's not about the money. We want to take care
Speaker 1: of our patients. We want to be able to give
Speaker 1: our patients the care that they deserve. And it's a
Speaker 1: twelve hour shift. It's not right that we worked for
Speaker 1: twelve hours shape. You can't sit down to eat, you
Speaker 1: can't go to the bathroom. It's just not right. Hey,
Speaker 1: it's short of what status Ku News make sure to
Speaker 1: subscribe to our channel on YouTube. Recently, as part of
Speaker 1: our partnership with Breaking Points, we went out to cover
Speaker 1: a protest among hundreds of Uber drivers after the company
Speaker 1: successfully sued to block a wage increase, the first increase
Speaker 1: in wages in many years for Uber drivers. Let me
Speaker 1: give you a little bit of the backstory. This was
Speaker 1: in New York City. Uber filed suit against the city's
Speaker 1: Taxi and Limousine Commission, seeking the halt a new rule
Speaker 1: that would raise driver pay from twenty nineteen rates by
Speaker 1: seven point four to two percent per minute and twenty
Speaker 1: three point nine three percent per mile. The company claimed
Speaker 1: the increase, set to take effect in late December, would
Speaker 1: have forced it to shell out an additional twenty one
Speaker 1: to twenty three million per month and raise rider shares
Speaker 1: by ten percent amid the holiday season. Big picture, Uber's
Speaker 1: revenue is up seventy two percent in the third quarter
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty two compared to the prior year. So obviously,
Speaker 1: this is a company making plenty of money and could
Speaker 1: probably afford to increase its driver's wages. But we went
Speaker 1: out to cover the protests. We heard really powerful stories
Speaker 1: from drivers, some of whom were driving thirteen to fourteen
Speaker 1: hours straight, many of whom were working extra jobs on
Speaker 1: top of Uber or a lyft, and we're struggling under
Speaker 1: the weight of inflation. Here is our on the ground
Speaker 1: reporting from the Uber strike. I'm a drive an advocate.
Speaker 1: The mayor knows who we are. We got a petition
Speaker 1: to reform the tax in the Masine Commission. Many council
Speaker 1: members signed that petition, including Eric Adams, including Jermani Williams.
Speaker 1: We keep inviting them, we text them, we email them,
Speaker 1: and they're not out here. They don't show up. Somebody's
Speaker 1: got to ask those questions why they're not here. We're
Speaker 1: two weeks away from Christmas, and look at what Uber's
Speaker 1: doing taxing the Maousine Commission approve of minuscule, a minuscule
Speaker 1: raise for the drivers, and here comes Uber trying to
Speaker 1: stop it. We didn't even get twenty five cents. It's
Speaker 1: around twenty three cents, twenty four cents. It's an additional night,
Speaker 1: it's an additional twenty two cents on the per mile
Speaker 1: and about five cents on the per minute. Didn't we
Speaker 1: didn't hit twenty five cents. And the reason they do this,
Speaker 1: the reason they do they be You can't blame them.
Speaker 1: They're smart, being proactive because this is gonna affect future raises.
Speaker 1: Understand So it could have been a nickel that we're
Speaker 1: fighting over. They're Suber still would have sued, you know,
Speaker 1: because for them it translates into millions. For us, the
Speaker 1: only translate into pennies, a few dollars, but we need
Speaker 1: We gave the TLC a proposal in twenty twenty to
Speaker 1: give drivers two dollars and fifty cents a mile and
Speaker 1: fifty cents a minute. The problem with the driver in
Speaker 1: New York is that people think that we're like like
Speaker 1: a Kmark job, like a like a fifteen dollar an
Speaker 1: hour job, a minimum wage job. No, we're small business owners,
Speaker 1: just like the bodega, the pizza shah, the bakery. We
Speaker 1: are small business owners. The only thing that our storefront
Speaker 1: is on a set of wheels, but many people come
Speaker 1: into our storefront and we're all over the city. We
Speaker 1: are sent you workers. I myself work throughout the pandemic.
Speaker 1: Instead of doing twenty five trips a day, I was
Speaker 1: doing three trips a day, and I still went to
Speaker 1: the hospital. Was not afraid to go to the hospital.
Speaker 1: I got COVID two times. And that's it's They would
Speaker 1: not do that to any other working class people. They
Speaker 1: wouldn't do it. There's just so many immigrant workers in
Speaker 1: this business. That and there's a language barrier. It's so
Speaker 1: easy to get over one now, it's very easy. Do
Speaker 1: you feel like they're using and exploiting you guys? Oh,
Speaker 1: of course, of course. This is this is not the
Speaker 1: this is not boohoo. The Paul taxi driver oh boo hoo,
Speaker 1: we need more money. Has nothing to do with greed,
Speaker 1: has nothing to do with greed. This is New York City.
Speaker 1: I'll tell you what. The Seattle Uber driver, the Seattle
Speaker 1: Uber driver is making more money right now than the
Speaker 1: New York driver, including if we get that raise. So
Speaker 1: the Seattle Uber driver is making a dollar thirty eight
Speaker 1: a mile and fifty nine cents a minute. The New
Speaker 1: York driver right now is getting one sixteen a mile
Speaker 1: and fifty two cents a minute. If we get the rais,
Speaker 1: the promile is gonna go to one thirty four and
Speaker 1: the permit is gonna go to about fifty six. Now,
Speaker 1: why it's not the same across That's that's that's the
Speaker 1: that's the thing that we that. It boggles the mind.
Speaker 1: It boggles the mind. Anybody could anybody could do the math.
Speaker 1: It's it's it's mind bothering. We will get back and
Speaker 1: fight them because you got the power, we got the strength,
Speaker 1: we got the faith. So we unless we want them
Speaker 1: to see us. We're here to let them know we
Speaker 1: need respect and there's to give it to us. And
Speaker 1: we will get that respect. We will at the end,
Speaker 1: we will. Ye, it's right because you are families. We
Speaker 1: should be able to spend time with our families, get
Speaker 1: vacations with our kids because you go out there every
Speaker 1: single day to make that happens. We want to take
Speaker 1: our kids to college, give then education they need in
Speaker 1: the near future. That's why de fine is for us
Speaker 1: for old drivers across the country. Right. So, Uber, we're
Speaker 1: here in front of your office. Shame you. Let that
Speaker 1: we know that we're here to get what you need.
Speaker 1: That's what we deserve after new folks, this is almost
Speaker 1: our fourteen of this Uber strike. My name is jas Lane.
Speaker 1: I worked very hard with the New York Taxi Workers
Speaker 1: Alliance to get our Taxi Medallion don't forgiveness program one.
Speaker 1: But it's time our Uber drivers get the money that
Speaker 1: they are owed and deserves. Frong not just because it's
Speaker 1: the holiday season, but the labor that our drivers provide
Speaker 1: is essential and necessary not only to keep the city functioning,
Speaker 1: but to keep mega corporations like Uber functioning and wealthy.
Speaker 1: We see time, time and time again, corporations like Uber
Speaker 1: boast about record profits every single year. But we know
Speaker 1: that record profits are just stolen wages from the working
Speaker 1: class of our city. In our states, it is essential
Speaker 1: that Uber makes good on the promise and the work
Speaker 1: that the Taxi Workers Alliance has done to win this
Speaker 1: raise that the city has already approved too. Every hour
Speaker 1: that Uber does not approve these wages is another hour
Speaker 1: that these drivers spend in the cold and dangerous climates,
Speaker 1: sitting in rain, in snow, in traffic for hours just
Speaker 1: to feed their families, get their children to college, and
Speaker 1: make an honest living. There's no reason why anyone should
Speaker 1: be driving or working any job for fifteen to twenty
Speaker 1: years and still be struggling to make the rent. There's
Speaker 1: no reason for that. So I have shut off my
Speaker 1: Uber at today. I will continue to keep it shut
Speaker 1: off until this raise is one. I'm proud to stand
Speaker 1: with the union members here today and ensure that we
Speaker 1: win the race for all and get our Uber drivers
Speaker 1: the money that they deserve for Hey, my name is
Speaker 1: James Lee. Welcome to another segment of fifty one to
Speaker 1: forty nine on Breaking Points. It is my first video
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty three, and I want to take a
Speaker 1: few minutes to revisit a topic that I'm very passionate about,
Speaker 1: which is health and nutrition. To start, let's examine a
Speaker 1: few data points. Rates of obesity in America have skyrocketed
Speaker 1: over the past fifty sixty years, up to a point
Speaker 1: now where over thirty percent of adults are considered obese
Speaker 1: and another thirty plus percent are overweight, meaning that all
Speaker 1: in all, more than two thirds of adults in the
Speaker 1: United States are either overweight or obese. Now, we all
Speaker 1: know obesity is linked to a bunch of different chronic illnesses,
Speaker 1: one of them being type two diabetes, so probably not surprising.
Speaker 1: The rate of diabetes in the US has also sky
Speaker 1: rocketed over the past fifty to sixty years. The only
Speaker 1: to start diabetes extremely rare back in the fifties and sixties,
Speaker 1: but now we're talking about disturbing numbers like roughly ten
Speaker 1: percent or more of Americans today are diabetic and even
Speaker 1: more are considered pre diabetic. So is there something about
Speaker 1: nutrition the food that we are eating, that is severely
Speaker 1: impacting our health and causing us to be fatter and
Speaker 1: sicker than we've ever been in history? This right here
Speaker 1: is a dead man who's about to change the world.
Speaker 1: Dennis Burkett was a world renowned scientist that liked to
Speaker 1: study pooh. He would study different types of Pooh. He
Speaker 1: would weigh it, he would measure it. He learned everything
Speaker 1: he could possibly learn about Pooh. He noticed that the
Speaker 1: people's poop in Europe and the United States was very,
Speaker 1: very different than the people's poop in Africa. The poop
Speaker 1: in the US and Europe often looked like this or
Speaker 1: like this. It was lumpy and hard, whereast the people
Speaker 1: in Africa had poop that looked more like this, and
Speaker 1: it was a lot smoother and softer. The people in
Speaker 1: high income countries like the United States and Europe had
Speaker 1: a bunch of health problems that the people in Africa
Speaker 1: simply didn't have. After living in Africa and studying this
Speaker 1: phenomenon for more than twenty years, Burkett came up with
Speaker 1: a hypothesis as to why Western countries are getting so sick.
Speaker 1: Burkett attributed these diseases to the small quantities of dietary
Speaker 1: fiber consumed in high income countries, due mainly to the
Speaker 1: overprocessing of natural foods. Burkett figured out that in high
Speaker 1: income countries we have severely fiber deficient diets. One of
Speaker 1: the first science and symptoms is constipation. Long term fiber
Speaker 1: deficient diet can lead to colon cancer, diverticulosis, appendicitis, varicose veins, diabetes, obesity, allergies,
Speaker 1: breast cancer, prostate cancer, IBD, lots of problem. We sure
Speaker 1: have talked an awful lot about science over the past
Speaker 1: several years. This, however, is probably some of the most
Speaker 1: fascinating research I've come across, but for some reason it
Speaker 1: gets almost no coverage, and we have to wonder why. Nonetheless,
Speaker 1: I did find this on the NIH website. Quote. Since
Speaker 1: Burkett's death in nineteen ninety three, his hypothesis has been
Speaker 1: verified and extended by large scale epidemiological studies which have
Speaker 1: reported that fiber deficiency increases the risk of colon, liver,
Speaker 1: and breast cancer and increases all cancer mortality and death
Speaker 1: from cardiovascular, infectious and respiratory diseases, diabetes, and all non
Speaker 1: cardiovascular non cancer causes. So we know for sure that
Speaker 1: fiber intake has a huge impact on our overall health
Speaker 1: and well being. More proof this is from the Mayo Clinic.
Speaker 1: Benefits of a high fiber diet and normalizes bowel movements,
Speaker 1: helps maintain bowel health, lowers cholesterol levels, helps control blood
Speaker 1: sugar levels, aids in achieving healthy weight, helps you live longer. So,
Speaker 1: once again, if fiber has so many health benefits, why
Speaker 1: are we removing it from all of our favorite foods.
Speaker 1: Everyone in the world is familiar with water white rice.
Speaker 1: Most people don't know is that rice actually looks like this.
Speaker 1: Around a grain of rice is something called brand. That's
Speaker 1: the fiber. The white part is called the endosperm. We
Speaker 1: only eat the endosperm. Now, let's look at wheat. Wheat
Speaker 1: looks like this. This is the wheat brand or fiber
Speaker 1: that we take off the wheat so that we can
Speaker 1: make products like this. Show me any carbohydrate in nature,
Speaker 1: and I will show you that God and Mother Nature
Speaker 1: intended that carbohydrate to be covered in fiber. When you
Speaker 1: take fiber out of food, it makes it much much
Speaker 1: hard to fill up, so you eat and eat and
Speaker 1: eat and never get full and buy more of the product.
Speaker 1: Those are literally all my favorite foods. Rice for obvious reasons,
Speaker 1: but also corn bread, sugar for some reason, they're nothing
Speaker 1: at all like they appear in nature. We have been duped.
Speaker 1: It's profitable to sell food that is fatty and sugary
Speaker 1: and salty and addictive. It's much less profitable to sell
Speaker 1: food that is wholesome that is high end fiber and
Speaker 1: is minimally processed. So whilst driving the abcity epidemic, it's
Speaker 1: corporate profits. Is it not extremely frustrating that so many
Speaker 1: solvable problems in our society stem from the fact that
Speaker 1: solving that problem would necessarily disrupt a very profitable financial scheme. Quote.
Speaker 1: Many of these ultra processed foods are almost prechewed for us.
Speaker 1: They melt in your mouth immediately. There's no protein, there's
Speaker 1: no water, there's no fiber slowing them down. It's going
Speaker 1: to hit your taste buds and light up your reward
Speaker 1: and motivation centers of the brain immediately. Then there is
Speaker 1: a secondary hit of dopamine when it gets absorbed into
Speaker 1: the body. That doesn't even sound like they're talking about
Speaker 1: food anymore. It's like they're describing some kind of super
Speaker 1: drug that they genetically modified to hack our brains. Ultra
Speaker 1: Processed foods have something else in common with nicotine. Some
Speaker 1: of the biggest producers of processed foods were from the
Speaker 1: nineteen eighties to the end of the two thousands, known
Speaker 1: as Big Tobacco. In nineteen eighty five, R. J. Reynolds
Speaker 1: acquired Nabisco for four point nine billion dollars, and Philip
Speaker 1: Morris acquired General Foods in a five point seventy five
Speaker 1: billion dollar deal that was then the largest takeover in
Speaker 1: US history outside of the oil industry. Philip Morris added
Speaker 1: Kraft to its portfolio in nineteen eighty eight and rebranded
Speaker 1: itself as Altria in two thousand and three. By the
Speaker 1: time Big Tobacco began acquiring food companies, they had decades
Speaker 1: of experience studying and optimizing the speed with which their
Speaker 1: products delivered nicotine to the brain. They continued to harness
Speaker 1: that science in their food products. This is really some
Speaker 1: story of American business ingenuity, using science, using the might
Speaker 1: of Big Tobacco to turn our foods into another addictive drug.
Speaker 1: What an engineering marvel. In twenty ten, Michelle Obama launched
Speaker 1: a campaign against child obesity. The First Lady lent her
Speaker 1: Sassy sachet to Move your Body, aiming to set healthier
Speaker 1: standards for food served in school lunchrooms. We send our
Speaker 1: kids to school, we have a right to expect that
Speaker 1: they won't be eating the kind of fatty, salty, sugary
Speaker 1: food that we're trying to keep from them when they're
Speaker 1: at home. Unfortunately, you know, Michelle Obama was on the
Speaker 1: right track right from the beginning, and then I think
Speaker 1: she got derailed by a mixture of bad advisors and
Speaker 1: by bringing in the food companies, and they were able
Speaker 1: to dilute her very powerful message down to something where
Speaker 1: you know, it's just her on television encouraging people to
Speaker 1: move that way rather than let's move together, you know,
Speaker 1: as a movement to be able to transform the food system.
Speaker 1: The better became move more. Not to say moving more
Speaker 1: is not a good thing. But this example, I think
Speaker 1: perfectly encapsulates the Obama legacy, does it not. It seems
Speaker 1: to always start with perhaps the best of intentions, promising
Speaker 1: to stand up for people, to write what's wrong, But
Speaker 1: for some reason they just could not escape the temptation
Speaker 1: of corporate grift, which ultimately doomed any real chance of
Speaker 1: them actually challenging entrenched power. But the FDA, as a
Speaker 1: lot of us already know, is in large part funded
Speaker 1: by the biopharmaceutical industry. Fifty four percent three point three
Speaker 1: billion comes from the federal government, but the other forty
Speaker 1: six percent two point eight billion dollars come from user
Speaker 1: industry fees. This is based on the latest available data
Speaker 1: that we have this thing about that incentive structure we
Speaker 1: have in place. The FDA, who are supposed to advocate
Speaker 1: on behalf of consumers, is itself in large part funded
Speaker 1: by big pharma, and big Pharma's profit streams are necessarily
Speaker 1: predicated on the existence of sick patients. So wouldn't it
Speaker 1: be great if one third, half two thirds of Americans
Speaker 1: were quote unquote sick. CNBC analysts love Eli Lilly for
Speaker 1: its potential block by obesity drug and we do too. Diabetes.
Speaker 1: The US accounts for nearly half of global diabetes drug sales.
Speaker 1: Could there be some sort of global conspiracy of food
Speaker 1: and pharmaceutical executives and regulators and dark rooms devising ways
Speaker 1: to make people sick? I cannot say. But what I
Speaker 1: can say is there's so much money to be made here,
Speaker 1: and in order to make this money, people must first
Speaker 1: be sick, be obese, be diabetic, whatever the case is.
Speaker 1: I do not think we can refute that there is
Speaker 1: a certain economic benefit of normalizing something like obesity. Companies.
Speaker 1: They aren't promoting body positivity because they desire a more
Speaker 1: healthy society. They are doing it because it is very
Speaker 1: financially lucrative to do so, so lots of momentum across
Speaker 1: various industries and sectors, private and public to sit idly
Speaker 1: by and watch all the fiber be quietly removed from
Speaker 1: our diet. One final fact about fiber, just for a
Speaker 1: point of comparison. According to Duke University's Global Health Institute,
Speaker 1: a hunter gather group the HATSA, for example, typically take
Speaker 1: in approximately one hundred grams of fiber per day, about
Speaker 1: five times more than an American adult usually gets. But hey,
Speaker 1: I think you should eat whatever you want to eat.
Speaker 1: My point, my goal for today and for twenty twenty
Speaker 1: three is to just provide you with important information about
Speaker 1: what I think is really going on by following the
Speaker 1: money in the food industry, in the regulatory environment, in
Speaker 1: big pharma, wherever else, to empower you to make the
Speaker 1: best decision for you. And that is all from me today.
Speaker 1: I hope this segment was helpful in terms of connecting
Speaker 1: the dots between something like the proliferation of low fiber
Speaker 1: foods with the underlying desire of big food to maximize
Speaker 1: profit at the expense of public health. If you did
Speaker 1: find this helpful, I would encourage you to check out
Speaker 1: my YouTube channel fifty one to forty nine with James Lee.
Speaker 1: Tons of video on there breakdowns on many different topics
Speaker 1: like this one. The link will be in the description below.
Speaker 1: Of course, don't forget to subscribe to Breaking Points and
Speaker 1: thank you so much for your time today and see
Speaker 1: you in the next one. I'm Maximilian Alvarez. I'm the
Speaker 1: editor in chief of the Real News Network and host
Speaker 1: of the podcast Working People, and this is the Art
Speaker 1: of class War on Breaking Points. I want to start
Speaker 1: off this segment by wishing everyone out there a safe, RESTful,
Speaker 1: and love filled holiday season. To borrow a phrase from
Speaker 1: the great Kurt Vonnegut, I hope each and every one
Speaker 1: of you is able to take some time back over
Speaker 1: the holidays to be with the people and do the
Speaker 1: things that make you brave and kind and healthy and happy.
Speaker 1: I also want to give viewers and listeners a warning
Speaker 1: up top that today's segment deals with the topics of bullying, harassment,
Speaker 1: and even suicide. If you are unable to continue with
Speaker 1: this segment, a completely understand. If you are able, however,
Speaker 1: I want to ask you to help us spread the
Speaker 1: word because this story is important and more people need
Speaker 1: to know about it. A year and a half ago.
Speaker 1: On my podcast Working People, we published an interview with
Speaker 1: the family of Evan Seifried, which was, to this day,
Speaker 1: the hardest interview that I've ever recorded. I spoke with
Speaker 1: Evan's mother Linda, his father Ken, and his brother Eric
Speaker 1: about his life, about the beautiful person and hard worker
Speaker 1: that he was, and I spoke to them about the
Speaker 1: tragic and unforgivable events that led to Evan's death. As
Speaker 1: anyone who knew him can attest, Evan was a loving son,
Speaker 1: brother and friend, and a dedicated worker for nineteen years
Speaker 1: with a virtually spotless record. Evan worked at a local
Speaker 1: Kroger grocery store in Milford, Ohio, where he eventually became
Speaker 1: the dairy department manager. From October twenty twenty to March
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one, however, Evan suffered a torturous litany of bullying, harassment,
Speaker 1: and sabotage, according to a lawsuit filed against Kroger by
Speaker 1: the Sifried family. As the lawsuit alleges it was this
Speaker 1: treatment which was the result of a conspiracy involving numerous actors,
Speaker 1: including management level supervisor Shannon Frazy and Joseph pigg at
Speaker 1: the Milford store that caused Evan to eventually suffer a
Speaker 1: transient episodic break and take his own life. For the
Speaker 1: Sifried family, nothing can ever replace the loss of their son, Evan,
Speaker 1: and as always, I want to send them my love
Speaker 1: and solidarity, and I want to thank them for sharing
Speaker 1: their story with me so openly and bravely, even though
Speaker 1: it was incredibly hard and painful to do so. While
Speaker 1: the Syfrieds fight to pick up the pieces, and while
Speaker 1: their lawsuit again Kroger is moving through the courts very slowly,
Speaker 1: a group of volunteers, family friends, and community members have
Speaker 1: come together to honor Evan's life, to hold Kroger accountable
Speaker 1: for his death, and to fight the scourge of workplace bullying,
Speaker 1: which affects millions of workers around the US and beyond.
Speaker 1: Through my podcast Working People, through my work at the
Speaker 1: Real News, and even here on Breaking Points, I've done
Speaker 1: my best to cover the story of Evan's tragic death
Speaker 1: and to lift up the valiant struggle of the Cyhreeds
Speaker 1: and the Justice for Evan Coalition to make sure that
Speaker 1: Evan's name isn't forgotten and that no one has to
Speaker 1: go through what Evan and his loved ones have had
Speaker 1: to go through. And I'll be honest, it's been a
Speaker 1: real struggle to get the story out there. But because
Speaker 1: the Ciphreeds and their supporters have refused to give up,
Speaker 1: because they have kept pushing over the U these two years,
Speaker 1: that may be changing. While Kroger continues to say unforgivably silent,
Speaker 1: asserting that it can't comment on ongoing litigation, a recent
Speaker 1: cover article about Evan Seifreed for the Cincinnati Inquirer, which
Speaker 1: was syndicated across the country, including for USA Today, has
Speaker 1: given Evans family and the Justice for Evan Coalition a
Speaker 1: renewed sense of hope that they will secure the justice
Speaker 1: and accountability that they have been fighting so tirelessly for.
Speaker 1: To talk about all of this, I'm honored to be
Speaker 1: joined today by Janna Murphy and Erica Erskine, the two
Speaker 1: founders and co organizers of the Justice for Evan Coalition. Jenna, Erica,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for joining us today on Breaking Points. Well,
Speaker 1: thank you so much, Max for having us And we
Speaker 1: just appreciate your listener so much tuning in today. Well,
Speaker 1: it's a real honor to have you both on the call, and,
Speaker 1: you know, just to sort of make sure that the
Speaker 1: breaking points, viewers and listeners have all the essential information
Speaker 1: from the jump, I wanted to build on my introduction
Speaker 1: and ask if you guys could first tell folks a
Speaker 1: little more about yourselves and how you got involved in
Speaker 1: the Justice for Evan fight, and if you could, you know,
Speaker 1: help walk us through the events that led to Evan's
Speaker 1: death and the long fight to hold Kroger, Shannon Frazy,
Speaker 1: and Joseph Pigg accountable. So, Jana, why don't we start
Speaker 1: with you Max. Back in the winter of twenty twenty one,
Speaker 1: the Syphre's were living a normal life here in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Speaker 1: Eric Seyfried is a close friend of mine and I
Speaker 1: am a close friend of the Cipher family. On the
Speaker 1: night of March the ninth, after Eric and I had
Speaker 1: spoken briefly on the phone and everything was completely normal,
Speaker 1: and I woke up the next day too many messages
Speaker 1: from my friend as he was on his way from Portland, Oregon,
Speaker 1: to be with his mother and father after his little brother,
Speaker 1: Evan Sifried, had taken his life. I'll jump to what
Speaker 1: family found out in the days following from Evan's coworkers
Speaker 1: at the Milfred Kroeger family was contacted by Evan's friends
Speaker 1: at Kroger, and so we have to tell you that
Speaker 1: Evan was murdered and they told him Ken Sifried and
Speaker 1: Evan Sifried about the relentless, fierce, horrible, unbelievable. It's un
Speaker 1: believable what Shannon Frasey and Joseph Pigg the campaign that
Speaker 1: they started against Evan. Evan was a diligent, loyal, nineteen
Speaker 1: year Kroger employee. He was the dairy manager at the
Speaker 1: Milfrom Kroger, he had an impeccable record, and that record
Speaker 1: stayed completely impeccable, not only on paper, but also with
Speaker 1: Evan's loyalty to Kroger. And when Shannon Phrasy became his
Speaker 1: manager at that Kroger, everything went to hell literally, And
Speaker 1: your listeners and yours can see the entire thirty one
Speaker 1: page lawsuit on scripts dot com. And he highly encouraged
Speaker 1: them to read the lassuit because due to our I said,
Speaker 1: went here the time. We don't have a lot of
Speaker 1: time to talk about all the details. So in my mind,
Speaker 1: all the details and running I'm trying to narrate it
Speaker 1: as much as possible. Months after this bullying campaign started
Speaker 1: with Shannon some female employees. Evan was a whistleblower, and
Speaker 1: female employees knew that PEO could help them when they
Speaker 1: had been sexually harassed by Joseph think they had reported
Speaker 1: that it was done. They came to Evan as a
Speaker 1: leader and asked for his help. He helped them file
Speaker 1: reports and Joseph Pig them verbally in person, threatened Evan
Speaker 1: that his information would be given out because Joseph Pig
Speaker 1: was a security manager at Kroger, and Evan's personal information
Speaker 1: indeed wastingent out and he was sent messages to his
Speaker 1: own He was a child promography to following to his
Speaker 1: phone to his dad to take to a lawyer. And
Speaker 1: as they were going downtown and they had an episodic break.
Speaker 1: This is a man with no prior history of illness,
Speaker 1: and and he and he went to his parents' home
Speaker 1: after he took his life in his childhood room and
Speaker 1: Kenzie found him. And and then in the days following,
Speaker 1: when the Kroger employees came out and told the family
Speaker 1: would have happened, then the family called the lawsuit against Kroger.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, Jennifer walking us through that, and
Speaker 1: again for viewers and listeners, you can go check out
Speaker 1: the previous reporting that I've done, including more extended interviews
Speaker 1: with Janna with the cifreeds with Erica, where we give
Speaker 1: a lot more of that essential background to the campaign
Speaker 1: of terror that Evan's managers waged on him for months,
Speaker 1: isolating him, bullying him, sabotaging him. According to the lawsuit
Speaker 1: filed by the family, which, as Janna mentioned, you can
Speaker 1: read the full text of online. And you know, it's
Speaker 1: just fair warning, it's horrifying stuff. You know. Again, Evan
Speaker 1: worked at this Milford, Ohio Kroger for nearly twenty years,
Speaker 1: had a spotless record, had become the dairy manager, and
Speaker 1: then when he got this new manager, you know, his
Speaker 1: life became a living hell. And he, you know, according
Speaker 1: to the lawsuit, was bullied and harassed and targeted viciously.
Speaker 1: Even while Evan was standing up for his co workers
Speaker 1: who were filing sexual harassment complaints. You know, Evan himself
Speaker 1: was getting you know, bullied and harassed by management. He
Speaker 1: was not getting the help that he needed from his
Speaker 1: union or from Kroger h R. And so again you
Speaker 1: can go check out all the details there, and Erica,
Speaker 1: I wanted to bring you in as well and ask
Speaker 1: if you could sort of talk about how you got
Speaker 1: involved in this campaign. And I guess what happened with
Speaker 1: the campaign after you know, the Cyphrieds learned about what
Speaker 1: their son had gone through before he took his own life,
Speaker 1: and you know, filed the lawsuit with Kroger. What happened
Speaker 1: then as far as you and Jana and Justice for
Speaker 1: Evan is concerned, well, our paths crossed Jane and myself
Speaker 1: after I read the very first article that really came
Speaker 1: out I think it was by the Washington Post back
Speaker 1: in July twenty twenty one, after the Zippers had filed
Speaker 1: the lawsuit against Kroger. So that's how I came to
Speaker 1: be a part of Justice for Evan, and myself being
Speaker 1: a employee of Kroger for over twenty years, it just
Speaker 1: struck a nerve with me and I something just was
Speaker 1: telling me, like, you got to help these people, and
Speaker 1: because it's not just helping the family, but it's really
Speaker 1: helping the Kroger workers across the country overall in dealing
Speaker 1: with this nonsense of mistreatment, bullying, and organizational mobbying that
Speaker 1: is running rampant through this company. So yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: it's just say I had some skill sets that I
Speaker 1: felt would be very, very useful, and that's how I
Speaker 1: came to be one of the co founders of Justice
Speaker 1: for Evan. And I mean, since then, the you know,
Speaker 1: the online campaign to build you know, the Justice for
Speaker 1: Evan Facebook page, and you know that has grown by
Speaker 1: leaps and bounds. I know that there have been demonstrations,
Speaker 1: you know, in cities around the country, while the Cifried's
Speaker 1: lawsuit against Kroger is slowly moving through the courts. And
Speaker 1: I just sort of wanted to ask, in the midst
Speaker 1: of all of that, how are the Cyphrieds doing. How
Speaker 1: are you all, both and and the other members of
Speaker 1: the Justice for Evan coalition holding up throughout all of this?
Speaker 1: And you know, as as you mentioned Erica, like you know,
Speaker 1: the Washington Post did cover this initially, and you know,
Speaker 1: there have been a couple of stories here and there,
Speaker 1: but by and large, it's been you know, working people.
Speaker 1: It's been great shows like the Retail Warzone, you know,
Speaker 1: that have have helped kind of keep this story alive.
Speaker 1: But then we got sort of a blockbuster moment. This
Speaker 1: past month, the Cincinnati Inquirer did a front page story
Speaker 1: on Evan's case and that was nationally syndicated. So what
Speaker 1: has that meant for you all the Cyphrieds and the
Speaker 1: justin Justice for Evan coalitions? So how are folks holding up?
Speaker 1: And what does the publication of this new story by
Speaker 1: the Inquirer mean for the fight for justice for Evan?
Speaker 1: Thank you? Max also want to go back briefly and
Speaker 1: mentioned that Evan did go through all the proper channels
Speaker 1: when he reported, and he was completely ignored by the
Speaker 1: entire organization of Kroger, And I really want to reiterate
Speaker 1: that to listeners. Evan Seifried did exactly what he was
Speaker 1: supposed to do. He always did, highly ethical, beautiful community
Speaker 1: and he was put under people who were his superiors,
Speaker 1: were not any of the caliber neror of a person
Speaker 1: that he was, nor any of the sciphered them all
Speaker 1: and the Cipher family, Eric Ken and Linda are suffering.
Speaker 1: Evan was a tremendous loss, not only to the world,
Speaker 1: to this small, beautiful, wonderful family. They're just the nicest people,
Speaker 1: and any anybody who could possibly judge what happened to
Speaker 1: Evan by saying anything negative ever about him, then I
Speaker 1: really want to encourage listeners to stand up to those
Speaker 1: people and say read delossity. You know, look at what
Speaker 1: this this, look at what really truly happened. And the
Speaker 1: Ciphereds are suffering. I mean they Kroger has not said
Speaker 1: boo to the Ciphered family. I mean this is this
Speaker 1: is unjust punishment to a family by the largest corporation
Speaker 1: in the Tri state area that they loved and supported
Speaker 1: for many many years, and that their son dedicated his
Speaker 1: work life too. And this corporation doesn't have enough heart
Speaker 1: in it to even say one thing to the family,
Speaker 1: not even to say we know that we're going through litigation.
Speaker 1: But it was a like we are sorry and we
Speaker 1: know that we know we need to change. I mean,
Speaker 1: they know this happened, we know this happened, and they
Speaker 1: don't have the courage to even come to the family.
Speaker 1: This family's been waiting since the summer of twenty twenty
Speaker 1: one to hear there is something from Kroger, to hear anything,
Speaker 1: and there's been nothing. This family is suffering. You know,
Speaker 1: this is another Christmas, another Thanksgiving. That's when Ken and
Speaker 1: Linda are out in Oregon with They're a very close family.
Speaker 1: They're getting ready to celebrate another Christmas without heaven. Amy,
Speaker 1: Evan's girlfriend is here in Cincinnati, getting ready to celebrate
Speaker 1: another Christmas without Evan. There's I mean, I use the
Speaker 1: word celebrate extremely loosely. They're greeting. All these people are
Speaker 1: dreaming and the fact that the Cincinnati inquired and an
Speaker 1: amazing journalist named to Pax, who has spent so much
Speaker 1: time creating this beautiful, amazing article and peace and the
Speaker 1: research that that good human being did and the ethical
Speaker 1: standard that the Cincinnati Inquirer has shown is impeccable. It's
Speaker 1: amazing and and it would be so happy with the
Speaker 1: people that we have encountered through this entire journey since
Speaker 1: we started Justice for Evan. And I encourage our listeners
Speaker 1: to get on the Justice for Evan Facebook page and
Speaker 1: look at the link tree that Erica has created and
Speaker 1: they can see all of the events set Justice for
Speaker 1: Evan and all of our supporters and all of the
Speaker 1: help from all of the good people, including you, Max
Speaker 1: and your amazing team. All the people have done podcasts
Speaker 1: with us, all the people had come out for the protests,
Speaker 1: all the people who helped us get through the national
Speaker 1: protests March night and through the shareholder meeting last June,
Speaker 1: which was a monumental event because Ronnie mcwollan actually read
Speaker 1: a prepared statement. He knew that he was going to
Speaker 1: be forced to do that, he did it. That was
Speaker 1: huge for the failing And then when the Cincinnati Inquired
Speaker 1: article came out two weeks ago. How that came out
Speaker 1: first was Ken Seifery did a long interview with the
Speaker 1: Cincinnati Inquire and I get very emotional because I know
Speaker 1: them behind the scenes and how hard that that was
Speaker 1: for him, and how important that it was for him
Speaker 1: not only to tell the chrismal story about what and
Speaker 1: Canada Linda went through that night and what they happened
Speaker 1: going through, but also to how important that it is
Speaker 1: for people to know what's going on at Kroger and
Speaker 1: these corporate order workers they don't know what's going on
Speaker 1: at Kroger. They have no clue what's happening at the stores.
Speaker 1: And it is our mission to get that out there
Speaker 1: to the public. What's going on in the stores. This
Speaker 1: can never happen to another employee. Again, it's not going
Speaker 1: to happen on my watch, and it's not going to
Speaker 1: happen on Erica's watch. And by God, we're going to
Speaker 1: make sure that these employees are protected at Kroger. And
Speaker 1: there are many good people at Kroger, many many and
Speaker 1: many good people who work on the floor. Eric dorks
Speaker 1: at Kroger, Amy works at Roger. I know lots of
Speaker 1: great people who work at Kroger. But the people who
Speaker 1: are at the top at Kroger, it has been shown
Speaker 1: to us, they really don't give a crap about what's
Speaker 1: happening with the people on the floors. They don't give
Speaker 1: a crap. And we know that those corporate workers, they
Speaker 1: don't even know that the employees weren't even getting paychecks.
Speaker 1: And I would really like to come back and do
Speaker 1: another podcast at EMAX for Rapids to do a lot
Speaker 1: more education to your listeners on like that about the
Speaker 1: paycheck issue and so many other issues that are going
Speaker 1: on at Kroger, so that we can just continue to
Speaker 1: broaden our microphone, get our microphone louder, and so that
Speaker 1: because to to how we are doing it justice for Evan,
Speaker 1: we are getting angrier as more time goes on. We
Speaker 1: are not getting tired. And that's what And we've told
Speaker 1: Koger this since the very beginning. If you think we're
Speaker 1: going away, do you see us going away? We were
Speaker 1: front page on the USA Today at three pm on
Speaker 1: Friday when that article came out as the lead story
Speaker 1: on USA Today with Evan's face looking down at his
Speaker 1: mother's cat, you know that beautiful face. At three pm,
Speaker 1: over seven thousand Americans we're reading that story. At the
Speaker 1: same time, after midnight that night, still over three hundred
Speaker 1: Americans were still reading that story. And then it came
Speaker 1: out on the front page of the Sunday Cincinnati Enquirer
Speaker 1: and the Kentucky Inquirer of Evan's girlfriend Amy crying on
Speaker 1: the front page, and you open it up and there
Speaker 1: is the biggest article ever and the Inquirer the full
Speaker 1: two page centerfold pictures of Evan and that and an
Speaker 1: incredible piece that Alex Coolers did. So we're not getting tired.
Speaker 1: Our fight is just starting. We're never going away. We
Speaker 1: are anxiously awaiting the day that Kroger is going to
Speaker 1: sit down at the table and admit this. And when
Speaker 1: they look at Ken Sipher, at their siphery and say
Speaker 1: we know we were accountable for Evan's death, and that's
Speaker 1: the only reason why he died. There's a victory. Well,
Speaker 1: and Erica, I guess by by way of closing us out,
Speaker 1: I think you know, Jenna, you know, did a brilliant
Speaker 1: job kind of laying out the importance of the publication
Speaker 1: of that piece. As you mentioned, Jenna, folks can go
Speaker 1: to the Justice for Evan Facebook page if they want
Speaker 1: to keep up to date with this, see how the
Speaker 1: movement's growing, get updates on future demonstrations that are going
Speaker 1: to be held. You can also find them on Twitter.
Speaker 1: And and Erica, I know that as as you mentioned,
Speaker 1: you know some as someone who is an employee of
Speaker 1: the Kroger Corporation, which extends in so into so many
Speaker 1: different areas. Right because Kroger's bought up like basically every
Speaker 1: other grocery store chain in this country, like King Soupers
Speaker 1: where workers were going on strike in Colorado earlier this year.
Speaker 1: I know that that's been a big part of this
Speaker 1: campaign's evolution as well, right, like connecting what Evan went
Speaker 1: through at the hands of Kroger management and everyone down
Speaker 1: the line from Kroger HR to all the way to
Speaker 1: the CEO Rodney McMullen. Everyone failed, Evan, and you guys
Speaker 1: are doing important work to sort of connect that to
Speaker 1: be ongoing struggle struggles of Kroger employees around the country.
Speaker 1: So I wanted to just ask if you could say
Speaker 1: a little bit about that by and what folks can
Speaker 1: do to get involved in that effort by way of
Speaker 1: closing us out. Yeah, I kind of kind of feel
Speaker 1: that we're, you know, more in the loop than you
Speaker 1: know Kroger Corporate and HR is half the time, because
Speaker 1: you know, it seems like they really do not have
Speaker 1: clue what goes on on a daily basis at the
Speaker 1: store level. That's where all the quote magic happens, as
Speaker 1: we say, and they just they just don't have a clue.
Speaker 1: It's that they're just so detached from reality. And it's
Speaker 1: seemingly more so as like the years go on, and
Speaker 1: especially lately and you know, you mentioned the UH uh
Speaker 1: by buying up stores with you know, the recent merger
Speaker 1: with UH proposal with with Albertson's, and you know, with
Speaker 1: with the way things have been at Kroger for a while,
Speaker 1: but especially since the onset of the pandemic, they don't
Speaker 1: have any business acquiring any more stores, uh, and thousands
Speaker 1: more employees whose lives they could potentially ruin if they
Speaker 1: don't get this stuff and check. So yeah, I do
Speaker 1: feel that, you know, we're not like me personally. I
Speaker 1: don't feel like I'm only doing my job, my full
Speaker 1: time job plus theirs, and really all at takes is
Speaker 1: they just need to open their eyes and their ears
Speaker 1: and realize that there's there's some things, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of things that need to be fixed, and we are
Speaker 1: more than willing to. We're at the table, We've been
Speaker 1: sitting at the table, and the only way to create
Speaker 1: this change is to literally directly sit across from the
Speaker 1: table with people like Roddy McMullen and you know, some
Speaker 1: of the key the key players in the head office.
Speaker 1: But moving forward, we are our current projects is our
Speaker 1: Billboard campaign that we're currently crowdfunding for to continue to
Speaker 1: raise public awareness, and this time we're literally going to
Speaker 1: raise public awareness right in downtown Cincinnati, right in Kroger's face. Literally.
Speaker 1: So it's just an extension of Alex Coolidge's article in
Speaker 1: The Inquirer, which has had us busy responding to messages.
Speaker 1: We've gotten emails with even more people employees, in particular
Speaker 1: coming out of the woodwork and saying, yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: I experienced similar things. I'm so sorry for, you know,
Speaker 1: the Ciphered's loss. If anything I can do to help,
Speaker 1: just please let me know. So we you know, we're
Speaker 1: growing in numbers and it's not gonna stop. So it's
Speaker 1: Kroger just needs to surrender basically and just start start
Speaker 1: listening to their their employees because, as Jenna has reiterated
Speaker 1: many times, we're not going away, and we're not tired,
Speaker 1: and we'll do this until well till the end of
Speaker 1: time basically, so and I you know, it just this
Speaker 1: work never gets easier, but it does bring a to
Speaker 1: me a sense of reward knowing that I'm helping so
Speaker 1: many fellow co workers across the country who have had
Speaker 1: nowhere to turn who have gone through the proper channels
Speaker 1: like Evan did, have been turned away, have been ignored,
Speaker 1: most of either quit or been terminated, and that can't
Speaker 1: continue to happen. You know, people need paychecks, people have
Speaker 1: to live, people have to eat, and it's very ironic
Speaker 1: that you know, in the grocery business, a lot of
Speaker 1: employees can even afford to eat because they don't even
Speaker 1: make a living wage. So there's there's a lot of
Speaker 1: things wrong with Kroger that needs to be fixed. But
Speaker 1: I do believe they have it in them. I really
Speaker 1: do they have it in them. There are a lot
Speaker 1: of good people within the Kroger enterprise. There's a lot
Speaker 1: of good people, and those people need to start coming
Speaker 1: out of the woodwork also well. And you know, I
Speaker 1: can't thank you and Jenna for being two of those
Speaker 1: good people fighting as hard as you have for the
Speaker 1: Cyphrieds and four Kroger workers everywhere. It's really an honor
Speaker 1: to be in this struggle with both of you. And
Speaker 1: I just wanted to underline something that both Erica and
Speaker 1: Jana said for viewers and listeners. When I interviewed Ken,
Speaker 1: you know, Evan's father, Linda Evans's mother, and Eric Evans's
Speaker 1: brother on that first episode of Working People, they explicitly
Speaker 1: pointed to Kroger's corporate policy as you know, the reason
Speaker 1: for their son's death. They said that once that Evan
Speaker 1: himself even told them that once Rodney McMullen took over
Speaker 1: as CEO, things changed at Kroger. It was all about
Speaker 1: the bottom line relationships with management really changed. It was
Speaker 1: about how much you could increase store sales at the
Speaker 1: cost of everything else. Ken you know, Cifried told me
Speaker 1: point blank it is because of this sort of relentless
Speaker 1: corporate policy that my son did not get the help
Speaker 1: that he was at asking for, that corporate didn't care
Speaker 1: about the treatment, and that he was receiving the complaints
Speaker 1: that they were hearing about that treatment because the store
Speaker 1: sales were up. So the family is directly is drawing
Speaker 1: a direct line between kind of Kroger's corporate policy and
Speaker 1: the hell that workers like Evan are having to endure
Speaker 1: at locations across the country. And so again I can't
Speaker 1: think you both enough for being part of this struggle
Speaker 1: and doing everything that you can to fight to hold
Speaker 1: Kroger accountable and to make sure that workers like Evan
Speaker 1: never have to endure this kind of thing again. So
Speaker 1: for Breaking Points, this is Maximilian Alvarez signing off and
Speaker 1: Janna Murphy Erica Erskine to founders and co organizers of
Speaker 1: the Justice for Evan Coalition, thank you so much for
Speaker 1: joining us today on Breaking Points. Thank you for watching
Speaker 1: this segment with Breaking Points, and be sure to subscribe
Speaker 1: to my news outlet the real news with links in
Speaker 1: the description. See you soon for the next edition of
Speaker 1: the Art of Class War. Take care of yourselves, take
Speaker 1: care of each other. Solidarity forever