Covid-19’s Impact on Labour

Abstract

The Chapter 7, titled “Impact on Labor” of the book titled “Covid-19 and Capitalism - Success and Failure of the Legal Methods for Dealing with a Pandemic,” has a twofold format. The first is to examine the impact of the Covid-19 on the labor market and on the methods of employment of labor throughout the Western world. A second approach consists of carrying out a (limited) number of case studies on the basis of which the findings of the aforementioned theoretical analysis could be tested. Methodologically, the research material and factual research provided by an amalgam of policy institutions, academic researchers and specialist investigative journalists had once again to be relied upon to a substantial extent. The importance of this factual research cannot be sufficiently emphasized. In this chapter, therefore, the findings of said institutions and authors are each meticulously synthesized, with explicit acknowledgment that the institutions and authors cited have, in many cases, been the original authors of the relevant, thus-quoted positions and opinions. This chapter exposes a further Achilles’ heel of neoliberal socioeconomic policies, in particular the extent to which, especially in times of crisis, the supremacy of economic interests, particularly those of the wealthy entrepreneurial classes, comes at the expense of public health in general and human lives in particular. This finding can be aptly illustrated by reference to the mode of organization and working methods of the meat industry, which have been universally guided by the dictates of neoliberal capitalism with all its pernicious consequences. A second illustration draws attention to the operation of Amazon, showing how in times of crisis, the fortunes of the rich of the world continue to grow at the expense of the well-being of the working classes. The example of Amazon also points out how the management of this largest retail company on earth does everything within its power to secure its (neoliberal) working methods, in particular to nip in the bud any attempt to re-establish an own trade union, whereas the past has shown that the functioning of trade unions, alongside other methods of collectivization of workers’ interests, has been one of the few adequate forms of resistance to the capitalist exploitation methods. This chapter therefore concludes with a call for a different organization of the socio-economic order in which man, rather than capital, would again be put first.

7.1 Introduction

7.1.1 Neoliberalism and Its Disturbed Relationship with Labour: Hence, with Man

In the words of Nelson, the capitalist approach to workers’ health mimics ‘the management of animals’ following plantation slaves. However, in economies based on slavery—e.g., the Roman empire, and more recently, in the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the economy of certain American states in the South¹—the health of slaves was of direct concern to their master, as slaves were property (and the rich, to some extent, tend to take care of their property).²

All that changed, however, once workers became “free” within burgeoning capitalism—at the beginning of the nineteenth century–, with issues of health becoming an extraneous matter of a private nature.³

However, the early capitalistic healthcare model in which everyone, including the working classes, had to take care of their own health, would soon turn out to be problematic. A socio-economic model under which exploited labourers were expected to take care of their personal health while lacking both the means and skills to do so, was far from ideal.

Once this insight became clear to the powers that be, the welfare state model that emerged after World War II started approaching the matter in a more rational and just manner, by ensuring both public health services and installing social security systems which collectivized healthcare costs by imposing systems of mandatory insurance.⁴

Under the doctrines of neoliberalism, however, these systems came under attack from the 1970s onward.⁵ Taking care one’s health again became (mostly) a private matter, while costs to state welfare systems had to be avoided as much as possible.⁶

In the opinion of Nelson, these basic aspects of political economy are among the reasons why the United States in 2020 was confronted with one-third of all Covid-19 cases, and that given “a choice between letting people die and closing down “the economy”, there was no question which the masters of the empire would choose”.⁷ By comparison, in the EU, healthcare was in most member states still based on a universal social security coverage (albeit public hospitals had suffered under austerity, while the private hospital sector, to a large extent, faced similar problems as the one in the United States itself). (Cf. Chap. 5.)

So far, according to Sumonja, there have been roughly three phases in economic neoliberalism’s dealing with the interests of the labour force, especially regarding issues such as health and safety:⁸

• (1) Sumonja refers to the first phase as a “vanguard” phase, which, roughly speaking, covered the Reagan-Thatcher era of the 1980s. Economic neo-liberalism in this time frontally attacked organised labour, as the latter was blamed for the corporate profitability crisis of the preceding decade. Economic neoliberalism during this period was further characterised by a policy of austerity and coercion. Neo-liberal policy in this era was, moreover, authoritarian, determined by social conservatism and designed to push egalitarian democracy aside.

• (2) The second, more “progressive” phase started at the end of the Cold War and lasted until the great recession of 2008.

  During this second phase, (economic) neoliberalism became both a hegemonic and global societal order. This was, amongst others, made possible by: (1) the conversion to the dictates of economic neoliberalism of traditional centre-left and Christian-democratic political parties in the West, accompanied by the abandonment of the working classes as the basic electorate of political left; (2) the policy of national governments to increasingly cede socioeconomic sovereignty to international financial and trade institutions, such as the IMF, the World Bank, the OECD and the WTO, as well as regional organisations, such as the EMU, and (3) the cultural validation of the dictates of neoliberalism under the libertarian values of the social movements of the 1960s, recruited to denounce all collective identities as oppressive in the name of a hyper-individualised freedom solely to be expressed by market choice (cf. Sect. 2.1.)

• (3) Since 2008, in the third “authoritarian” phase, economic neoliberalism has even more explicitly broken with elements of formal democracy and no longer hesitates to openly infringe fundamental rights. In this “authoritarian phase”, economic neoliberalism has in a wide range of countries been attempting to subject almost all strata of society to its principles and methods.

  In the E(M)U, since the entry into force of the Maastricht Treaty (1992), this has been accomplished, to a very large extent, through a policy of austerity which was, as we saw in Chap. 4,—loosely—based on the so-called “Maastricht convergence criteria” (cf. Sect. 5.2.1.2.).

Since the financial crisis of 2008, the authoritarian approach to implementing the dictates of economic neoliberalism has continuously expanded. All public sectors of life, especially those of EU member states that became dependent on financial support from the EU (and the ECB), were subjected to its principles, as laid down in the abovementioned Maastricht convergence criteria. It was hereby assumed that these convergence criteria give no other option than to give in to the ever-intensifying pressure from the EU institutions to cut public expenditures, and to increasingly abandon the public sector (and public services) to the hands of the free market.

Moreover, in the United States, this neoliberal, authoritarian austerity policy became very closely intertwined with the conservative ideology that especially the Republican party has adopted since the Reagan-era. (Cf. Sects. 2.1 and 5.1.)

One of the main elements of economic neoliberalism, is how it deals with the “human cost”-factor, of people belonging to the lower and working-classes. In the 1980s, free-market policies were hailed as fundamental step towards ensuring general prosperity and broader individual freedoms for all countries in the world that were willing to adhere its policies. Since then, a common criticism of economic neoliberalism has been that the access to and distribution of resources, products and services in free market economies is more inequitable than ever. Neoliberal reform had resulted in huge income and wealth inequalities all over the world,⁹ and free market-liberalizing policies sacrificed civil, social, political and even basic human rights to the interests of economic competitiveness. It has, basically, been the working man who has become the victim of all this, with the lower classes being generally more vulnerable to neoliberal exploitation practices. These practices, nevertheless, affect everyone who is dependent on an income from labour (as opposed to capital) for their livelihood. As to the functioning of the labour market, this evolution went hand in hand with regressing workers’ rights, in order to allow employers—basically enterprises—to function more optimally (e.g., through systems of “flexible labour”, referring to labour market conditions which grant lesser and lesser rights to workers, and more and more flexibility to the employers for exploiting their employees).

There have been several layers of policy making and market regulation with the goal of subjecting the working classes fully to the interests of the entrepreneurial sector.¹⁰

Reference can in this regard be made to, e.g., the insights shared by Blanton and Peksen.

First, a key characteristic of economic neoliberalism concerns its friendliness to global trade and investment, through policies such as the dismantling of customs tariffs and the easing of capital movement. Several studies have shown a clear negative relationship between such policies of globalising trade and capital movements on the one hand, and workers’ rights on the other. This approach basically implies that efforts to increase involvement in the global economy are accompanied by a reduction in worker protections, to ensure the competitiveness of enterprises in the global market. This, obviously, entails a “race to the bottom” dynamic exerted by global capital on labour rights (and, by extension, on civil and human rights as well).¹¹

Secondly, broader neoliberal policy reforms aimed at establishing a “business-friendly” regulatory environment, such as ensuring labour flexibility and lower barriers to doing business, also had a negative influence on workers’ rights. Such measures have long been a key element of policies aimed at increasing economic competitiveness. It is hereby assumed that workers’ rights are counterproductive to economic growth, as according to neoliberal doctrine, these undermine the economic freedom of employers by supporting various kinds of regulation.¹²

Thirdly, so-called “smart money” policies also became detrimental to workers’ rights. From a macro-economic point of view, neoliberal policies promoting price stability provide a more favourable environment for trade and commerce, compared to policies protecting labour (and, by extension human) rights. Despite some alleged benefits, such policies, in particular the control of inflation and/or ensuring price stability, at least in a capitalist monetary environment, has however proven to be mostly detrimental to workers’ rights. The reason being that, in most cases, it exercises a downward pressure on wage levels, alongside other working conditions, and moreover undermines the power of trade union organisations to protect the wage levels and working conditions of their members.¹³

A fourth key characteristic of pro-free market policies (mainly dating back to the theories of Milton Friedman) is the love of neoliberals for what they refer to as “minimal” states, meaning states that play no (pro)active role in the economy. Such a minimal state, the argument goes, will be less likely to “crowd out” private investment and interfere with the actions of free market players. Hence, in terms of societal duties and rights, a state’s primary obligation to its population is of a negative quality, in particular the protection of (rich) individuals and their property from aggression (by the poor). However, research has indicated that the more a neoliberal state succeeds in reducing itself (or, phrased differently, in becoming a “minimal state”, or a “night watchman state”), the less able (or even: less willing) such a state will be to protect positive rights, such as workers’ rights. More specifically, the protection of workers’ rights is believed to be a costly endeavour, as it requires the provision of state resources to monitor compliance with these rights and prosecute violators, which could impede free trade. Similarly, a “small state” will be less able, and willing, to prevent employers from violating the core labour standards under which people of the working classes are employed. This implies that, the more a state starts corresponding to the ideal of a neoliberal, minimal state, the more likely it is to allow employers to resort to exploitative practices.¹⁴

Overall, research points to a both strong and consistent negative relationship between neo-liberal policies and a willingness to respect fundamental workers’ rights. The more “market-friendly” public policies become, the more damaging they are towards labour and social rights.¹⁵

Fifthly and finally, as more and more countries all over the world have begun to follow neoliberal ideology by implementing “free market reforms” the more these effects started to resonate on a global scale. As a result, neoliberal reforms swept the world economy in the 1980s and 1990s, widely seen as the culmination in the so-called “Washington Consensus” model (cf. Sect. 3.4.1.). After the fall of the Soviet regime in Russia, even central and Eastern European countries made their own transition to free market structures, while many other states radically reformed their socioeconomic order in accordance with explicit dictates of the IMF and World Bank austerity programmes. These transitions have been detrimental to workers’ rights.¹⁶

7.1.2 Some Further Insights in the Theoretical Background Regarding the Hierarchy Scale Between Capital and Labour Within (Neo)Liberal Societies

When considering the matter from a longer, historical perspective, one can but observe how the success of capitalism has largely been based on how enterprises—in the broadest sense of the world—employ people (other than the shareholders of companies).¹⁷ This goes back to the hierarchy between the stakeholders of capitalistic companies, as worked out under the classical economic theories developed in the course of the eighteenth century.

Already from the very start, capitalist ideologies—such as (economic) liberalism, and later (economic) neoliberalism—stipulated a very clear hierarchy between these several categories of stakeholders. In this hierarchy set out by the ideologies in favour of capitalism, the interests of capital come first (hence the denomination “capitalism”), followed by the interests of the managers and directors leading companies, while the interests of the employees are often entirely neglected, or at least only cared for to the least possible extent.¹⁸

When we transpose this approach to real life by making abstraction from legal fictions and only referring to human beings (to the extent that legal persons, such as companies, are mere fictions of the law that do not really exist), capitalism basically boils down to an economic system that favours the interests of the rich (esp. people belonging to the entrepreneurial class)¹⁹ to the detriment of the working class. It is, in this manner, by definition, of an elitist and anti-egalitarian nature.

In Western “liberal”²⁰ societies that mirror capitalist economies, this hierarchy is enabled by the legal principle of contractual freedom, also referred to as the “voluntary association”-mechanism. In accordance with this voluntary association-theory, all legal entities, be they human beings or fictitious legal entities, are allowed, and even supposed, to enter into agreements in order to conduct their private affairs, amongst which entering into employment agreements: e.g., a person looking to get employed is supposed to enter into negotiations with a person (in many cases: a legal person) who is looking to hire work forces, the ultimate idea being that they would reach an employment agreement that serves both their interests in the most effective manner. In accordance with the theories of (economic) liberalism (as these, in most Western jurisdictions, lie at the basis of contract law), such negotiations between a future employer and employee are, moreover, deemed to take place on a purportedly equal footing.²¹

Under the dictates of capitalism, enterprises are, furthermore, above all supposed to make as much as profits possible, these profits, moreover, being supposed to flow mainly to the shareholders. This helps to explain why capitalistic enterprises are—and even should be—extremely cost aware. This principle can be referred to as the “maximalization of profits and minimalization of costs”-principle. This principle was first developed as a measure of conduct for enterprises, and later, under the dictates of economic neoliberalism, for all possible layers of society. In (classical) economic literature, this approach, as applied to the employment of—real—people, translates into “the Iron Law of the Wages”. This (classical) Iron Law of the Wages basically holds that, to be sufficiently profitable, employers should aim at keeping the cost of hiring and employing employees –the cost of wages—as low as possible.

The application of the voluntary association-theory often leads to situations in which employees find themselves imprisoned in a merciless socio-economic-system, where it becomes almost impossible to still enjoy one’s job. The relationship between employers and employees has, in many cases, become completely dehumanized. (Cf., furthermore, Sect. 7.12, where the insights of Erich Fromm in this regard will be briefly readdressed.)

Another consequence of these (neo)liberal principles has been that in capitalist societies, basically two main interest groups of people (sometimes referred to as “classes”²²) have emerged, namely, on the one side, the small class of (rich) entrepreneurs (in the broad sense of the word) and, on the other side, the large class of—(much) poor(er)—working people. As a result, under the rule of capitalism, a manifest conflict of interests determines the relationship between said two classes: While it is in the interests of the class of rich entrepreneurs to employ workers at the lowest possible (or acceptable) cost, it is in the interest of the class of workers to be employed under the most favourable working conditions possible.²³

The answers provided by economic neoliberalism for the societal problems caused by capitalist labour policies, so far, have been that the relationships between labourers and the enterprises employing them, should be even more left to the domain of the free market itself. Within such a way of reasoning, there can, e.g., be no place for labour or social protective legal measures that had been installed in the past to protect employees against capitalistic exploitation. As a result, during the past decades, neoliberal governments all over the world started deploying state authority in order to get rid of labour and social protective legal measures that had been installed in the period after World War II, in order to liberate the markets from anything hindering entrepreneurs in purportedly enhancing general welfare through employing the rest of mankind at the lowest possible cost (otherwise put: for the lowest possible wages). In this manner, neoliberal ideology has during the past decades initiated an ongoing race to the bottom regarding labour standards and social protection.

Finally, while the pursuit of profit determines the behaviour of corporations—and, therefore, also of the rich in society-, members of the working classes are largely dependent on the income generated from their labour efforts for their daily livelihoods. This explains why, at least in the more prosperous capitalist countries, neoliberal policy—e.g., minimum wages policy, taxation policy…—is designed to ensure that wages enable members of the working classes to make a decent living, besides being able to consume basic products and services—produced by the big enterprises—but not much more. On the contrary, wealth accumulation and saving by the low and middle classes is, increasingly, discouraged under a wide range of neoliberal policies, as this could allow members of the working class to become less dependent on labour, which would destabilize the construct of neoliberal societies.

Among countries, a certain degree of nuance may still apply. It is, e.g., in certain western countries still possible for members of the working class to purchase a house, provided they are prepared to take on a long-term mortgage loan, which in turn perpetuates the prison for working people even more, since a mortgage borrower will have to work a large part of his life to be able to repay such a mortgage loan.²⁴ In more extreme cases, even that possibility has not been granted to the members of the working classes. We refer here to e.g., the (German) meat processing industry—which we shall readdress at the end of this chapter. Here, (imported) workers are expected to return part of their meagre wages to their employers as rent for a rental apartment made available by the latter. (Cf. Sect. 7.11.1.)

For those who belong to the enterprise class in such capitalist countries, wealth accumulation is, obviously, much more tolerated (and enabled, e.g., via all kinds of favourable tax regimes), under pretext of the eternal “trickle-down”-economics argument: the enterprising class must be pampered as much as possible, because they are the (only) ones providing general prosperity, which then also trickles down to the working classes. In this manner, capitalism has set up a (so far) perpetual motion machine that continues to be cranked up with every further neoliberal measure, by which the sharp division within society between a small class of wealthy entrepreneurs and a large class of poor to very poor workers is continuously kept in place.

Even worse, capitalist models of organizing the economy have, time and again, shown themselves to be incapable of dealing with crises. This explains why, in times when things are going (more or less) well, the free markets allow the profits from the functioning of the economy to flow into the pockets of the rich (via the numerous corporate profits distribution mechanisms), only to turn to the government when things get bad by making claims for state aid. (Cf. Chap. 4) It is then up to states to burden themselves even more heavily with debts—to be passed on to future taxpayers—in order to bail out said ailing enterprises and firms. This phenomenon has also been referred to as “privatization of profits and socialization of losses”. As a result, the problems of capitalist economies worsen after each crisis. Reference can in this regard be made to the figures concerning the growth of the public debt due to Covid-19 (cf. Sect. 3.5), in the knowledge that such public debt weighs most heavily on the working classes who are (1) the most affected by the effects of taxation in neoliberal countries, (2) the most affected by austerity policies, when the powers that be undertake such a policy, and (3) the most affected by an economy that goes haywire due to excessive private and public debt (e.g., leading to longer working hours, an even greater need for flexible work systems, later retirement ages, less social security benefits (such as furlough and sick leave), more stress at work because of ever-higher production quotas …).

7.1.3 The Role of the State in Regulating Labour Markets

Although capitalism has gradually evolved into the dominant socio-economic system on Earth, this does not imply that it has a completely unilateral character. On the contrary, there may be very strong differences between capitalist countries, be it that the basic premises of capitalism—especially the notion that labour must serve capital, or, in other words, that people are subordinate to the interests of the economic system—are in most countries the same.

E.g., in the opinion of Aghion, Maghin and Sapir, the differences between the German and the American capitalist system form a striking example of how there are still significant differences between capitalist countries, particularly with regard to labour protection issues. E.g., in “normal years”, the unemployment rate of both countries is believed to be similar, but in “crisis years” (e.g., in recent history, in the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2008, i.e. in the years 2009–2010, as well as in the Covid-19 year 2020), the unemployment rate rose sharply in the United States, while it remained quite stable in Germany, a fact that has been attributed to the “Kurzarbeit” system, amongst other factors. The difference between the two countries is even more striking with regard to health coverage. Already in normal times, there is a fundamental difference between Germany, where a system of universal health coverage prevails, and the United States, where even after the enactment of the ACA in 2014 (cf. Sect. 5.2.3.4), the part of the population without any health coverage at all was believed to still amount to around 9% in 2018 (with predictions being made that this rate would amount to almost 12% in 2020, to fall to 11% by 2021).²⁵

Compared to Germany, health coverage in the United States is therefore both structurally weaker and particularly deficient in times of recession, as it is often linked to employers. It has been shown, for example, that a one percentage point increase in the unemployment rate after the great recession of 2007–2009 led to a substantial reduction—of 1.67 percentage points (2.12%)—in the probability of retaining health coverage.²⁶

Similar differences exist between the United States and several other Western European countries with regard to systems of unemployment and health coverage. E.g., in countries such as France, Italy, Spain, the Benelux countries and the United Kingdom, besides numerous other countries, people enjoy universal health coverage. Thus, although some of these countries may be dealing with high structural unemployment and, moreover, had to endure a sharp increase in unemployment rates throughout 2020, their citizens were able to retain their health coverage in spite of the Covid-19 crisis.²⁷

Obviously, this classic capitalist hierarchy scale between labour and capital, besides the interconnectedness between the rich classes of society and ruling politicians and the fact that the members of the working class are completely dependent on their income from labour, created a perfect storm for Covid-19 to play out throughout the Western world in all its disastrous effects.

7.2 The Impact of Covid-19 on Labour

7.2.1 General

In the Western world, particularly in Europe and the United States, the outbreak of the Covid-19 health crisis has been accompanied by an economic crisis that, as pointed out by Aghion, Maghin and Sapir, threatened the health, jobs and incomes of millions of people.²⁸

The strict containment measures resorted to by many of these Western countries during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic—i.e., more or less from March to April/May 2020, with huge differences between countries—in order to mitigate the increase in Covid-19 contamination cases (cf. Sects. 2.3, 2.4 and 2.5) has, obviously, put a major brake on a wide variety of socioeconomic activities. According to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), the collapse in hours worked and the decline in socio-economic activities had not been seen in peacetime since the Great Depression of the 1930s.²⁹

Envisioning a rapid and sustainable recovery of the economy and the rebuilding of a more resilient and inclusive labour market, G20 Leaders at their Summit that took place on 6 March 2020 committed to do whatever is necessary to overcome the Covid-19 pandemic and its impact and, in particular, to make every effort possible to preserve people’s jobs and incomes. As part of this commitment, G20 Leaders requested the ILO and the OECD to closely monitor the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on a variety of labour market related matters, including (un)employment.³⁰

The result of this effort has been a comprehensive and insightful report in which the social aspects of Covid-19 were treated in detail. The findings of this report will be discussed in the following subsections.

7.2.2 The Unequal Impact of the Crisis

Probably one of the key findings of the joint ILO-OECD report has been that the socio-economic consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic have not been equally severe for all members of global societies. Basically, the vulnerabilities that had already been characterising neoliberal societies throughout the world were clearly exacerbated by the Covid-19 crisis itself. This implies that Covid-19 has resulted in even greater socioeconomic inequalities. As a result, across the Western world, many of those already most deprived, have also been the least able to shield themselves against the socio-economic consequences of Covid-19.³¹

During the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, it have mostly been low-paid, often low-skilled workers that were particularly affected by the crisis Covid-19 caused.³²

First, a lot of the so-called “frontline” workers who had put their health and safety most at risk and had continued to expose themselves to the Covid-19 virus in order to ensure the continuity of essential services during the lockdown periods, were at the same time the ones employed in sectors characterised by relatively low wages.³³ These included health and care workers (excluding physicians), but, e.g., also cashiers in supermarkets or convenience stores (that had remained open during the first wave of the pandemic), people employed in food production, industry workers, caretakers and domestic workers, agricultural workers, and delivery and transport personnel (including truck drivers).³⁴

Data from a number of countries have indicated that in April 2020, the top 25% of earners were, on average, at the same time 50% more likely to be allowed to work at home during the lockdown periods than the bottom 25%. At the same time, low-paid employees and independent workers were twice as likely to stop working altogether during the effective lockdown periods.³⁵ Thus, these low-wage jobs were either affected by the fact that people could no longer work at all (to the extent that the nature of their jobs did not allow for working from home), or by the fact that they had to keep showing up in their physical workplace (and were thus more exposed to the threat of the Covid-19 virus than those who were allowed to work from home). We shall illustrate the situation for people stuck on the physical work floor at the end of this chapter by describing the impact of Covid-19 on the meat processing sector throughout 2020 (cf. Sect. 7.11.1.).

Second, labourers in various forms of employment that differ from full-time salaried work under a permanent contract—such as (1) the self-employed, (2) those on temporary, on-call and/or part-time contracts, and (3) labourers in the informal economy—have been most exposed to job and income losses caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. This exposure stemmed partly from the sectoral concentration of workers in various work arrangements, such as accommodation and food services, arts, entertainment and recreation, and a wide variety of other personal services, and partly from their low participation in social protection schemes. In addition, workers on fixed-term contracts were among the people who first lost their jobs during the first wave of the Covid-19 crisis, as expiring contracts were in most cases not renewed.³⁶

Third, the impact of the Covid-19 crisis was particularly severe for labourers in the informal economy, for whom being forced to stay at home simply meant losing their jobs and livelihoods. According to estimates made by the ILO, in 2020, 1.2 billion labourers in the G20 economies performed labour under such an informal employment system. This extreme high figure represented 55% of total employment (i.e., 20% in the developed G20 economies, and 67% in the emerging G20 economies). Of these informal economy labourers, an estimated 850 million (i.e., 70%) was most likely to be severely affected by the Covid-19 crisis, resulting in an estimated decline in their earnings of 61% (i.e., 34% in developed G20 economies, and 76% in emerging G20 economies). In addition, relative poverty (defined as the part of labourers earning less than 50% of the median wages of the overall population on a monthly basis) rose sharply as regards informal workers and their families, by almost 36 percentage points in the G20 economies (i.e., by more than 50 percentage points in the developed G20 economies, and by 29 percentage points in the emerging G20 economies).³⁷

There are purportedly two main reasons why such a high proportion of workers in the informal economy was so severely affected by the containment measures. The first reason is said to be “sectoral”: the sectors in which informal economy labourers mostly work, were at the same time the sectors hardest hit by the Covid-19 pandemic.³⁸ Among these sectors most affected by the Covid-19 pandemic were retail and manufacturing, which at the time accounted for 22% and 21% respectively of informal non-farm labour in the G20 countries.³⁹ A second reason for the high impact of Covid-19 on informal economy labourers was related to the size of the economic business units in which they were performing their labour. The vast majority of labourers at risk in the informal economy were the self-employed or the ones working in small enterprises with fewer than 10 workers, both categories being generally more vulnerable to economic shocks. These categories of informal workers, including the owners of micro-enterprises employing fewer than 10 workers themselves, accounted for almost 70% of total informal employment in G20 countries.⁴⁰ In most G20 countries, the vulnerability of informal economy labourers was, furthermore, compounded by their limited access to social protection systems, such as unemployment or sickness benefits. In the absence of a unified social protection system and even of ad hoc support measures for supporting these categories of informal economy labourers, means-conditional minimum income guarantee schemes or conditional cash support forms were often the only form of support available. However, unless extended, these measures did not provide immediate support to moderate-income workers who had lost their jobs and livelihoods as a result of the Covid-19 crisis. As a means of responding to the Covid-19 outbreak, many G20 countries therefore simply resorted to temporary emergency support measures to fill the gaps in income support that had been revealed during the early days of the Covid-19 crisis.⁴¹

Fourth, young people were among those most likely to face lasting effects of the Covid-19 crisis. Indeed, as had already been the case during the 2008 financial crisis, young people were again likely to be among the biggest losers of the Covid-19 crisis. E.g., the graduates of 2020—sometimes referred to as the “Corona class”—were leaving schools and universities with little chance of finding a job or work experience in the immediate future. Meanwhile, many of their peers a decade older, were experiencing a second severe economic crisis in their short careers and lifetimes. According to the ILO, initial labour market experience has a profound influence on later working life, and a crisis such as the 2008 financial crisis, or the Covid-19 crisis of 2020-2021, can have lasting and marked effects in terms of future employment opportunities and earnings.⁴² For the current generation of young people, not only has the Covid-19 crisis disrupted their skill-development, but there are fears that they will also have to bear the direct burden of financing the high levels of debt incurred by neoliberal governments for measures taken to mitigate the immediate negative economic consequences of the Covid-19 crisis.⁴³ (Cf. Sect. 3.5, on the huge increase in global debt as a result of the Covid-19 crisis. Cf., furthermore, Sect. 4.2.3, where it has already been mentioned that some of the EU’s interventions were to be financed either by new taxes or new debts, thus creating an intergenerational effect that will—again—put the burden of the economic crisis largely on the shoulders of the “next generation”.)

Fifth, women have been disproportionately affected by Covid-19 in various ways.⁴⁴

According to the ILO, women bore a disproportionate share of the socioeconomic costs of the Covid-19 crisis. The ILO has mentioned the following factors:

• (1) Women were, relatively speaking, more heavily involved in front-line occupations in the healthcare and related sectors.

• (2) Women suffered disproportionately from job loss and reduced working hours, and

• (3) Women often had to face an increased workload at home, during the lockdowns and beyond.

Basically, the Covid-19 crisis strengthened some of the gender inequalities that had been marking G20 (and other) labour markets for decades already.⁴⁵

Women were of vital importance in the healthcare response to the Covid-19 pandemic. This is mainly due to the fact that women make up the majority of healthcare workers in almost all G20 economies, ranging from a mere 35% in Saudi Arabia to more than 80% in countries such as Russia, Canada and Korea. Along with their male counterparts employed in the same sector, women in healthcare had to face exceptional demands and were subjected to increased risks regarding their own health and safety throughout the Covid-19 crisis. This was especially bad during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, when most (Western) countries were still groping for the best way to respond to the Covid-19 crisis and to protect their frontline health workers from contamination. Moreover, as explained before, in many cases healthcare workers lacked adequate PPE for protecting their own health when dealing with Covid-19 patients and hospitals or nursing homes. In many of these cases, the pressure brought forward by the Covid-19 crisis was particularly strong on mothers who, because of what has been referred to as “entrenched cultural and gender norms”, had to face additional childcare demands as a result of closures of schools and day-care during the lockdowns of the Covid-19 crisis. By contrast, women remained largely under-represented in leadership roles in the health care and long-term nursing sectors (cf. Chaps. 5 and 6), as well as in advisory positions shaping the government response to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic.⁴⁶

Women were, furthermore, more concentrated in “hazardous occupations”⁴⁷ than men, a fact that has been mainly attributed to gender differences with regard to employment by profession and by sector.⁴⁸

As already mentioned before, the consequences of job loss were particularly severe for labourers in the informal economy. Employment in this sector tends to favour women, who are thus more likely to be confronted with job loss. More precisely, 42% of the women were said to perform labour in these informal economy sectors at the start of the Covid-19 crisis, compared with only 32% of the men. This was even worse in emerging countries where women were, e.g., significantly over-represented in the manufacturing and wholesale/retail sectors. Women were more confronted with a sharper decline in labour force participation, employment and working hours, as well as a decline in social security coverage. They were, therefore, also more subjected to large income losses than men. Covid-19 exacerbated an already precarious situation, as women were, on average, since decades already facing lower incomes, higher poverty rates and greater difficulties in accessing income support than men. The Covid-19 crisis also increased the burden of unpaid care and domestic work, much of which has traditionally fallen on the shoulders of women.⁴⁹ As schools and day-care centres started closing due to containment measures (especially during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic), parents’ time spent on childcare, supervision and schooling increased, as did the care for disabled or elderly family members. The largest part of this additional workload again fell on the shoulders of women. Single parents, most of whom are women, were found to be extremely vulnerable. They were, e.g., found to be hit much harder than two-parent families by the closure of childcare facilities and schools during lock-out periods. Dependence on a single income also implied that the loss of a job could be severely affecting single-parent families, particularly in countries where public family support was weak or slow to respond. More generally, the greater burden on women with regard to household tasks may also have affected their career prospects in a negative manner. Together, all these additional burdens women had to face, may also have caused an impact on the mental health of many of them.⁵⁰

According to an article that appeared in The Guardian on 4 May 2021, which was based mainly on information provided by the “Trades Union Congress” (abbreviated as “TUC”), the uneven impact of Covid-19 on women has been confirmed by research into the situation in the United Kingdom. According to this newspaper article, working women in the United Kingdom even faced a greater risk on the labour market than during the financial crisis of 2008, in particular because many women had become (temporarily) redundant as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. According to the analysis undertaken by The Guardian, female redundancies in the United Kingdom amounted to 178,000 between September and November 2020, a number that was said to be 76% higher than the peak at the height of the financial crisis of 2008, when female redundancies had only reached 100,000. During the same period of time, “only” 217,000 men had become redundant—which was 3% more than the peak in male redundancies that had occurred during the financial crisis of 2008. Still according to the TUC, as quoted by The Guardian, during the Covid-19 pandemic, women in the United Kingdom had been more likely to be off work than men, as well as to be employed in the sectors hardest hit by Covid-19, such as retail and healthcare. The Guardian-article also confirmed that in the United Kingdom, women had to bear the brunt of childcare when schools and childcare centres had to be closed as part of the containment measures. According to the TUC’s Job Monitor,⁵¹ during the 12 months counting back to December 2019, women accounted for six out of 10 job losses in hotels, six out of 10 job losses in wholesale and retail trade, and almost six out of 10 job losses in other services, such as hairdressers, beauty and care services. While the number of female redundancies slowed down as of November 2020, by 4 May 2021, the figures still remained at “crisis levels”. According to the latest official figures available on 4 May 2021, almost 94,000 additional women had been turned redundant between December 2020 and February 2021, close to the level seen at the height of the financial crisis of 2008. By the end of February 2021, 2,337,900 women were reported to be on furlough, compared to 2,144,700 men.⁵²

There is also a growing amount of evidence originating from some of the advanced G20 economies that the Covid-19 crisis has had a more negative impact on the mental health of women than on that of men. The combination of deteriorating mental health and an increasing degree of physical and psychological abuse some women were exposed to, was, moreover, expected to have a long-term negative impact on women’s likelihood of returning to work when the economy would finally recover.⁵³

According to research undertaken by Reinhart, Dawes and Maybank, published in “The Lancet” on 20 April 2021, it appears that the Covid-19 pandemic has benefited from a long-standing synergy—produced by public policy (or, put another way, by policy largely based on the dictates of economic neo-liberalism)—between “structural misogyny, racism, inadequate welfare and labour protections, and epidemiology”.⁵⁴ E.g., in the United States, millions of labourers got infected and there have been thousands of deaths from Covid-19. A disproportionate number of people put at risk had been women and people of colour, particularly among caregivers, such as health care aides and auxiliary healthcare labourers without high occupational status. Approximately 80% of healthcare labourers who contracted Covid-19 in the United States were women, with healthcare workers of colour significantly over-represented among those contaminated. At the same time, this mirrors the fact that a female workforce, mostly from minority groups and/or from immigrant populations, has formed the basis of health care delivery in the United States, as in the United Kingdom and many other countries.⁵⁵

Sixth and final, as more and more people work from home based upon modern information and communication technologies, labourers were also more exposed to labour-related cyberbullying.⁵⁶

Some of these issues will be discussed again in Chap. 10.

7.2.3 Collapse in Employment and Hours Worked

The lockdown and containment measures that were massively resorted to in the Western world, particularly during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic (cf. Sects. 2.3, 2.4 and 2.5), led to a sharp and unprecedented fall in employment in the G20 economies. E.g., monthly labour force data from G20 countries (for which such data were available) painted a common picture. There was a sharp drop in the number of still employed persons, as upon the outbreak of Covid-19, labourers were laid off, made redundant or did not have their (temporary) labour agreements renewed. Between December 2019 (when there still had been a pre-Covid-19 peak in activity) and April 2020 (when the trough of the Covid-19 crisis was reached in most Western countries), these declines amounted to almost 40% in Mexico, to around 8-9% in Japan and Korea. On average, the sharp decline of the number of people still at work that occurred as countries resorted to containment measures, has been 14 times greater than the total peak-to-trough decline—measured over a much longer period—that had occurred during the 2008 financial crisis.⁵⁷

In all countries for which data were available, the amount of people still at work increased again from April 2020, but remained well below its pre-Covid-19 crisis level throughout the months of June and July 2020. In most countries, the fall in total hours worked was larger than the fall in the number of people still employed, ranging from a dramatic fall of hours worked of 46% in Mexico, to a still significant fall of hours worked of around 10% in Australia. The decline was, moreover, considerably larger on average (by more than 6 times) than the fall that had occurred during the 2008 financial crisis.⁵⁸

Projections by the ILO have even suggested that, on a global scale, the number of working hours may have dropped by 14% between Q4 2019 and Q2 2020. This projection came down to an equivalent of approximately 400 million full-time jobs (under the assumption of a 48-hour working week). With regard to G20 economies in particular, the ILO projection of the decline of total hours worked came down to an equivalent of 265 million full-time jobs. In addition, for many people, especially for women, this decline of paid working hours went hand-in-hand with an increasing number of hours spent in unpaid care work due to closures of school and child care centres, the reduction of public service available to people with disabilities and/or to the elderly, the non-availability of domestic workers, and the need to look after one’s family members who contracted Covid-19.⁵⁹

7.2.4 Unemployment

According to the ILO, in many countries, the decline in effective employment and the number of hours worked did not entirely translate into higher official unemployment numbers.⁶⁰

According to the same source, the unemployment rate in Canada and the United States rose significantly upon the outbreak of Covid-19—much higher than during the 2008 financial crisis. However, it remained lower than could be expected, given the decline in effective employment and total hours worked. E.g., in the United States, employment declined by 22.4 million (adjusted seasonally) between March 2020 and April 2020, while unemployment only rose by a smaller 15.9 million. By contrast, in several other countries, the rise in unemployment has been much more moderate. These differences between countries partly reflected differences in the treatment of temporarily unemployed labourers. These were considered “unemployed” in Canadian and US statistics, while most other jurisdictions still considered this “employed”. These differences in numbers also reflect the policy approach resorted to in each country for cushioning the socioeconomic impact of the Covid-19 crisis. Many countries, particularly in the EU, started to make extensive use of re-employment programmes in order to prevent people from becoming unemployed.⁶¹ (On these socioeconomic and cultural differences, cf., furthermore, Sect. 7.12.)

According to Krugman, the situation was most severe for those workers who were hardest hit. E.g., the collapse of the Covid-19 pandemic disproportionately affected workers in the leisure and hospitality sector—e.g., restaurants—while the unemployment rate for workers in industry was much lower.⁶²

The rise in unemployment was, furthermore, mitigated by those unemployed who waited to actively search for a new job or who were unavailable for work when national and local lockdowns had been put in place. In accordance with standard criteria defining the notion of “labour force”, these persons were classified as “inactive”, and therefore not part of the official labour force numbers. Consequently, in all G20 countries for which monthly data were available, barring the United Kingdom, labour force participation rates fell substantially upon the outbreak of Covid-19. In the opinion of the ILO, for many of these people, there was also little incentive to actively seek work during a period of confinement, while others were not available for paid employment because of the additional household duties associated with confinement, such as childcare and home teaching activities. Although some decline in labour-participation rates had already been a feature of previous recessions, the magnitude of the decline during the Covid-19 crisis has been of an exceptional nature in most countries, as many people were discouraged from actively seeking work. In cases where people were unable to return to work quickly, this may even have resulted in permanent discouragement for some workers.⁶³

With the recovery of economic activity as of May 2020, many people belonging to this group of potential job seekers returned to the labour market. This inflow of people who were officially not categorised as potential labour market participants implied that the reduction in unemployment would take time, despite the recovery in effective employment itself. Indeed, in both Canada and the United States, the unemployment rate in July 2020 remained well above its pre-Covid-19 crisis level. According to the OECD’s June 2020 projections, unemployment rates in most of the G20 countries where these data were available, would still remain much higher at the end of 2021, than they had been at the end of 2019.⁶⁴

Partly because of where the slump was concentrated, at least in the United States, those who remained unemployed tended to be Americans who had earned low wages even before the slump, implying that the recovery of the economy after the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic left out those who needed the recovery most.⁶⁵

7.2.5 Changes in Wages and Incomes

As the Covid-19 virus started to spread around the world, (physical) workplaces began to close as of March 2020. Millions of labourers lost some or all of their income. Even people who still remained working in many cases had to accept shorter working hours and/or wage cuts. This phenomenon occurred in various economic sectors, such as airlines, retail and accommodation, food services and the textile and clothing sectors, all sectors which, at the time, were moreover heavily feminised sectors. In some cases, such wage reductions were negotiated in formal, collective agreements between employees and employers.⁶⁶

In some countries, labour statistics pointed to a general decline in wages. E.g., in Australia, average nominal wages for employees aged between 50 and 59 fell by 3.2% between 14 March 2020 and 13 June 2020. In the United Kingdom, the real average wages fell by 1.2% in April 2020, after also having fallen in March 2020. In the United States, by contrast, real wages experienced an unprecedented jump of 5.8% in April 2020, followed by a weaker real growth of 0.5% in May 2020. However, this is thought to have reflected a so-called “compositional effect”, namely a larger job loss among low-paid workers than among high-paid workers, which has as effect that the average wages of those still employed, increased. Restricting the analysis to workers employed in consecutive periods, one study, cited by the ILO, found that in March, April and May 2020, wage freezes and cuts were much more frequent than in the same months of 2019. In Canada, there was also an exceptional acceleration in real wage growth, which probably—and similarly to the United States—reflected greater job losses for low-paid workers, rising by 6.8% in April 2020, after a substantial rise in unemployment numbers from 8% in March 2020, to 13.4% in April 2020.⁶⁷

7.3 (Re-)Organizing the Working Floor

7.3.1 Introduction

One of the basic assumptions of capitalist economies is that the economy must keep running and essentially cannot afford any (long) breaks. All economic tools and legal mechanisms that shape the capitalist economy, e.g., the methods of employment based on labour contracts, the repayment of all forms of credit (ranging from financing loans for companies to mortgage loans for individuals), the design of production lines, the content of purchase and supply contracts, leases—the list is obviously too long to sum up in detail—are based on this premise. The more a country’s economy is aligned with these capitalist working methods, the more important it is for its economy to be able to keep going. Thus, when at the end of March-early April 2020, most Western countries had no choice but to move to lockdown measures (cf. Sects. 2.4 and 2.5), methods were anxiously sought to keep the capitalist machinery running as much as possible. For almost all white-collar work (e.g., administration, management, dealing with files, etc.), the solution could be found in “teleworking”, made possible primarily by software packages that enabled online meetings, in addition to a multitude of other applications, such as lectures and teaching (particularly relevant for schools and universities).

These tools even proved to be so effective that soon after they got widely and globally used, there were calls to continue using them in the post-Covid-19 era.

However, no such high-performance substitutes were available for physical labour, which implied that people providing such physical labour would soon be called back to the work floor, with all the negative effects that this would entail.

In the following Sect. 7.3.2, we shall first take a closer look at the design of telework. In a subsequent Sect. 7.3.3 we shall discuss some of the implications of the recall of workers to the physical working floors.

7.3.2 Telework

For many G20-countries, one of the key measures resorted to for containing the spread of Covid-19, was the encouragement of telework from home.⁶⁸

As of March 2020, in order to promote a rapid transition to telework in all professions for which this was considered feasible, countries all over the world started taking legal and practical measures to simplify the use of telework, including even financial and non-financial support to enterprises in order to enable their transmission to a telework environment. By way of an example, the ILO report has pointed to the example of Italy that largely simplified the procedure for working from home by allowing enterprises and their employees to set up telework without the need for a prior agreement from the trade unions or for a written agreement between employer and employee. Similarly, Russia made alterations to its labour code concerning telework rules. Spain expedited already existing public programs in support of the digitalisation of the working environment of small and medium-sized enterprises. Other countries, such as Japan and Korea, offered financial support for subsidising the cost of introducing remote working arrangements.⁶⁹

Some large technology enterprises themselves also stepped in by providing enterprises and employees with specific assistance and temporary free access for using some of their communication and data exchange software.⁷⁰

Data based on surveys conducted in mid-April 2020 point to a massive increase in the share of employees working from home by comparison to pre-Covid-19 crisis figures. This increase amounted from around 30% in Canada, to almost 70% in South Africa.⁷¹

According to the ILO, the result of all this has been a global experiment in mass telework that, at the same time, generated a number of specific organisational problems. On the one hand, telework has been instrumental for helping to contain the Covid-19 virus itself, especially by granting a greater degree of flexibility to individuals for managing their work and family lives, particularly in the context of the closures of school and child day-care facilities which—in rich countries—also resorted to functioning in a virtual environment and which mandated parents to stay at home in order to take care of their (small) children. On the other hand, the mandatory and full-time nature of telework during the Covid-19 pandemic has been unusual, to the extent that telework had in the past mostly been of a voluntary nature and only been used for limited periods of time (e.g., one or two days per week). Purported risks of telework were that it could exacerbate the risk of social isolation and detachment from colleagues and employer, as well as raising ergonomic problems and creating difficulties in detaching from work.⁷² Nevertheless, some have argued that working from home and/or telework, already underway in times preceding Covid-19, are likely to accelerate further in the wake of the crisis.⁷³

What the Covid-19 crisis also seems to have demonstrated is that the most digitalised enterprises are the ones most likely to emerge stronger. E.g., enterprises that had already invested the most in adopting new digital technologies in times pre-Covid-19, were simply able to continue offering their services remotely, which in many cases implied a competitive advantage by comparison to enterprises that had not yet adapted to said technological changes. Once the Covid-19 pandemic will be over, this is, moreover, expected to lead to new customer demands for greater flexibility and more personalised online services.⁷⁴

7.3.3 Adopting Strict Health and Safety Standards in the Workplace

In order to protect labourers for whom working from home was impossible because of the nature of the labour concerned, i.e., in most cases, physical labour and/or labour implying the transfer of physical goods, countries in many cases resorted to limiting business activities to “essential” activities and/or services, or introduced very strict so-called “occupational safety and health” (OSH) standards.⁷⁵

E.g., many countries issued stricter health and sanitary guidelines, ranging from the requirement to use room dividers and personal protective equipment (PPE)—such as face masks, gloves and other protective clothing—to restrictions on the maximum number of workers allowed to be physically present on enterprise premises (or certain parts of these premises). Such measures, again, proved more difficult to implement in the informal economy, where labour activities are in many cases carried out in crowded places, such as public areas, often with limited access to hand-washing stations and/or PPE. In addition, labourers and enterprises active in the informal economy are, by definition, not registered, which made it difficult to properly identify them and to disseminate information on OSH measures in an official and effective manner.⁷⁶ Because of this, it became essential to adapt existing policy interventions by taking into account the specific constraints faced by most enterprises and labourers in the informal economy, such as decreased or simplified levels of information and granting exceptional, limited access to formal healthcare services. Solutions were thought of by using communication channels adapted to the needs of the informal economy, such as radio, in order to disseminate information of general interest, by cooperating with entrepreneurial and middle class organisations, and by adopting innovative communication mechanisms and techniques for better reach.⁷⁷

According to research referred to by the ILO in its here quoted study, 32 specific national OSH policy measures in 16 EU countries had been implemented for dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic at the time of the study. Of these, 13 policies had focused on general principles for occupational safety and health, 12 on telework arrangements, 5 on alterations to working arrangements, and 2 specifically on employee welfare.⁷⁸

For example:⁷⁹

• (1) In Italy, the government, associations of employers and trade unions jointly signed a protocol on occupational safety and health measures during the early stages of the Covid-19 crisis, and subsequently, as the Covid-19 crisis persisted, renewed and updated this protocol.

• (2) Germany introduced strict rules for its meat processing industry, after a series of outbreaks of Covid-19 in slaughterhouses and/or meat processing factories had occurred (cf. Sect. 7.11.1.).

• (3) In France, the Ministry of Labour and the employers’ organisations in the construction sector negotiated a guide that defined protocols on health and safety in the construction sector, while at the same time aimed at supporting business continuity.

• (4) In Spain, the national OSH institute published updated guidelines for the sectors that were still in operation, including advice on the use of PPE.

• (5) In countries such as the United States, South Africa and South Korea, national OSH authorities made recommendations on the use of engineering and administrative controls, safe work practices and PPE.

Employers have in many countries also been advised to continuously evaluate and manage alternating occupational risks. In Russia, in order to prevent violations of employees’ labour rights, an interactive, public control mechanism was launched on the website-portal “Online Inspection of the Russian Federation”. Through this portal, employees obtained the possibility to request for advice on compliance with labour legislation, as well as to make an appeal in case of a labour rights violations and/or for complaining about poor labour conditions.⁸⁰

It also became essential to distribute accessible information on occupational safety and health measures targeted at vulnerable groups of the population, such as migrant workers and refugees, e.g., by making such information available in a language they could understand. Special consideration was hereby given to labourers active in informal economic units. In some countries, the ILO itself started to support “Migrant Worker Resource Centres”, as well as social partners, in providing understandable and relevant information to migrant workers and the communities to which these belonged on a broad range of topics, such as assistance on Covid-19 related issues, legal assistance for migrant workers who had become the victims of labour rights violations, and the provision of both health and safety training and materials, such as face masks and hand sanitizers. One of the forerunners in this regard has undoubtedly been the Danish Refugee Council that, in partnership with the Danish Ministry of Health, started to provide information on Covid-19 in 25 languages.⁸¹

7.3.4 Unaddressed Mental Health Issues

In the United Kingdom, the NAO report of 13 May 2021 already cited above, explicitly mentions that the Covid-19 pandemic put a strain on some health and care workers, a sector that was already under high pressure before the Covid-19 outbreak.⁸²

For example:⁸³

• (1) In May 2020, some 45% of UK physicians (3,936 out of 8,685) who responded to a British Medical Association survey said that they suffered from mental illnesses ranging from depression, anxiety, stress, burnout, emotional distress, to other mental health problems related to and/or aggravated by their work. Some registered social care managers added to this that medical workers’ mental health was under great pressure, with people being particularly worried about becoming ill themselves, and/or unknowingly passing on the Covid-19 virus to others.

• (2) At the height of the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, some care labourers, physicians and nurses felt that they were not sufficiently protected. Many social service providers, similarly, pointed out that they were running out of PPE. This was said to create uncertainty, anxiety and stress.

Given, on one side, the stress that medical staff members were already under prior to the Covid-19 pandemic and, on the other side, the additional pressures brought along by the Covid-19 pandemic itself, the NAO report found that the after-effects of the Covid-19 pandemic response were likely to be significant and, for some people, even lasting.⁸⁴

7.4 Providing Sickness Benefits and Paid Leave to All Workers

Again according to the ILO-report referred to before, the widespread use of sick pay and paid sick leave played an important role in enabling workers who got contaminated by the Covid-19 virus to self-isolate, and thus in helping to contain the spread of Covid-19 as much as possible. Said support systems, more precisely, were crucial to workers on several levels, namely by protecting their income, their jobs and their health. However, in the opinion of the ILO, such paid sick leave could only be an effective policy tool during containment, mitigation and post-containment periods, provided it is widely available to a sufficiently large proportion of the workforce.⁸⁵

Regretfully, these premises were far from being met anywhere before the outbreak of the Covid-19 crisis. As a result, at the onset of the Covid-19 epidemic, many labourers, particularly those employed in low-wage forms of employment, such as informal workers and the self-employed, were by and large left unprotected, or inadequately protected, under collectively funded sickness benefits. In addition to posing significant poverty risks, these gaps in protection of the official sick leave programs, also posed a serious threat to public health, as labourers without income replacement during illness may be inclined or even forced to remain working, which, in case of the Covid-19 disease, might result in the contamination of (numerous) others.⁸⁶

As a result, many G20 countries decided to significantly expand their existing sick leave programs, or even to initiate such programs for the very first time in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. E.g., in Korea, where there had been no prior compulsory sick-leave scheme, the “epidemic law” extended paid sick leave to labourers hospitalised or quarantined because of Covid-19. In the United States, it was decided to introduce two weeks of mandatory sick leave for labourers suffering from Covid-19-related symptoms in enterprises with fewer than 500 employees—with such sick leave initially paid by employers but afterwards fully reimbursed by the federal government. Several other countries, including France, Australia and Spain, increased the amount of paid sick leave for people with Covid-19, often through the introduction of new pandemic-related payments or supplements. Some countries (e.g., France and the United Kingdom) temporarily removed existing waiting periods. A group of other countries (e.g., Russia) relaxed on reporting requirements, e.g., by delaying or waiving the need for a medical certificate, or by allowing online claims. In Russia, it was, furthermore, enacted upon by the legislator that the amount of temporary disability benefits for periods of disability falling within the time period starting 1 April 2020 until 31 December 2020 (the latter date included) could not be less than the minimum wage. Other G20 countries introduced what has been referred to as “stopgap” measures to extend coverage to categories of labourers not covered before. E.g., in the United Kingdom, sickness benefit schemes were extended to all labourers, including those employed in the gig economy and those who were self-insured. Japan decided to provide cash sickness benefits to people who took time off work because of “subjective” Covid-19 symptoms but could not consult a physician. In such a case, a certificate stating the labourer’s incapacity to work and provided by the employer was allowed to replace a medical certificate.⁸⁷

During the Covid-19 pandemic, several countries also temporarily extended access to sickness benefits for self-employed workers suffering from Covid-19 and/or in quarantine. This was, e.g., the case for France, Australia, Canada, Korea, Singapore, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States. Some countries also resorted to measures for ensuring that national social protection schemes were temporarily expanded for the benefit of migrant workers. E.g., in order to ensure migrants’ access to public healthcare services, Portugal adopted provisions in accordance with which they were considered permanent residents for the duration of the Covid-19 pandemic.⁸⁸

Some governments issued various other measures to provide income security for those affected by Covid-19, such as the payment of crisis allowances or partial unemployment benefits for employees who were ill and/or in quarantine. This has been the case for, e.g., Australia, Canada, France and the United States. In Argentina, a generalized one-time cash benefit was accorded through existing support channels of the government agency responsible for providing family benefits. The beneficiaries of this one-time support included domestic workers in formal and informal employment. In addition, various countries installed relief funds or other financial support schemes to the benefit of self-employed labourers. In almost all these cases, however, said measures were time-limited and applied to Covid-19 cases only.⁸⁹

Despite the benevolent intentions, said Covid-19 specific sickness benefits in many countries only covered a small fraction of wages, or were only granted for periods even shorter than the recommended self-isolation periods for people suffering from Covid-19 symptoms.⁹⁰

7.5 Addressing Unforeseen Care Needs

For many labourers, the Covid-19 crisis created or increased the needs for family care. We have already explained how, especially during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, many people, especially women, had to devote more time than usual to care for their family, notably children, but also other family members with special care needs, such as elderly parents or family members with disabilities. These increased care needs had many causes, such as school and child day-care closures (cf., furthermore, Chap. 8), reductions in public services for people with disabilities and the elderly (cf. Chap. 6), as well as a decreased availability of domestic workers. The ILO in this regard pointed to the fact that working a full-time job is already difficult under normal circumstances, but that combining a full-time employment with Covid-19 enhanced care needs from children, elderly family members and/or family members with disabilities, was in many cases impossible. This appeared to be especially difficult for single parents and for (young) couples whereby only one partner could telework from home, or whereby both partners were not able to perform telework from home. It needs, hence, not be surprising that especially parents with young children who require closer attention, especially during times of school closures where they were at home all the time and, moreover, were supposed to commit to online schooling, reported particular difficulties balancing work and family life.⁹¹

In order to try and diminish the strain put on working parents, many G20 countries resorted to specific measures for supporting families. Obvious such measures were extending the duration of special paid leave (including parental leave), or providing special financial means so that families could hire paid care services. Examples of countries that resorted to such measures were Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States. However, in most of these countries, the special paid leave and/or income support measures only applied for limited, fixed periods of times, ranging from 10 days (per parent) in Korea, to up to 12 weeks in the United States, and to four months in Canada. Still, in other countries (e.g., France), the special family support measures were extended a couple of times, for the duration of the closures of the schools and child care facilities concerned. In still other countries, labourers were allowed to take special leave at a flat-rate payment (e.g., in Canada, Korea) or at a fixed part of their usual salary (e.g., in France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States). To the extent that in some countries authorities suspected that continued payment of wages without people working (or without people working full-time) would be difficult to bear for many employers, these countries resorted to measures aimed at supporting employers, such as reductions in employer social security contributions or even direct funding of the special family leave systems through general taxation or social security. Some countries decided to extend these special family care leave systems (or the income support for hiring external care) to self-employed labourers (e.g., in Canada, France, Italy, Japan, and the United Kingdom). However, the ILO pointed to the fact that the financial compensation the self-employed were entitled to, was in many cases lower than the compensation granted to employees. Some countries granted subsidies to compensate enterprises that granted family leave (e.g., Japan), or made loans available to the self-employed who needed to stay home due to school or childcare facility closures.⁹²

In some countries, specific measures were resorted to in order to address special care needs of essential service workers, many of whom (as explained before; cf. Sect. 7.2.2) being women. E.g., in France, Germany and Russia, authorities allowed childcare facilities to remain open, albeit with reduced staff, in order to ensure that the children of essential service workers, e.g., healthcare staff members, could still be looked after. Similar measures were resorted to by Korea, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Also in Australia, childcare services were allowed to remain open to care for the children of essential workers, while vulnerable children were entitled to enhanced government financial support.⁹³

7.6 Addressing Discrimination, Stigma, and Exclusion

The quoted ILO-report also explains that, from the early start, the Covid-19 pandemic particularly created severe problems for groups of people who already in normal times face discrimination, stigma and exclusion. This may have been due to the fact that many people belonging to such stigmatized or discriminated groups, are over-represented in the informal economy. Varying from country to country, examples of such groups included people with disabilities, indigenous and tribal peoples, lgbtq+ people, people suffering from HIV, forcibly displaced populations and labourers with a migrant background. The ILO report reminded that, regretfully, in many countries these groups of people are far from small or rare categories, but often intersect with each other, as well as with a wide variety of other concerns which may be related to gender (e.g., discrimination against women), socio-economic status (e.g., class-related issues), age (e.g., discrimination on the labour market against people from a certain age on), besides numerous other factors. These factors, either on their own or combined, all may result in multiple layers of discrimination, stigma and exclusion regarding access to employment, social protection, family rights and healthcare services. Covid-19 raised special problems with regard to both protecting labourers belonging to such categories and ensuring that they would be protected and that they would not be discriminated against. This appeared to be especially problematic for labourers belonging to such groups who were employed in the informal economy and who in many cases already were discriminated against on matters of social and labour protection before the outbreak of the Covid-19 crisis. Furthermore, the ILO expressed its concern about increasing levels of discrimination, xenophobia, and homophobic attacks during the Covid-19 pandemic, besides dramatic spikes in both domestic and societal violence and harassment.⁹⁴

In order to deal with these specific societal problems, some G20 countries resorted to either inclusive policies, targeted measures, or to a combination of both. Such targeted measures could, e.g., be aimed at addressing the impact of the health crisis and the economic consequences for such specific groups. This “twin-track approach” involved, phrased differently, targeted measures to the exclusive benefit of minority groups of special vulnerability, as well as resorting to actions for ensuring that these minority groups would be included in the more mainstream responses and support measures for dealing with the Covid-19 crisis, such as access to financial support, benefits and/or special care services. Such integration policies could also include measures such as, e.g., relaxation of eligibility requirements for benefits. An obvious example of the latter category have been the measures aimed at allowing migrant workers and/or informal economy labourers in general to benefit from income support schemes that, in “normal times”, are only open for regularly employed workers. Such inclusion measures, in most cases, only applied for the duration of the Covid-19 crisis, or for a more limited duration.⁹⁵

The category of “targeted measures” included measures for ensuring that public healthcare, public education and matters such as workplace communication regarding Covid-19, were easily accessible to persons with disabilities or to people who speak another language. This could, e.g., involve the use of sign language, as well as ensuring that communications were made available in languages accessible to migrant workers and indigenous and/or displaced people. There were also measures resorted to for ensuring that communications would happen in a culturally appropriate manner, e.g., by taking into account cultural practices of minority groups, indigenous peoples, etc. Such targeted measures could also deal with special healthcare needs, such as social security coverage for dealing with specific, additional healthcare expenses to the benefit of people with disabilities or people living with pre-existing medical conditions, such as HIV, for whom the Covid-19 pandemic generated specific concerns and problems. Some countries were reported to have facilitated the access to benefits for people with disabilities, e.g., through a relaxation on administrative requirements, or to have established systems of ongoing care and support (e.g., in Argentina, France, Turkey and Saudi Arabia). Some countries were reported to have advanced the payment of retirement pensions or disability benefits. Another support measure consisted of increasing the level of financial support under such schemes in order to reduce the risk of poverty (e.g., in Argentina and Turkey). Spain even introduced a minimum-income scheme in the form of a permanent structural instrument designed to protect the most disadvantaged.⁹⁶

7.7 Securing Jobs, Supporting Companies, and Maintaining Essential Service Provision

7.7.1 Introduction

The quoted ILO-report pointed to the (obvious) fact that imposed business closures or other restrictions, quarantines of people, and limitations on mobility, all measures that have been resorted to for containing Covid-19 (cf., in more detail, in Chap. 2), had as side-effect that they put enterprises under severe strain. As economic activity plummeted because of a combination of Covid-19 contamination cases and Covid-19 related deaths on one hand, and of the public measures for dealing with the Covid-10 pandemic on the other hand, even productive, well-managed enterprises started facing major liquidity shortages. Financial commitments to a wide variety of creditors, such as suppliers, employees, lenders, investors and even the state could no longer be met (cf. Chaps. 3 and 4). As for many enterprises demand collapsed and supply chains broke, some enterprises also found themselves with excess capacity. Besides the problems this caused for the enterprises themselves (the solutions that states resorted to have been dealt with in the previous Chaps. 3 and 4), such situations obviously also put jobs at risk on a large scale.⁹⁷

Appropriate solutions had to be found for this, such as:

• (1) Job-retention schemes.

• (2) Limiting dismissals for economic reasons.

• (3) Schemes of protecting workers against unfair dismissals and/or from becoming irregular workers.

• (4) Liquidity support to enterprises (cf. already in Chaps. 3 and 4).

7.7.2 Job-Retention Schemes: Short-Time Work and Wage-Subsidies

According to the ILO-report, one of the main policy tools used by many advanced countries for dealing with the labour related consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic have been “job retention schemes” (abbreviated as “JRS”). Such JRS are designed for protecting labourers against mass layoffs, as well as for protecting incomes. Such JRS, e.g., may aim at preserving jobs at enterprises by temporarily reducing the labour costs of such enterprises, which often account for a substantial share of enterprises” operating costs. Labour costs are especially considerable in the service sector, to the extent that this sector mainly relies on vast numbers of personnel. The service sector, however, was also one of the sectors that were particularly badly affected by the Covid-19 crisis. Other parts of JRS aimed at providing (complements to already existing) liquidity support measures to the benefit of enterprises who faced temporary credit payment constraints.⁹⁸

Such JRS may take a wide variety of forms:

• (1) JRS can directly subsidise hours not worked, e.g., under the form of short-time work (STW), or temporary layoff schemes.⁹⁹

• (2) JRS can subsidise hours worked.

• (3) JRS can top-up overall earnings of labourers on reduced hours (e.g., the “Job Keeper Payment” in Australia).¹⁰⁰

• (4) Etc.

JRS in practice could differ widely in the level of support they provided to enterprises and labourers and in the eligibility conditions they imposed for participation (e.g., economic necessity, “force majeure”, social partner agreement, restrictions on redundancies…).¹⁰¹

According to the ILO-report, several G20 economies, moreover, already had pre-existing “short-time working schemes” in place, which they could quickly adapt to deal with the Covid-19 crisis. Among the G20 countries, those with existing job retention programmes in place were, e.g., Brazil, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Turkey. The measures resorted to by these countries for expanding their existing STW schemes fell into three main categories: (1) simplifying access and extending coverage in order to stimulate take-up by the enterprises concerned; (2) extending coverage to non-permanent labourers, which often included temporary labourers, (interim) agency labourers, and even some categories of self-employed labourers, and (3) increasing the levels of financial support, e.g., by raising income replacement rates for workers and/or reducing costs for enterprises.¹⁰²

In addition, a number of countries were reported to have introduced new job retention schemes, based on a combination of elements of STW schemes and elements of standard wage subsidies. Australia and Canada, e.g., were among the G20 countries that resorted to temporary wage subsidy schemes. In the opinion of the ILO, while wage subsidy schemes may be easier to execute and, moreover, provide more flexibility to enterprises than traditional STW schemes, they also tend to be less well targeted at enterprises facing financial problems. By contrast, in countries where the costs of lay-offs are relatively low, a STW scheme was in most cases not very appealing for enterprises.¹⁰³

According to the ILO-report, in several of the G20 countries, both the requests and the actual uptake under new or extended JRS have been massive. By May 2020, enterprises’ requests for support under JRS covered 55% of employee costs in France, over 40% in Italy, and around 30% in the United Kingdom, Germany and Australia. In some countries, however, the actual take-up of JRS has been significantly lower than originally intended. In Germany, e.g., the actual take-up only amounted to 19% in May 2020, and to 33% in France.¹⁰⁴

In the opinion of the ILO, the substantial adoption of such JRS instruments in both Australia and many of the European countries, in part, explains why these countries did not experience the massive increase in unemployment that occurred in countries such as Canada and the United States.¹⁰⁵

7.7.3 Limiting Economic Dismissals and Protecting Workers Against Unfair Dismissals, or From Becoming Irregular Workers

According to the ILO-report, to keep the immediate increase in layoffs within reasonable boundaries and to propagate a high take-up rate of JRS, some G20 countries resorted to restrictions on collective and individual dismissals.¹⁰⁶

Such restrictions included: (1) imposing an explicit ban on layoffs for economic reasons, as did Argentina, Italy and Turkey; and (2) resorting to increased control and costs for layoffs, as did Spain and France.¹⁰⁷

Such policies of limiting layoffs can serve several further goals, such as:¹⁰⁸

• (1) help maintain incomes of labourers,

• (2) during a period of already high anxiety, limit the possibility of employers to use a new crisis, notably the Covid-19 crisis, as an excuse to dismiss labourers they had already planned before to lay off for non-economic reasons.

On the downside, a strict ban on dismissal of personnel may also result in enterprise failures, especially in cases that the access to JRS is incomplete, impractical, delayed or simply too costly. Forbidding dismissals may also further lead to adjustment towards fixed-term contracts, which are terminated in case of simple non-renewal. Finally, limitations on economic layoffs, especially in combination with too generous JRS may prevent necessary structural changes in the labour market and even slow down general economic recovery.¹⁰⁹

During the Covid-19 pandemic, it also became of significant importance to ensure that migrant workers and refugees obtained regular status or did not fall into a situation of irregularity. E.g., measures for facilitating the extension of visas and amnesties, as well as permits for renewal of work or residence, can help to ensure both access to essential services, and continuity of regular employment, in this manner avoiding a rise of irregularity. During the Covid-19 crisis, some countries (such as South Africa), therefore, decided to extend migrant work visas and/or amnesties, besides resorting to other measures for alleviating the obstacles that migrant workers and their families living in destination countries were facing. During the peak months of the Covid-19 crisis, a number of EU countries resorted to steps to extend the validity or automatically renewable residence or asylum status documents. This was, e.g., done by Portugal, Italy, Spain, Ireland and Portugal. Other EU countries introduced measures to enhance transition from the informal to the formal economy, in sectors characterized by a high proportion of informal migrant workers. This was, e.g., done by Italy. Spain also made the treatment of residence permits more flexible in order to avoid their withdrawal or non-renewal if a migrant loses his or her job, or is temporarily laid off due to the Covid-19 crisis.¹¹⁰

7.7.4 Liquidity Support for Enterprises

According to the ILO-report, many G20 countries—but also supranational policy levels, such as the E(M)U—adopted a wide range of emergency measures to support the liquidity of the entrepreneurial sector in the broad sense of the word. In addition to monetary measures resorted to by central banks (cf. already Chap. 3), governments themselves intervened by means of fiscal policy measures for helping enterprises in smoothing their financial obligations over time (cf. already Chap. 4). Such fiscal policy measures included subsidies, loan guarantees and other fiscal measures aimed at supporting the overall financial liquidity position of enterprises. Some countries even delivered direct financial support by injecting liquidity or by pooling losses. Other measures included grants based on past sales, job retention grants, donations and profit sharing agreements. There were even countries (e.g., Russia) that took more direct support measures, such as allowing enterprises a deferral of paying their taxes and/or social security contributions, extending loan maturities and/or temporarily suspending loan re-payments. Finally, some countries supplemented these measures with further “soft” policy tools aimed at securing repayments and payments of interests, as well as preserving operating cash flow.¹¹¹

Still according to the ILO, many countries issued specific measures for supporting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in particular, to the extent that such small and medium-sized enterprises were generally facing greater liquidity constraints.¹¹²

It has been estimated that without these public support measures, 20% of the enterprises operational in the EU, would have faced a liquidity crisis after the first month of Covid-19 containment. If the containment measures would have lasted seven months, more than 50% of the entrepreneurial world would have started to face a liquidity shortage. In case these liquidity constraints would not have been addressed immediately through monetary and/or fiscal policy measures, this could have resulted into a severe solvency crisis, with long-term negative effects on employment, productivity, economic growth and overall welfare.¹¹³

However, certainly in the EU and in the EU Member States, the majority of the Covid-19 financial support measures, both in the field of monetary policy, as in the field of fiscal policy, were made to the benefit of the banking and business world with the “trickle-down economics doctrine” in mind. This aid to the entrepreneurial class would then “drip” to the rest of the population, e.g., via wages. However, it is suspected that the costs of this aid, in particular the repayment costs of the loans that European governments had to incur to finance it, will in the post-Covid-19 era have to be recovered from the general EU population. As has also been the case after the 2008 financial crisis, this will probably happen through a mix of (1) higher and/or new taxes, (2) the resumption of neoliberal austerity policies and, perhaps even (3) a renewed debate on even further raising the retirement age for the working class.

As was already explained above in Sect. 7.1.2, with each crisis, these effects of the capitalist monetary and financing model get even worse, which is why already in the aftermath of the previous capitalist crisis of 2008, we ourselves called for a fundamental rethinking of the systems for ordering the economy.¹¹⁴ The current Covid-19 crisis has only magnified this need, which is why we continue to emphatically reiterate our call to start thinking about alternative systems. We shall return to this important issue in the final conclusions of this book (cf. Chap. 11).

7.8 Income Support for Those Losing Their Job or Self-Employment Income

According to the ILO-report, during the Covid-19 crisis, extended income support programmes have been of vital importance for alleviating economic hardship. Such programmes were especially aimed at stabilising the economy by supporting aggregate demand.¹¹⁵ Even before the Covid-19 crisis, such social protection schemes varied considerably between advanced and emerging/developing economies. Variations occurred, e.g., in terms of design, coverage, level of support and delivery mechanisms of these protection schemes. In light of these already existing differences, a variety of strategies were adopted to strengthen these schemes in the face of the brutal and deep recession that was caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.¹¹⁶

In the ILO-report, it is explained how in many advanced G20 economies, but also increasingly in some emerging economies such as China, social insurance schemes are of vital importance for delivering proximity support in the event of job loss. However, the Covid-19 crisis highlighted a number of shortcomings in these existing schemes, both with regard to labourers to the self-employed, who were not always fully covered by these schemes, if at all. For this reason, already in the early weeks of the Covid-19 crisis, many G20 countries sought to improve both access and the levels of support under the unemployment insurance or assistance systems.¹¹⁷

According to the ILO-report, measures taken by countries to extend said benefits, at a federal/national or local policy level, fell into four main categories:¹¹⁸

• (1) Ameliorating access to and increasing coverage under said unemployment benefits—either by decreasing or completely eliminating minimum contribution demands, or waiting periods (e.g., in Spain and the United States), or by extending the qualifying period with regard to employment conditions (e.g., in France and the United States), or by including groups that had before not been eligible, such as the self-employed (e.g., in China, France, Spain and the United States) or domestic labourers (e.g., in Spain).

• (2) Extending the duration of unemployment benefits—either by prolonging the maximum time duration (e.g., in Argentina, Germany, Switzerland and the United States), or by extending all expiring claims until the end of the Covid-19 crisis (e.g., in Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal and Spain).

• (3) Increasing the level of unemployment benefits (e.g., in Australia, Russia, and the United States), or by increasing the level of benefits under second tier programmes (e.g., in Austria, the United Kingdom and the United States).

• (4) Granting income aid to the most disadvantaged—e.g., by introducing minimum income schemes for aiding those suffering from societal exclusion, or those exposed to a risk of becoming excluded, because of a shortage of financial resources (e.g., in Spain), besides measures of a temporary nature to support informal and self-employed workers (e.g., in Argentina and Italy).

7.9 Employment Services and Training for Jobseekers and Workers

During the Covid-19 pandemic, countries also had to undertake measures to help public employment services cope with the surge in claims for benefits and adapt to the demands raised by physical distancing measures.¹¹⁹

Measures resorted to included:

• simplifying and streamlining application procedures (e.g., in Russia, Spain, and the United Kingdom).

• moving quickly to online platforms (e.g., in Spain and the United Kingdom).

• changing the procedures for making claims during periods of confinement.

• allowing automatic renewal of benefits, without having to follow the usual renewal procedures (e.g., in Spain).

• relaxing job search and reclassification requirements for existing beneficiaries during the Covid-19 crisis (e.g., in France and Germany).

• resorting to a moratorium on existing sanctions for jobseekers who did not comply with the regulations (e.g., in Australia and Italy).

• the reallocation of staff from non-core services to claims processing as a priority (e.g., in Germany).¹²⁰

• …

Countries also soon started to prepare their employment services for the time when physical and social distancing measures, besides other containment measures, would be abandoned. Well-functioning private and public employment services were hereby deemed of vital importance for facilitating the relocation of job seekers, as it was expected that the labour market would shift drastically across sectors and regions once the Covid-19 crisis would reach its conclusion. Some countries, e.g., started to increase funding for retraining and upgrading programmes for labourers who lost their jobs because of the Covid-19 crisis (e.g., Korea, India).¹²¹

7.10 Plans for Reopening the Economy

7.10.1 Neoliberal Strategies of Reopening the Economy (and Why These Can Be Lethal)

7.10.1.1 Underlying Neoliberal Ideas

To the extent that the entire organization of neoliberal economies is geared towards keeping every worker employed for (1) as long (in life), and (2) as much as possible, it should come as no surprise that, already very early in the course of the Covid-19 pandemic, and much earlier than would have been appropriate for combatting it, calls for the “reopening of the economy” started resonating throughout the Western world.

Western countries could instead have followed the lead of the examples of a wide variety of Asian countries. These had much more experience in combating these kinds of health crises, and contrary to many Western countries, had in most cases, based upon an elimination strategy rather than a mitigation strategy, kept strictly observed NPIs (short for “Non-pharmaceutical interventions”), such as testing and tracking, besides social distance and hygiene measures, in place until the Covid-19 spread had as good as entirely disappeared from their territory (cf. Sect. 2.4.2.4.1). Another example that could have inspired the governments of the Western world was, e.g., New Zealand (cf. Sect. 2.4.2.4.2).

Notwithstanding the success rates of said countries, the Western world was not particularly inspired by these examples. On the contrary, especially during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic (albeit not limited to this first wave), most Western countries found situations of lockdown and/or, by extension, all types of measures that limited the freedom of individuals and enterprises too much, more than enough after a few weeks only. As a result, neoliberal governments of many Western countries, urged upon by all kinds of business interest groups, started much sooner than would have been wise with the so-called “reopening of their economies”. Working people were quickly ordered back to their physical workplaces, in many cases without much consideration for their health or safety. (Cf. Sect. 2.2.6.)

So, especially during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, already after a few weeks of restrictive measures, neoliberal governments all over the Western world initiated plans for reopening their economies, with one of the most prominent advocates of this policy being (once again) US President Donald Trump (next to a wide variety of lesser gods of neoliberal thinking).

An early example of how neoliberal ideology thus became dangerous for the working class, could already be seen from the pressure put on the American federal government by a variety of corporate lobbyists, not to activate the “Defense Production Act”. Under this Act, the US executive branch could have decided to order enterprises to manufacture medical supplies for both testing and treating the Covid-19 virus. Instead of making use of this possibility, Trump insisted that hospitals would simply take care of their own. (Cf. Sect. 2.5.4.1.) Worse, a wide variety of politicians and lobbyist soon started aching to get the economy back to normal, with the stock markets and the popularity ratings of politicians themselves further driving these demands. The lieutenant-governor of Texas even went as far to suggest that older Texan citizens—the group most prone to dying from the Covid-19 virus—would be glad to “sacrifice” their lives in the interest of getting the economy moving again.¹²²

The underlying policy of dealing with the Covid-19 crisis thus became not so much about (entirely) eliminating the disease, but rather one of keeping statistics in check (i.e., a mitigation strategy), namely by on the one hand accepting that new Covid-19 infections and deaths would continue to occur, while on the other hand ensuring that the contamination and death cases would not become so high that (1) the hospitals (especially regarding the availability of ICU beds) would no longer be able to cope with new cases (as had happened in Italy in early-March 2020) and (2) economic production would suffer too much.

Indeed, under neoliberal doctrine, the importance of the economy (more specifically of the profits of the class of wealthy entrepreneurs) always takes precedence over any other concern,¹²³ in the case of the Covid-19 crisis, including public health, which itself, in accordance with economic neoliberalism, only needs to be protected to the extent that it could negatively affect economic production. Under such a public policy approach, the life of an individual (unless it concerns a wealthy entrepreneur, or a major shareholder of an important company) is of no value; what counts are the profit margins.

Incidentally, we have already seen this neoliberal subordination of all other values to economic interests several times before in our search for the causes and consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic,¹²⁴ e.g., also:

• (1) With the privatization and the marketization of the hospital sector since the 1990s, whereby EU austerity policy had led to a reduction in health and medical care, including a substantial decrease in both the number of hospitals and hospital beds (both ICU and other), next to a decrease in nursing staff—especially in the aftermath of the financial crisis of 2008 (cf. Chap. 5).

• (2) With the privatization and the marketization of the long-term nursing home sector, whereby, under the dictates of economic neoliberalism, the quality of care for the elderly had been sacrificed to the profit margins of the private companies that own and run such long-term nursing homes to an ever-increasing extent (cf. Chap. 6), and,

• (3) As we shall see below, regarding the EU’s vaccination policy, whereby (infuriatingly well-paid) EU officials in charge of the Covid-19 vaccine procurement conducted lengthy negotiations in order to obtain the lowest possible prices for the Covid-19 vaccines. As result that the EU placed most of it procurement orders very late in the bidding game, ultimately resulting in extreme vaccination delays all over the Union; cf. Sect. 9.4.3.).

But for the moment, we are dealing with the fact that, just a few weeks after the initial lockdowns and similar containment measures during the first wave of the ovid-19 pandemic, Western countries were itching to reopen their economies, and, in order to do so, were looking for measures not so much aimed at preventing the further spread of Covid-19, but to keep this spread as manageable as possible in the light of economic interests.

We shall address these measures under the Sect. 7.10.2, but not before having a closer look at one of these “reopening” plans, more precisely the mid-April 2020 plan of the Trump administration in the United States.

7.10.1.2 Trump’s Plan for “Opening Up America Again”

On April 16, 2020, President Trump introduced his “Opening Up America Again”-plan,¹²⁵ aggressively touting his desire to get back to normal and emphasizing the importance of reopening the economy as soon as possible.¹²⁶

Ironically, Trump’s reopening plan was announced on the day of the at the time highest US-death toll, with a total of more than 680,000 confirmed Covid-19 contamination cases and 34,000 Covid-19 related deaths.¹²⁷

Figure 7.1 gives an overview of the new daily Covid-19 cases the United States was reporting at the time.

Fig. 7.1

New daily cases of the Covid-19 virus in the USA (as of 15 April 2020) [Source: BBC News (2020a)] (Source: Covid Tracking Project, 15 April)

The Trump administration’s 18-page guidance document, titled “Guidelines—Opening up America again”, detailed three phases to reopen state economies, with each of these phases lasting, at minimum, 14 days.¹²⁸

These three phases were as follows:¹²⁹

• (1) Phase one was to include much of the at the time already existing lockdown measures, such as the avoidance of all non-essential travel and a ban of gathering in large groups. But Trump’s document also said that large venues, such as restaurants, places of worship and sports venues could again start operating under strict physical distancing protocols.

• (2) If there was no evidence of a reoccurrence of Covid-19, phase two was to allow non-essential travel. The Trump administration-guidance, moreover, said that schools could then also reopen and bars could start operating “with diminished standing-room occupancy”.

• (3) Under phase three, states still facing a downward trend of Covid-19 contaminations would be allowed to start “public interactions” and to allow unrestricted staffing of worksites. Visits to long-term nursing homes and hospitals would also be allowed to resume, and bars would be allowed to increase their standing room capacity.

Under this policy, counties could start to return to normalcy after a month-long evaluation period. In places with remaining Covid-19 infections, or with rising rates, this evaluation period could take longer.¹³⁰

However, academics and public health experts soon started scrutinising the president’s plan and guidelines, doubting both their safety and necessity.¹³¹

E.g., in an opinion piece which appeared in ‘The Guardian” on 3 May 2020, entitled “Donald Trump’s four-step plan to reopen the US economy—and why it will be lethal”, Robert Reich commented on the underlying neoliberal agenda of this reopening strategy, as well as on the dangers it inherently posed.¹³² In addition, upon the announcement of Trump’s reopening plan, a chorus of expert voices warned that three essential pillars for such a plan to have the slightest chance of being successful, were still missing in the United States. According to these scientists and public health officials, these three pillars were: (1) mass testing to identify those who were contaminated, (2) contact tracing to isolate other people who might have caught Covid-19 from them, and (3) an ample supply of personal protective equipment (PPE) to shield frontline healthcare workers from any flare-up of the number of contamination cases.¹³³

According to Reich, the implementation of the plan of the Trump administration to reopen the economy by early-May 2020, in practice, started with an announcement made by Trump’s labour department. Furloughed labourers that did not accept an employer’s offer to return to work, would lose their unemployment benefits, regardless of Covid-19. Around the same moment, Trump’s ally, Iowa’s Republican governor, Kim Reynolds, similarly explained that labourers could not refuse to return to work for fear of contracting Covid-19, arguing that this would imply a voluntary dismissal which would make someone ineligible for benefits. In all these statements, no consideration for the health of the employee was considered relevant.¹³⁴

For Reich, it was clear:¹³⁵

Forcing people to choose between getting Covid-19 or losing their livelihood is inhumane. It is also nonsensical.

The neoliberal scheme to reopen the economy as quickly as possible and send the working classes of the American population back to the physical working floors as soon as possible, was not just based on the aforementioned threat of withdrawing social benefits (obfuscated with the classic austerity argument that these burden public finances too much).

More importantly, a twofold persuasion strategy was used.

The first part of this persuasion strategy concerned a deliberate concealment of the actual Covid-19 contamination figures, in order to convince workers of a false sense of security. According to Robert Reich, at the beginning of May 2020, no one had any clue how many Americans were infected, because the Trump administration deliberately continued “to drag its heels” on testing. E.g., Florida, one of the first states to reopen its economy, had simply stopped releasing medical examiners’ statistics on the number of Covid-19 victims because the figures were higher than the state’s official count. Not surprisingly, the White House at the time also blocked Dr Fauci from testifying before the US House of Representatives, apparently in order to stop him from presenting the members of the House (and, by extension, the American public) with accurate figures on the crisis.¹³⁶

Still according to Reich, the second step of this persuasion strategy was to convince the general public that lockdown and social distance measures affected their individual freedom too much and, therefore, clashed with the basic values of Western society. As much as this line of argument, going back to the writings of Ayn Rand (cf. Sect. 2.5.2), is, obviously, complete nonsense, it is nonetheless astonishing to witness to what extent this kind of propaganda has been successful (and even resonated far beyond the borders of the United States itself).¹³⁷

According to Reich, the Trump administration went incredibly far in deploying this persuasion strategy. Weeks before, Trump had already called on the general public to “LIBERATE” states such as Michigan, whose Democratic governor, Gretchen Whitmer, had mandated strict “stay-at-home rules”. At the time, Michigan purportedly had the third-highest number of Covid-19 related deaths in the United States, although it was only the 10th biggest states in terms of population. The Covid-19 virus had, more precisely, infected more than 41,000 Michigan residents and had led to the deaths of 3789, many of them in the Detroit area. When Whitmer had made the decision to extend Michigan’s lockdown measures until 28 May 2020, gun-toting protesters were reported to have rushed to the state house, while chanting: “Lock her up!” Rather than condemn the behaviour of these protesters, president Trump had responded by suggesting that Whitmer should “make a deal” with the group of protesters. “The Governor of Michigan should give a little, and put out the fire,” President Trump was reported of having tweeted, while continuing; “These are very good people, but they are angry. They want their lives back again, safely!” In another tweet, almost foreshadowing the events that preceded the attack on the US Capitol on 6 January 2021, President Trump had appealed to supporters of gun rights when he wrote: “LIBERATE VIRGINIA, and save your great 2nd Amendment. It is under siege!” Meanwhile, the US attorney general, William Barr, had directed the justice department to take legal action against any state or local authorities imposing lockdown measures that “could be violating the constitutional rights and civil liberties of individual citizens”.¹³⁸

Making lockdown, containment and other health and safety measures about “freedom” is in the opinion of Reich, obviously, absurd. Together with Reich, we can only argue that “freedom” is meaningless for people who have no choice but to accept (or return to) a job that will put both their health and life at risk.¹³⁹

As a final component of his “reopen the economy”-strategy, Trump even announced that he would seek to give reopening businesses a “liability shield” against legal action by workers or customers who would get infected by the Covid-19 virus. At the end of April 2020, Trump also announced that he would use the “Defense Production Act” in order to sign an executive order, forcing meat-processing plants to remain open despite extremely high rates of Covid-19 infections and deaths among meatpackers.¹⁴⁰ Such an executive order was ultimately signed on 28 April 2020. (Cf. Sect. 7.11.1.2.2.1.)

In a similar manner, the (at the time) US Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, insisted that the proposed legislation giving state and local governments the funding they desperately needed, had to include legal immunity for corporations that would cause workers or consumers to become infected. In the further opinion of Reich, such legal initiatives were not only immoral, but also completely absurd, raising the question how the economy could safely reopen if enterprises did not have any incentive to keep people safe, taken into further consideration that vague promises to provide protective gear and other safeguards are worthless absent the threat of damages if workers or customers would indeed get infected.¹⁴¹

It was, moreover, not only politicians who wanted the economy to reopen as soon as possible, and regardless of the cost for human lives among the working classes. Also, captains of industry joined in. E.g., during the spring of 2020, after having called government stay-at-home orders “fascist” and tweeting “FREE AMERICA NOW”, Elon Musk was reported to have reopened his Tesla factory in Fremont, California, even before health officials had declared that it was safe to do so. Almost immediately, 10 labourers of Tesla contracted the Covid-19 virus. As contamination cases mounted further, Musk simply fired labourers who had taken unpaid leave in order to protect themselves from being contaminated. Seven months later, at least 450 Tesla labourers had been infected with Covid-19.¹⁴²

Be this as it may, President Trump’s idea of reopening the economy had by the end of April 2020 obtained a huge resonance. One of the states that, at the time, announced its own reopening plan even ahead of the three-phase “Opening Up” Trump himself had in mind, was the state of Georgia, where the reopening was officially slated to start on Friday, 24 April 2020. Georgia announced it was about to allow hair salons, nail salons, massage therapists, bowling alleys and gyms—all, obviously, of the highest importance for the economy to function—to open again, with restrictions on the in-store density of consumers. In addition, movie theatres and restaurants were scheduled to reopen by Monday, April 27, 2020. Unfortunately, Georgia was not alone in its efforts to restart its economy. South Carolina, in a similar manner, albeit at a slower pace, began its own, limited store reopenings on Monday 20 April 2020, while Florida had already lifted a state order that had before closed public beaches. Texas was likewise allowing for some limited business reopenings as of Friday 24 April 2020, while Tennessee announced plans to reopen the majority of its businesses as of 1 May 2020.¹⁴³

By 20 May 2020, each state that had imposed a stay-at-home order earlier in the Covid-19 pandemic, had begun lifting the restrictions on enterprises and public areas. People were, in some cases, allowed to go back to restaurants, offices and places of worship. In response, some people effectively ventured out; however, other people would still continue to stay at home as much as possible. Health experts at the time declared that they wanted to see expanded testing and contact tracing of people who were suspected of having caught the Covid-19 virus, before they could validate such reopenings. Health experts similarly called for improved medical treatment options and vaccine development before even considering further step(s) of these reopening processes.¹⁴⁴

Nevertheless, in the period between 20 April 2020 until mid-May 2020, most of the states of the United States started their reopening process. Table 7.1 gives an indication of the first date, per state, on which such reopening started.

Table 7.1 Starting dates of reopening of US states^a

7.10.1.3 In-Between Evaluation

Throughout the further Covid-19 pandemic, the approach of easing restrictions as soon as Covid-19 contamination and Covid-19 related death numbers were somewhat under control again, would characterize the public policy of neoliberal governments all over the Western world, with the underlaying aim not so much the elimination, or mere containment of the Covid-19 pandemic, but rather to keep it within purportedly “reasonable” boundaries. As explained before, this policy approach resulted in a series of guided “accordion movements”, whereby the numbers of Covid-19 cases (both contamination cases and deaths) would go up (during reopening) or down (when reopened economies had to lock down again), as indicated above (cf. Sect. 2.2.6 and Table 2.1.).

7.10.2 Ensuring the Safety of Re-Opened Workplaces (Enough)

By the time the first calls to “reopen the economy” started resonating throughout the Western world, around the beginning of May 2020, the development of Covid-19 vaccines was still in an early stage (cf., furthermore, Chap. 9). If Western economies were to reopen, a comprehensive set of NPIs would be needed to avoid a second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. These would range from large-scale testing, monitoring and contact tracing, to enhanced personal hygiene recommendations and continued physical and social distance policies. In the meantime, working from home could remain a viable means of ensuring that some work could continue, without the risk of spreading the Covid-19 virus during commuting and working hours. This would however, remain a privilege for those few labourers who did not need to be physically present at their place of employment.¹⁴⁵

Incidentally, this connected back to a discriminatory policy within capitalist societies from a more distant past, in which a distinction was made between, on the one hand, so-called “(physical) blue-collar” workers who, in times of Covid-19, could not be sent back to the working floors quickly enough and, on the other hand, so-called “(intellectual) white-collar” workers for whom teleworking was deemed possible.¹⁴⁶

According to the already quoted ILO-report, in their search for methods to reopen the economy, most G20 countries resorted to specific policies for a supposedly safe return to work, often recommending a gradual return to the workplace based on several criteria. These included: (1) limiting the frequency and proximity of contacts between labourers and between labourers and customers, and (2) increasing the awareness and preparedness on how to deal with new outbreaks of the Covid-19 virus that were bound to occur.¹⁴⁷

Many return-to-work public policies required employers to carry out risk assessments and to provide safe labour conditions in accordance with a hierarchy of controls, as suggested by ILO guidelines on occupational safety and health management systems and on return-to-work policies.¹⁴⁸ In addition to government rules that described best practices, some enterprises were in need of more practical and/or financial support in order to implement these kinds of occupational health and safety practices (e.g., through tax credits). According to the ILO, in many countries, collective bargaining and social dialogue proved to be further key instruments in guaranteeing safer working environments. Guidelines and codes of best practice drawn up by the social partners, as well as agreements signed between employers and trade unions, as resorted to in e.g., France, Italy and Spain, have demonstrated how social dialogue and collective bargaining could complement public policy measures.¹⁴⁹

Without wishing to downplay the importance of such measures, one cannot escape the impression that in many cases they were simply “too little, too late”, as e.g. the events in the German meat processing industry (to which we shall return in more detail in Sect. 7.11.1) have shown.

Alongside these back-to-work rules, the effective isolation of infected labourers remained a central measure for curbing the spread of the Covid-19 disease. In order to ensure that such a policy could be implemented, isolated or quarantined labourers had to obtain a replacement income for the duration of their leave. A rule that proved highly effective concerned the automatic extension of sickness benefit rights, particularly for workers put in isolation or quarantine. This helped to prevent that people who contracted Covid-19, still kept working (either out of their own free will in cases where no replacement benefits were in force, or under pressure from their employer). More generally, it was considered important to maintain and apply extraordinary entitlement to sickness benefits and paid sick leave, and to extend these rights to groups of labourers who were not sufficiently covered under normal rules. The Covid-19 crisis in this regard accentuated long-standing deficiencies in the regulation of sickness benefits in a wide variety of countries. The ILO, therefore, advised these countries, some of which had introduced mandatory sick leave and benefits regulations for the first time in their history, to consider closing these gaps between categories of labourers permanently.¹⁵⁰

At the same time, in line with general neo-liberal policy, as soon as labourers who benefited from paid sick leave could safely put back to work, it was expected that they would be allowed to do so. In particular, it was considered important to avoid that paid sick leave schemes would become a route to disability benefits for the long-term unemployed, as had in the past occurred in some advanced G20 economies after a period of recession. For neoliberal policymakers, this general guideline was seen as even more crucial in the context of Covid-19, to the extent that some labourers on sick leave or under quarantine might not have been able to return to work or that their employers simply would not want them back. Linking workers that had been put on sick leave to vocational rehabilitation and employment services was, therefore, seen as essential to prevent a long-term exit from the labour market (which can, obviously, never be tolerated according to neoliberal principles).¹⁵¹

7.10.3 Adapting Job Retention Programmes

Still according to the ILO-report quoted before, job retention programmes, state-funded STW systems, and wage subsidy programmes, all helped to prevent an initial rise in unemployment during the early period of the Covid-19 crisis in many countries. However, such programmes are primarily developed to provide short-term critical aid in times of crisis, and cannot be used for a prolonged period of time. This is why, in the opinion of the ILO, these programmes had to be modified as the crisis persisted, in order to provide sufficient incentives for enterprises to keep running, and for employees to be sufficiently willing to return to viable employment. The ultimate goal of such modifications was, obviously, to reduce pressure on public budgets (in light of the prevailing fiscal austerity), as well as to avoid the risk that prolonged reemployment programmes would become an obstacle for recovery by slowing down the reallocation of jobs to more viable and productive enterprises. Concerns about potential abuses (by neoliberals, usually referred to as “profiteering”) had already been raised at the start of the Covid-19 crisis. These concerns, moreover, grew as some enterprises continued to claim subsidies for reduced working hours, even after labourers had returned to work.¹⁵²

In re-opening the economy, policymakers sought to focus job retention programmes on jobs that, despite a short-term risk of redundancy, were most likely to remain sufficiently viable in the longer term. In order to avoid a sudden wave of job redundancies, it was considered essential for job retention programmes to be carefully tailored to respond to evolving economic and health conditions, and account for sector-specific conditions.¹⁵³

To achieve this, governments could resort to a number of policy levers, such as:¹⁵⁴

• (1) Asking enterprises to bear part of the costs of short time working schemes themselves. This was believed to be a delicate exercise. Requiring enterprises to contribute to the costs of hours not worked, increased the incentive for them to limit the reallocation of jobs after the crisis (and, hence, to end certain jobs altogether). In order to avoid that sharing the financial burden of STW schemes would cause financial difficulties for the employers concerned, such employer participation could take the form of deferred payment or be vested on interest-free loans.

• (2) Resorting to time limits for the programmes in question—but with limits adapted to changing circumstances.

  E.g., limits on the maximum duration of job retention programmes were aimed to reduce the risk of supporting jobs that were no longer viable, even in the long term. However, the ultimate duration of job retention schemes had to be adjusted in line with the changing health and economic situation, which was not always easy to estimate.

• (3) Promoting worker mobility between subsidised and non-subsidised jobs: This could be accomplished by requiring, or allowing, workers on short-time working schedules to register with and receive government support for finding a new job (e.g., job search assistance, career guidance and training).

• (4) Promoting participation in training during reduced working hours.

  Using reduced working hours for training could help labourers to improve their productivity in their current job, or to improve their chances of finding another job. Several countries, therefore, encouraged training during short-time working by offering financial incentives to enterprises and/or labourers themselves. In other countries, participation in training programmes even was a condition for receiving subsidies for short-time work.

7.10.4 Ensuring Adequate Income Protection

As the Covid-19 crisis progressed, it was soon deemed unlikely that employment levels would return quickly to former trend levels in most G20 countries. Because of this, social protection systems were likely to come under pressure. The ILO, therefore, stressed the need to strike a balance between ensuring adequate income to the members of the working classes, including through job retention programmes, and encouraging active job search when employment growth would start to pick up.¹⁵⁵

Governments were advised to reassess the temporary schemes put in place in order to support the self-employed and small enterprises at the start of the Covid-19 crisis. These schemes had been designed to provide quick, preliminary assistance, often with limited attention to targeting. These schemes were usually not linked to previous earnings, which was to be introduced when the economy were to reopen again. More generally, there was the need to expand entitlements to out-of-work income support measures to the self-employed, as well as to labourers employed in other—more informal—forms of employment, to the same extent as those enjoyed by regular employees. Although the inclusion of the self-employed and the informal economy workers in social protection schemes faced various difficulties, especially on identifying their contributory income, several countries, nevertheless, succeeded in developing well-designed policies tailored to these kinds of labourers, including finding a right balance between non-contributory and contributory schemes.¹⁵⁶

As the Covid-19 crisis persisted, many jobseekers exhausted their entitlement to unemployment benefits. Labourers in non-standard jobs and informal workers without a replacement income were forced to exhaust their savings. It was feared that the number of claims for more “last resort” minimum income benefits, such as general social assistance and conditional and unconditional cash transfer programmes, would skyrocket. Effective targeting of these minimum income programmes was therefore considered vital, especially as budgetary pressures continued to increase. Nevertheless, governments were still recommended to ensure adequate financial support for those in need.¹⁵⁷

7.11 Some Case Studies

7.11.1 Meat Processing Factories

7.11.1.1 Introduction

7.11.1.1.1 Economic Background: The Iron Law of the Wages Having More Lives Than the Proverbial Cat

In our earlier work, a multitude of considerations have already been devoted to the contemporary scope of an ancient capitalist, economic principle known as the “Iron law of the wages”, the idea that any enterprise operating in accordance with capitalist principles, has to keep its wages—and similar employee related costs—as low as possible in order to achieve the highest possible profitability, so e.g., in our book “The unfree market and the law – On the immorality of making capitalism unbridled again”, where we wrote:¹⁵⁸

An equally alarming example of the capitalist principle that labour should be exploited as cheaply as is possible is obviously the migrant issue. In that sense, populist (political) opinion arguing that the failure to integrate migrants in many western countries has been caused by left-wing thinking (which has, above all, attempted to propagate that migrants should be given a worthy place within the Western societies), whereas in reality the migrant issue directly stems from the capitalist principle that labour should be exploited as cheaply as possible, even if this implies importing cheap labour forces from other countries, is both factually and morally completely wrong.

This method of importing cheap labour forces from other territories, especially to perform hard and hazardous labour, has indeed been used on a massive scale by many capitalist companies in the period after WOII, often even with explicit governmental approval.

However, this mass import of cheap labour, mainly to carry out the less pleasant jobs, has in most cases not been accompanied sufficiently by appropriate measures to effectively integrate the people providing the labour into the societies to which they were artificially drawn, resulting in the known migrant issues which many Western countries are facing today.

Obviously, many other harrowing examples can be given of the inhumane degradation caused by reducing the human being to a mere work force to be used in the capitalist production process at the cheapest price possible.

At the time of writing, we could not have predicted how true those words would ring only two years later. As the Covid-19 pandemic revealed its most glaring malpractices, in various Western countries on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, the slaughter- and meat processing industry turned out to mirror perfectly what we had written in 2018.

Indeed, Covid-19 brought to light that said industry applied the working methods of capitalism at its crudest, with as main characteristics: (1) A massive employment of cheap immigrants imported from foreign countries to be employed in dire conditions in highly profitable enterprises; (2) An extremely low wage policy; (3) Factory and working conditions that, for cost reasons, lacked even the most elementary safety and hygiene measures; (4) Housing of migrant workers in cheap accommodations that left much to be desired, even the most basic comfort, and (5) In short, living and working conditions that, bearing in mind the principle of the Iron law of the wages, were deliberately kept as rudimentary as possible, fully neglecting the safety and health risks concerned, even after the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic itself.

After having already exposed similar malpractices in the liberalized sectors of hospitals and long-term nursing homes (Cf. Chaps. 5 and 6), in 2020, Covid-19 thus also exposed extreme malpractices from the slaughterhouse and meat processing industry in an equally poignant way.

A further study of this latest travesty will hopefully give neoliberal adherents of trickle-down economics some pause before they further dismiss critiques of their theories and schemes as nonsense.

7.11.1.1.2 The Meat Processing Industry as One of the Spreading Industries of Covid-19

7.11.1.1.2.1 Working Floor Conditions

Throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, slaughterhouses and meat processing factories have proven to be a major vectors for Covid-19 infection. By the middle of 2020, outbreaks in this type of facilities were centre stage throughout the Western world, affecting entire communities and regions and necessitating intensive public health interventions.¹⁵⁹

Using county-level data from the United States, Taylor, Boulos and Almond found a strong correlation between livestock meat processing factories and Covid-19 transmission in the local communities located around them. These findings suggested that meat processing factories act(ed) as transmission vectors for surrounding communities and that they enhance(d) the spread of the Covid-19 virus beyond what would have been probable based on population risk characteristics alone. Taylor, Boulos and Almond made a further estimation that, by 21 July 2020, the total excess Covid-19 contamination cases related to proximity around meat processing factories in the United States amounted to between 236,000 and 310,000 (equalling 6–8% of all American contamination cases), and deaths between 4300 and 5200 (equalling 3–4% of all American Covid-19 related deaths), with the vast majority of these contamination cases and deaths likely to be associated with community spread outside of these facilities. The association suggested by these authors primarily concerned large meat processing factories and/or large meat packing plants. Moreover, Taylor, Boulos and Almond found evidence that meat processing factory closures mitigated county-wide cases and that such factories that had obtained permission from the USDA (the Department of Agriculture) for enhancing the speed of their production lines had experienced more Covid-19 cases at a county-wide level.¹⁶⁰ Taylor, Boulos and Almond also indicated that the presence of a slaughtering factory in a US county was related to four to six more cases of Covid-19 per thousand population, an increase of between 51 and 75% over the baseline rate. The authors also pointed to a rise in mortality from 0.07 to 0.1 Covid-19 related deaths per thousand population, an increase which amounted to between 37 and 50% over the baseline rate.¹⁶¹

Taylor, Boulos and Almond, furthermore, indicated that a temporary closure of a high-risk meat processing (or similar) factory was followed by a decrease in the growth rate of Covid-19 contamination cases. The authors also found that smaller, decentralised meat processing factories did not seem to add to Covid-19 transmission.¹⁶²

Slaughterhouses and meat processing factories were thus quickly upon the outbreak of Covid-19 identified as environments conducive to the transmission of SARS-CoV-2, due to several reasons: (1) The Covid-19 virus appeared to thrive in both low temperatures and very high, or very low relative humidity; (2) Metal surfaces were believed to retain live Covid-19 viruses longer than other surfaces or materials; (3) Dense aerosol production, combining elements such as dust, feathers and excrement, occurred in these meat processing factories, while the continued and intense use of water carries these materials onto all possible surfaces, creating a further ideal environment for the spread of the Covid-19 virus; (4) Due to loud noise, labourers have to talk loudly, or even shout, in order to be understood over the noise of machines and animals, which releases more droplets and spreads them further; (5) Working floors are crowded, with people having to walk around a lot, which makes physical and social distancing extremely difficult.¹⁶³ Other environmental issues that already were believed to contribute to the spread of the Covid-19 virus, that at the time still needed further investigation, but that since then have been clarified, included (6) the likelihood of airborne spread of the Covid-19 virus, and the role of air cooling or heating and filtration systems.¹⁶⁴

Research into the circumstances surrounding a huge Covid-19 outbreak that occurred from May to July 2020 in the German meat processing plant “Tönnies” (cf., furthermore, Sect. 7.11.1.2.3.3), in addition, suggested that circumstances in the cutting room of a meat processing plant could favour the spread of the Covid-19 virus over distances of more than 8 m.¹⁶⁵ This same research also pointed to the fact that all infections during “a first wave” of the huge Covid-19 outbreak that had occurred within the Tönnis factories (namely in May 2020) had originated from a single employee.¹⁶⁶ Specifically, this first Covid-19 outbreak in the Tönnies factories had occurred because an employee of the slaughterhouse had come into contact with employees of an infected factory of a different slaughterhouse, “WestCrown”, located in Dissen. The housing of the labourers had not yet played a major role in this first outbreak in the Tönnies plant that occurred at the end of May 2020. However, the latter factor became all the more important when, in mid-June 2020, a more severe, condensing outbreak of the Covid-19 virus hit Tönnies again, eventually forcing the meatpacking enterprise to shut down for up to a month.¹⁶⁷

The quoted researchers had also taken a closer look at the routes that had most likely been taken by the Covid-19 virus between the first contaminated employee and the other Tönnies workers.¹⁶⁸ The researchers found that most of the employee’s colleagues who had been working within an 8-metre radius around him, had also tested positive for Covid-19. In the quoted study, it was therefore assumed that Covid-19 virus particles could be transmitted over longer distances under the conditions of a meat processing plant.¹⁶⁹ According to the researchers, the Covid-19 virus had, moreover, already spread in May 2020: The virus had transmitted in rooms of the factory where the air was circulated and cooled to 10 degrees Celsius. In addition, the supply of fresh air in these rooms had been low, while heavy physical work had been carried out. Under these conditions, a distance of 1.5 to 3 m was no longer considered sufficient to prevent Covid-19 transmission.¹⁷⁰

Although sharing flats, bedrooms or carpooling did not play a role in the first outbreak of Covid-19 in Tönnies factories in May 2020, the researchers pointed to the fact that these factors were likely to have played a major role in the second, larger outbreak around the Tönnies meat processing factories that occurred in mid-June 2020.¹⁷¹ The researchers, in addition, concluded that this second outbreak was caused by Covid-19 cases linked to the first outbreak.¹⁷² (Cf., furthermore, Sect. 7.11.1.2.3.3).

As a result of (this and previous similar) outbreaks of Covid-19 in livestock slaughterhouses and meat processing factories, meat processing enterprises around the world were urged to resort to risk assessments and to implement a sequence of protocols aimed at preventing further Covid-19 contamination outbreaks. These measures included: (1) Staggering start, finish and break times for different groups of labourers; (2) Reducing crowd assemblies through creating outdoor break areas; and (3) Installing barriers between labourers, especially those working on meat production lines.¹⁷³ Soon after the first Covid-19 contamination cases were detected in this type of factories, it was also advised that labourers would be screened regularly for Covid-19 related symptoms, including fever, e.g., upon arrival at work, which would allow for quick isolation when necessary.¹⁷⁴ Other recommendations related to operational procedures, such as decreasing the rate of animal and carcass processing, requiring face covering, incorporating good practice in the safe fitting and removal of PPE, installing non-contact time clocks and resorting to improved cleaning and disinfection protocols. It was also recommended that health education materials for staff would be culturally appropriate and would be made available in all relevant languages in light of the workforce present. Other early recommendations implied that face masks were to be mandatory on board of all means of mass transport, and that employers should begin to motivate their labourers (1) not to report to work if they were ill, or showing Covid-19 related symptoms, (2) to immediately report all possible symptoms, and (3) to self-isolate when necessary. Adequate sick pay was also considered of vital importance during any absence from work.¹⁷⁵

7.11.1.1.2.2 Socio-Demographic Factors and Working Conditions

At the beginning of 2020, the European meat industry employed nearly one million workers and contained more than 32,000 enterprises, with meat production accounting for 1.53% of EU GDP. As a result of neo-liberal public policies, the European meat processing sector was characterised for decades already, by social dumping practices and aggressive competition between enterprises, both nationally and across borders, which had led to a real “race to the bottom” with regard to wages and general labour conditions.¹⁷⁶ In addition, pressure from retailers had led to a policy of price cutting for years. Competition from outside the EU was also indicated as an important factor for explaining the working conditions prevailing in the sector.¹⁷⁷

The meat processing sector in general is considered to be a “fragmented industry”, based on excess capacity and, therefore, subjected to cost pressure originating from the more powerful customers (such as supermarkets) who have access to imported products as well, and can easily exert pressure on prices. As a result, margins within the industry are low and volatile. In most countries, large meat processing factories have, furthermore, obtained the largest share of the market, or are in the process of expanding rapidly.¹⁷⁸

In this context, employers saw themselves forced to adopt aggressive labour-related strategies that have affected employees in various ways, such as: (1) acceleration of line processing, with important consequences on both health and safety; (2) pressure for flexible working conditions; (3) lowering wages and working standards; and (4) increased reliance on precarious labourers.¹⁷⁹

Meat processing factories are by definition of a labour-intensive nature. Although modern processing factories have been reported to have made ergonomic improvements in the course of the last years, repetitive strain injuries still commonly occur, and such do incidents such as cuts, slips and falls. The general labour conditions are considered to be rather harsh: they are e.g., cold, of a boring and repetitive nature, and requiring physical strength and fitness. It is, hence, not surprising that employee turnover rates in the meat processing sector are high in most European countries. As the result of a combination of these factors, an increasing number of labourers within the industry are suffering from a variety of occupational diseases, such as musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs), as well as from psychosocial problems at work (such as work-related stress).¹⁸⁰

The socio-demographic factors and working conditions of the sector implicated in the Covid-19 epidemics that occurred in slaughterhouses and meat processing factories on a global scale are all characteristic of exploitative capitalism at its worst. The sector has: (1) a young workforce, more likely to suffer from asymptomatic Covid-19 contamination; (2) precarious and poorly paid jobs that discourage workers from disclosing their symptoms for fear of punishment; (3) long working hours and coercive labour agreements and conditions; (4) heavy reliance on migrant labourers, (5) housing in inadequate and overcrowded accommodations, (6) transport from and to work taking place in overcrowded buses, and (7) limited or no hygiene and safety measures.¹⁸¹

According to a detailed report from the EFFAT, trade unions have in the recent past identified the following specific concerns:¹⁸²

• (1) Job insecurity: Low wages and long working hours are the norm in meat processing factories.

• (2) A large proportion of the personnel employed in the European meat processing sector are cross-border or migrant labourers originating from both the EU and third countries. Many of the people employed in meat processing factories in Western European countries originate from Central and Eastern European countries (CEECs), under the EU’s free movement of labour-principle.¹⁸³

• (3) Wage disparities with regard to labourers directly employed by the meat processing enterprises are generally relevant.

• (4) Wage deductions for housing, transport and even working tools are often directly imposed on migrant and cross-border workers.

• (5) Due to low wages, labourers often must share overcrowded accommodation, which is sometimes even directly linked to their employment contract or owned by the employer, whether it is a subcontractor or a temporary work agency.

In view of the many outbreaks in the meat processing industry during the first half of 2020, the IUF, in collaboration with Dr Nabarro—Professor of Public Health at Imperial College London and WHO Special Envoy for Covid-19—started a more in-depth investigation into the problems that the European meat processing industry at the time was facing and that made it especially vulnerable to outbreaks of Covid-19 (and similar viruses). According to the results of their preliminary research, published in a report of 25 June 2020 (entitled “Covid-19 outbreaks in slaughterhouses and meat processing plants”) by the European Federation of Food, Agriculture and Tourism Trade Unions (EFFAT), the following factors have been identified as contributing to the enormous spread of the Covid-19 virus in meat processing factories:¹⁸⁴

• (1) Lack of social distancing: Labourers of meat processing factories often work shoulder-to-shoulder, in close proximity to one another, on processing lines. Although staggered shifts and breaks may be used to promote physical distancing, not all meat processing enterprises showed a sufficient willingness to resort to such practices during the first period of the Covid-19 pandemic, as this was said to slow down production. It is believed that this lack of social and even physical distancing policies has contributed to the spread of the Covid-19 virus.

• (2) Poor housing conditions: In almost all EU countries (but also in the United States), the meat processing sector is heavily dependent on migrant and cross-border labourers. Labourers often live in overcrowded flats, in many cases provided by their employers, with sometimes several people living in one room. Said labourers, moreover, continue to live in such unacceptable accommodations for two main reasons: (1) Because housing is often part of their employment agreement, or (2) Because their wages are too low to provide for better living accommodations, and because they may try and save money to get better housing. Obviously, respecting social and even physical distancing in these arrangements is usually impossible.

• (3) Lack of inspections: In many countries, the frequency of health or labour inspections decreased significantly during the Covid-19 pandemic. This is believed to have attributed to more breaches of the law and violations of health and safety precautions issued to protect labourers during the Covid-19 pandemic.

• (4) Joint transport: Many labourers in the meat industry travel to their working place by public transport or carpooling, often even provided directly by employers. In many cases, measures to ensure social or physical distancing during transport could not be respected.

• (5) Ventilation: In many meat processing factories, especially older ones, there was no or poor ventilation, which provided for a further breathing ground for the spread of the Covid-19 virus.

• (6) PPE: Personal protective equipment, especially face mask wearing, was already considered essential at early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic, with recommendations that such proper PPE had to be provided and used in the working place in a systemic manner. This did not always happen in meat processing plants.

• (7) Cold: Some parts of meat processing plants are inevitably very cold. The Covid-19 virus is more easily transmitted in colder temperatures. This aspect has often not been sufficiently considered.

• (8) Job insecurity and lack of social protection: The employment conditions of many meat processing labourers at the time were extremely precarious. In addition, the level of sickness benefits could be very low or inexistent. This led to the fact that, in the event of the onset of Covid-19 symptoms, some labourers were not inclined to report their condition for fear of losing their job, or not being able to afford to live decently on sick pay alone.

The cited 2020 EFFAT report mentions that, after some bad experiences with Covid-19 outbreaks in meat processing factories, many European countries adopted precautionary measures for safeguarding the health and safety of labourers for the duration of the Covid-19 pandemic. These measures were, in some cases, adopted at government level, while in other cases, they were enacted through collective labour agreements at cross-industry or sectoral level. These measures included, amongst others, a duty to provide information on the risks of the Covid-19 virus, temperature control at the entrance of the meat processing facilities, filling in forms containing questions on the labourers’ health status, hygiene measures, staggered work shifts to ensure physical and social distancing, the use of PPE, modifications of workstation design with, e.g., the installation of plexiglass, modifications of the design of communal areas (such as canteens, changing rooms …) in order to ensure physical and social distancing, clear processes for dealing with labourer illness, etc. The earlier referred to preliminary research by the IUF in collaboration with Dr Nabarro, further indicated that after these measures had been adopted and adhered to, the level of Covid-19 contamination afterwards became fairly limited, although it was also pointed out that these measures proved insufficient in cases where labourers lived together in overcrowded accommodations.¹⁸⁵

In a report dated from 1 until 8 May 2020,¹⁸⁶ the US CDC reached similar conclusions. This report indicated that, in investigating early outbreaks of Covid-19 in meat processing factories, the CDC had identified several common characteristics regarding both meat processing facilities and their labourers that were likely to increase the risk of transmission of Covid-19. Challenges identified by the CDC for such meat processing facilities included structural and operational practices that made it difficult to maintain a 6-foot (2-meter) distance while working, particularly on production lines, as well as in non-production areas during breaks and upon entrance and exit of the facility. The CDC report also indicated that the pace and the severe physical demands of meat processing often made it difficult to fully comply with face mask recommendations, with some labourers even mentioning that they only covered their mouths and frequently replayed their face masks while performing labour. It was also indicated that some meat processing factories had difficulty meeting the enhanced cleaning and disinfection guidelines recommended for all working places for reducing the transmission of the Covid-19 virus.¹⁸⁷

The socio-cultural and socio-economic challenges of Covid-19 prevention in American meat and poultry processing plants, moreover, included addressing the needs of labourers originating from varied backgrounds and speaking a variety of primary languages (with one factory reporting that its workforce spoke 40 primary languages). This required original approaches to educating and training labourers and supervisors on safety and health information. Specific problems were about reports of labourers being encouraged, or forced, to continue to work while ill or when showing Covid-19 related symptoms. This was often due to medical and disability leave conditions (or the absence thereof) and attendance rewards that encouraged to continue to work during sickness or when showing symptoms. Finally, as in Europe, labourers were reported to often live in shared and crowded accommodations, often of a multi-generational nature. Labourers also often shared the same means of transport to and from work. Allowing labourers to keep a physical distance outside the premises of the factories themselves could easily be achieved by measures like increasing the number of vehicles used and by reducing the number of passengers per vehicle. This would already have already reduced the risk of transmission outside the meat processing facilities themselves.¹⁸⁸

7.11.1.2 Outbreaks in Specific Regions/Countries

7.11.1.2.1 General

According to the previously cited study undertaken by Taylor, Boulos and Almond, the livestock and poultry processing industry forms an essential component of the global food supply chain. Especially in the United States, the meat processing industry forms a large industry, employing around 500,000 people. The meat processing industry is also a highly concentrated one: It is estimated that the four biggest American, pork and poultry processing enterprises serve up to 55 and 85% of their respective markets. The degree of concentration in the American meat processing sector is, moreover, much larger than in the EU, where the 15 largest meat processing meat factories are said to account for about 28% of EU meat production only.¹⁸⁹

The first big outbreaks of Covid-19 in slaughterhouses and meat processing plants in Germany occurred as early as May-June 2020, when public health authorities were first confronted with a huge outbreak of Covid-19 in Gütersloh, North Rhine-Westphalia. More than 1500 of the 7000 meat processing labourers had tested positive for Covid-19, and 640,000 inhabitants of two affected counties were sent back to confinement.¹⁹⁰ Similarly, at one of Portugal’s largest poultry slaughterhouses, at least 129 of 300 meat processing labourers had contracted Covid-19. The enterprise concerned was subsequently closed for a week, with additional measures including screening and testing of all labourers, besides setting up new cleaning areas and enhancing disinfection protocols.¹⁹¹ The first outbreaks of Covid-19 in England and Wales were also said to have been at and around meat processing factories located in Anglesey, Merthyr Tydfil, Wrexham and Kirklees.¹⁹²

All of these outbreaks were part of larger flare-ups of the Covid-19 pandemic that occurred in the United States and Europe—an illustrative sample of which will be discussed in some more detail in the following subsections.

7.11.1.2.2 The United States

7.11.1.2.2.1 The US Livestock- and Poultry-Processing Industry and Its Inherent Vulnerability for Covid-19

Again according to Taylor, Boulos and Almond, on the eve of the Covid-19 outbreak, the livestock and poultry processing industry in the United States was characterized by a process of consolidation into fewer and larger factories that had already been going on for decades. By 2020, meat production per individual factory had tripled since 1976. By the end of November 2020, 12 American meat processing enterprises were reported to produce more than 50% of the American beef, with 12 further enterprises producing more than 50% of the American pork.¹⁹³

Already shortly after the Covid-19 outbreak, early spreads of the Covid-19 virus were reported in the American livestock processing industry. This resulted in greater attention and updated safety advice from the part of the USCDC. As a result, several meat processing factories had already been forced to close.¹⁹⁴

In late April 2020, US President Donald Trump announced that he would use the “Defense Production Act” in order to sign an executive order that would force meat processing plants to remain open, despite knowing the extremely high rates of Covid-19 contamination cases and related deaths among labourers in the industry.¹⁹⁵ This executive order was ultimately signed on 28 April 2020.¹⁹⁶ The federal executive order qualified the status of livestock slaughtering and processing factories as “critical infrastructure” for national security reasons and required them to remain open.¹⁹⁷

At the time, work patterns in the US livestock processing industry showed several characteristics that made their factories especially susceptible to local respiratory virus outbreaks. In a similar manner as the already above quoted EFFAT-report (cf. Sect. 7.11.1.1.2.2), the CDC mentioned the following characteristics of the meat processing industry as potential risk factors adding to the spread of Covid-19: long working days in continuous close proximity to co-workers, difficulties to properly cover the face due to physical work-related demands, besides joint transportation among labourers. The CDC-report also hypothesised that an increased speed of production lines because of technological improvements, as well as changes in corporate policies, could have enhanced the transmission of the Covid-19 virus. In addition, in order to preserve meat after slaughter, meat processing areas had to be kept between 0 and 12 °C, with such low temperatures having been associated with an increased risk of Covid-19 contamination. Moreover, studies had suggested that industrial climate control systems applied for cooling and ventilating meat processing facilities may have promoted the spread of pathogenic bioaerosols, one of the suspected transmission routes for the Covid-19 virus.¹⁹⁸

Still according to Taylor, Boulos and Almond, meat processing labourers’ socio-economic status and work practices may have added to the huge degree of infection and transmission. Among so-called frontline meat processing labourers in the United States, 45% were at the time classified as “low-income”, 80% as people of colour, and 52% as immigrants, many of whom were “undocumented” and did not have ready access to health care and other social and labour protections that could have facilitated prevention and treatment. In addition, labourers at meat processing facilities were believed to have been incentivised to continue working even if they were ill or showing Covid-19 related symptoms. This has to a large extent been attributed to corporate policies on sick leave and attendance bonuses. Furthermore, as the meatpacking industry had consolidated over the decades, it had potentially increased its monopsonist power in labour markets, which was increasingly linked to greater occupational risks.¹⁹⁹

Other research has shown that by mid-May 2020, nearly half of the Covid-19 outbreaks—12 out of 25—in the United States had been linked to meat processing factories where poultry, pigs and cattle are slaughtered and packaged. This had in its own turns led to a resurgence of the Covid-19 virus in many small American towns and had prompted calls for urgent reforms in the meat processing industry that was considered being plagued by health and safety issues. E.g., in Nebraska, by mid-May 2020, five counties had experienced Covid-19 outbreaks that could be traced back to meat processing factories. One of these counties was Dakota County, where at the time, about one in 14 residents tested positive for Covid-19, which at the time was the second highest per capita infection rate in the United States. As of 14 May 2020, the Nebraska counties of Dakota, Hall, Dawson, Saline and Colfax, furthermore, accounted for nearly half of the 9075 Covid-19 contamination cases in the state. According to further figures provided by the International Union of Food and Commercial Workers, as referred to by Lakhani, by then, at least 30 meat processing factory labourers had died due to Covid-19-related complications, while more than 10,000 meat processing labourers had been infected by or exposed to the Covid-19 virus.²⁰⁰ Still according to Lakhani, in Nobles County, Minnesota, nearly 500 meat processing workers at a large Brazilian-owned JBS pork processing factory had tested positive for Covid-19. Because of the activities of these meat processing factories, the Covid-19 outbreak spread much more rapidly throughout the county, with 1291 confirmed Covid-19 contamination cases as of 13 May 2020, up from only a handful by mid-April 2020. At that time, about one in seventeen people in the county were reported to test positive for Covid-19.²⁰¹

7.11.1.2.2.2 The Case of Smithfield Foods Pork-Processing

One of the first cases of a (huge) Covid-19 outbreak in a meat processing plant in the United States was at the Smithfield Foods pork processing factory in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. The plant—referred to as “a massive eight-storey white box perched on the banks of the Big Sioux River”—ranked in March 2020 as the ninth largest pork processing factory in the United States. When operating at full potential, the factory could process 19,500 freshly slaughtered pigs per day, purportedly “slicing, grinding and smoking” the freshly slaughtered meat into millions of pounds of meat end-products, such as sliced bacon, hot dogs and hams. Counting over 3700 labourers, the enterprise was at the same time the fourth largest employer of the city.²⁰²

According to Mitchell, on 26 March 2020, the local newspaper “Argus Leader” posted an article on its website that a labourer employed by Smithfield Foods had tested positive for Covid-19.²⁰³ A spokeswoman of the enterprise explained that the worker had been put under quarantine for 14 days and that his workplace and other common areas that he frequented had been “thoroughly disinfected”. The local paper also quoted the USCDC as having declared that there was no evidence that Covid-19 was to be associated with food, and that “there is likely very low risk of spread from food products or packaging that are kept over a period of days or weeks at ambient, refrigerated, or frozen temperatures.”²⁰⁴

However, the factory—which was later qualified as part of so-called “critical infrastructure industry” for national security reasons by the Trump administration (c. Sect. 7.11.1.2.2.1)—would remain fully operational. In a video statement that was released and put online on 19 March 2020, Smithfield CEO Kenneth Sullivan declared similarly that food was an essential part of the American people’s lives and that the enterprise’s more than 40,000 US team members, next to thousands of American family farms and a wide variety of other supply chain partners formed a vital part of the country’s response to the Covid-19 virus, in this manner attempting to justify the decision to keep Smithfield’s factories open. The company’s CEO added that Smithfield was taking the utmost precautions for ensuring the health and well-being of its labourers and of the consumers of its products.²⁰⁵

At the time, Smithfield’s labour force consisted largely of immigrants and refugees from countries such as Myanmar, Ethiopia, Nepal, Congo and El Salvador. Eighty different languages were reported of being spoken in the factory. Estimates about the average hourly wages ranged from USD 14 to USD 16 per hour. Working hours were said to be long, the labour was considered to be back-breaking, and being positioned along a production line often simply implied being less than one foot away from one’s colleagues on either side of the line.²⁰⁶

On 9 April 2020, with 80 confirmed contamination cases of Covid-19, Smithfield issued a statement in which it was formally indicated that the factory would close for three subsequent days over the Easter weekend to come for a thorough clean-up, and that it would only return to full capacity on the following Tuesday. The announcement explained in more detail that the factory would suspend meat processing operations at large parts of the plant on 11 April 2020, and that it would subsequently close completely on 12 April 2020 and 13 April 2020. However, it later emerged that Smithfield labourers were still called in to work during all these three days. Video footage was taken of the company’s car park full of cars and of large groups of labourers entering the factory buildings. The plant had reportedly continued to operate at around 60–65% capacity, implying that hundreds of labourers had continued to perform their labour.²⁰⁷

By 15 April 2020, when the Smithfield factory ultimately did close under pressure of the South Dakota governor’s office, the factory had become the number one source of new contamination cases in the United States, with a cluster as huge as 644 confirmed Covid-19 contamination cases among Smithfield labourers and people who had contracted the Covid-19 virus from them. In total, Smithfield-related contamination cases accounted for 55% of all the state’s cases, which at the time far outnumbered neighbouring and much more populous Midwestern states in terms of Covid-19 contamination cases per capita. These official figures were released one day after the first Smithfield labourer had died in hospital.²⁰⁸

7.11.1.2.3 Germany

7.11.1.2.3.1 Introduction

In Germany, outbreaks in several meat processing factories during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic affected entire regions and even initiated local lockdowns (after the national lockdown had come to an end already).²⁰⁹

According to the already referred to EFFAT-report, it has especially been the difficult employment and housing conditions that many meat processing labourers had to undergo, that contributed the most to the spread of the Covid-19 virus in Germany’s meat processing factories. One of the central causes why labouring conditions in German meat processing factories were so bad was the sector’s subcontracting system. This subcontracting system had for almost two decades been a major cause of social dumping in the meat processing and slaughterhouse sector in Germany, and—following in Germany’s footsteps—gradually also in the rest of Europe. This system is a textbook example of capitalistic malpractices, and had already, before the outbreak of the pandemic, resulted in thousands of job losses in other EU countries, especially in neighbouring countries such as Denmark, France, the Netherlands and Belgium.²¹⁰

At the beginning of 2020, around 110,000 labourers were reportedly employed by Germany’s meat processing sector. Around 30,000 of these were believed to be employed by subcontractors. The employees of these subcontracting firms were mostly migrant and cross-border labourers originating from Central and Eastern European countries (abbreviated as “CEEC”). In Germany’s large meat processing enterprises (such as, e.g., “Danish Crown”, “Tönnies”, “Westfleisch”, “Vion”), the number of labourers employed by means of this business practice were said to represent about 80–90% of the total labour force. All the core activities of Germany’s meat processing factories (ranging from receiving, unloading, slaughtering, cold storage, pre-cutting, fine cutting, packaging to distribution of the livestock or poultry) were generally performed by these subcontractors. This allowed meat processing enterprises to substantially reduce labour costs (e.g., wages and compulsory social benefits) and to avoid liability for labour rights violations. The practice had also allowed the big meat processing enterprises to evade and circumvent social mandatory requirements, such as wage levels and social security contributions, and even corporate taxes. Labourers who were officially employed by subcontractors, in practice operated on the meat processing enterprise’s premises and, although the meat processing enterprises claimed to bear no legal responsibility for these labourers, they clearly had a decisive influence on the working and employment conditions. In practice, the foremen of the meat processing enterprise were the ones who gave direct orders to the labourers employed by the subcontracting firm(s). This generally applied system of avoiding mandatory legal rules was believed to be one of the main drivers for a continuous “race to the bottom” in terms of wages and labour conditions throughout the German meat processing industry, which had even led to neighbouring countries following the (bad) German example.²¹¹

At the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, a vast majority of these “subcontracted labourers” were bound by a German employment contract and officially employed by a German subcontractor. This implied that their employment relationships were governed by German law (e.g., on matters such as working time, health and safety provisions, remuneration …). Important alterations to the applicable German legislation had occurred in 2015 when, in response to pressure from trade unions, a statutory minimum wage had been introduced (at 9.35 euros per hour). Also in 2015 and because of the same reasons, several of Germany’s big meat processing enterprises, including “Danish Crown”, “Tönnies”, “Vion” and “Westfleisch”, had joined a “voluntary declaration” (in German: “Freiwillige Selbstverpflichtung”) in accordance with which they committed to no longer resorting to legal persons established under the law of other countries for posting labourers to Germany. Another important alteration of the legislative framework had occurred in 2017, through the so-called “GSA Fleisch” (or, in full, the “Gesetz zum Schutz der Arbeitnehmerrechte in der Fleischwirtschaft”). This law brought along some new restrictions on the practice of social dumping through subcontracting, such as a prohibition on wage deductions for financing work tools used by the labourers. Despite these changes to the legislative framework, the labour conditions of labourers employed in the German meat processing sector remained poor. At the beginning of 2020, when the Covid-19 crisis broke loose, the subcontracting system, which until then had been one the main causes of labour rights violations and social dumping practices in Germany, also became one of the main causes for the spread of Covid-19.²¹²

Labourers employed by the subcontractors of meat processing enterprises generally performed between 48 and 65 working hours per week, while their colleagues directly employed by the meat processing enterprises themselves normally performed “only” around 40 working hours per week (up to 48 working hours per week). This implied that for labourers under contract with a subcontractor, the working day could amount to up to 16 h, and this six days a week. Wage disparities between labourers employed by subcontractors and labourers employed by the meat processing enterprises themselves, could be similarly significant. Labourers under contract with subcontractors were reported to earn on average around 40–50% less than labourers directly employed by the meat processing enterprises themselves. This far lower pay was mostly the result of unpaid overtime, as the working hours performed by labourers employed by subcontractors were often not properly recorded. E.g., It was still a common practice to record worked hours by handwritten note, obviously leading to many accidental and deliberate mistakes. A further common, albeit illegal practice that still characterized the employment trough subcontractors, were deductions from the labourers’ take-home pay for work materials (ranging from knives, to aprons, gloves …). As these illegal deductions were often applied to wages already at a minimum level, the practice pushed labourers employed by subcontractors into poverty. Housing accommodations were in most cases also extremely poor. Labourers employed by subcontractors often had no other choice than to agree to live in overcrowded flats, with joint bathrooms and with even reported cases of five or six people having to share a single dormitory. These forms of accommodation were, moreover, usually provided directly or indirectly by the subcontractor himself. In other words, the legal employer, i.e., the subcontractor, was in many cases also the landlord. This per definition made the labourers doubly dependent on their legal employer, who in many cases, also deducted the rent due by a labourer (often amounting to between 200 and 350 euros per month for a single room) directly from the labourer’s salary. Most employment contracts between a subcontractor and a labourer were temporary. This implied that job insecurity was extremely high. This is especially relevant, as many labourers hired by a subcontractor, when they experienced symptoms of the Covid-19 virus, did not want to report their illness out of fear of losing their employment. The role played by labour intermediaries operating in the country of origin of the labourers hired by the subcontractors, formed a similar matter of concern. The vast majority of labourers employed by (usually German) subcontractors, usually arrived in Germany under the “free movement of workers” that applies in the EU. A recruitment agency, or other type of labour intermediary, located in the (CEE) country of origin, was usually the one who recruited the candidates. This intermediary would also charge candidates various fees and costs related to recruitment and travel to the destination country. Once these candidates arrived in Germany, they got legally employed by a German subcontractor. The latter was in many cases but a mailbox company with only an elementary office in Germany and with a limited number of German employees. There were, moreover, in most cases close links between the intermediary from the country of departure and the subcontractor established under German law.²¹³

As already mentioned before, a clear lack of proper inspections during the Covid-19 crisis has formed another factor in the huge spread of the Covid-19 virus in Germany’s meat processing enterprises. However, inspections in the German meat processing sector did not function properly under normal circumstances either. To put it simply: the meat processing factories were not inspected enough by both federal and local authorities.²¹⁴

7.11.1.2.3.2 Several Early Outbreaks in Meat Processing Factories

Already in May 2020, after an outbreak in a meat processing factory located in the town of Coesfeld, near the city of Münster, the state of North Rhine-Westphalia was the first to resort to an “emergency mechanism” for postponing the lifting of the federal containment restrictions in the administrative district of Coesfeld. The localised spike in Covid-19 cases occurred in Coesfeld after a test of 200 labourers of the Westfleisch meat processing factory had indicated that 151 of them had tested positive for Covid-19. The factory was subsequently closed. Elsewhere, 109 meat processing labourers had tested positive for Covid-19 at a factory in Bad Bramstedt, in the Segeberg district. In addition, more than 200 labourers of Romanian origin had tested positive for Covid-19 at a slaughterhouse located in Birkenfeld, Baden-Wurttemberg. And a meat processing factory located in Schleswig-Holstein had to be shut down after 128 of its labourers had tested positive for Covid-19.²¹⁵

These were just some of the most relevant early cases of Covid-19 outbreaks throughout German meat processing factories. Further outbreaks would soon afterwards be reported in many other facilities all over the country.²¹⁶

But the biggest outbreak of Covid-19 in a German meat processing plant during the first half of 2020 was reported in a Tönnies plant in Rheda-Wiedenbrueck (North Rhine-Westphalia). The Tönnies slaughterhouse and meat processing facility, considered to be the largest in Europe, at the time employed 7000 labourers, of whom, in June 2020, over 1550 tested positive for Covid-19. The factory was closed down on 18 June 2020. All labourers who had tested positive for Covid-19, as well as their relatives, had to be quarantined. Various police units (and even the army) had to be deployed in order to ensure compliance with preventive measures.²¹⁷

Given the scale and importance of this Covid-19 outbreak in the Tönnies plant, it will be discussed in more detail in the next subsection.

7.11.1.2.3.3 Tönnies

After there had already been many cases of slaughterhouses/meat processing factories with Covid-19 outbreaks, on June 10, 2020, it was reported that there had been 29 new Covid-19 contamination cases in the Gütersloh district, 27 of which were at a slaughterhouse belonging to Germany’s largest meat processing company “Tönnies”, located in Rheda-Wiedenbrück.

Because of a previous Covid-19 outbreak at “Westfleisch”, in the Coesfeld district, the Ministry in North Rhine-Westphalia had issued mandatory tests at slaughterhouses and/or meat processing factories. However, by the time these tests were to be conducted, the Tönnies enterprise had already started to carry out its own screenings. Tönnies had declared that the infection-risk in its factories had motivated them to start performing their own tests. The enterprise, which had already faced an outbreak of Covid-19 in May 2020 (cf. Sect. 7.11.1.1.2.1), declared that it would do everything possible to reduce the risk of new infections to a minimum within the framework of occupational health and safety rules incumbent on it.²¹⁸

By 15 June 2020, another 46 people tested positive for the Covid-19 virus at the Tönnies slaughterhouses. According to a local crisis team, the enterprise was by then already experiencing a “second wave” with more Covid-19 illnesses: Already around 100 employees had been quarantined before and a total of 13,000 Covid-19 tests had been carried out in Tönnies. In total, 130 infections had been detected. In the Gütersloh district, the seven-day incidence had risen to 25.3, implying that there were 25.3 new Covid-19 contamination cases per 100,000 inhabitants on a seven-day basis.²¹⁹

By 17 June 2020, it was reported that around 730 people had tested positive for the Covid-19 virus at ‘Tönnies’, while 6400 employees were said to be quarantined.²²⁰ In order to contain the further spread of the Covid-19 virus, the city of Verl had commissioned an external security service to keep an eye on the accommodation where many of the workers of the factory were residing. The external security was to survey the accommodation around the clock for a period of two weeks. In addition, public authorities were setting up a mobile information office. Problematic was that not only Tönnies employees were living in the accommodations, but also many employees from other companies, making it difficult to separate the ones from the other.²²¹

According to virologist Eckerle, it was clear that the working conditions in the slaughterhouses were not compatible with the prescribed hygiene measures.²²²

The district of Gütersloh ordered the closure of the company on Wednesday afternoon, 17 June 2020. Pigs for slaughter were no longer accepted and the cutting department was closed. Nevertheless, production continued, with several hundred of employees still remaining at work on Thursday, 18 June 2020. This was decided after consultation with the health department, in order to allow the factory to process the meat stored in cold stores. This was supposed to take 2 days, after which the Tönnies plant would be completely closed for a period of 7 to 14 days.²²³

A further consequence of the rising Covid-19 contamination cases was that more than 5000 workers had to be tested. The employees of the Gütersloh district performing these tests had so far been supported by volunteers from the Malteser Aid Service and the German Red Cross. But this aid was no longer deemed enough. Administrator Sven-Georg Adenauer, therefore, applied for administrative assistance from the Bundeswehr. In response, 13 soldiers with previous medical knowledge were announced to arrive on Friday, 19 June 2020, next to an additional 12 in order to assist with the administration of the whole process.²²⁴

Isabella Eckerle, head of the Emerging Viruses research group for Infectious Diseases Department at the University of Geneva, assumed that the enterprise had remained infected since the previous outbreak in May 2020. However, a Tönnies spokesman emphasized that the enterprise had done all it could to keep the Covid-19 virus out of its premises, suggesting that the infections had been the result of weekend visits by workers to their home countries.²²⁵

District Administrator Adenauer ordered that all schools and child care centres in the Gütersloh district were to be closed from Thursday, 18 June 2020 on. Adenauer stressed that this was a far better measure than a full lockdown of the entire Gütersloh district. Bundestag member Britta Haßelmann declared to be appalled by the situation in the slaughterhouses in Rheda-Wiedenbrück and even filed a criminal complaint against Tönnies. According to Mrs Haßelmann, the outbreak of infections could only be explained by a massive non-compliance with occupational safety standards, besides irresponsible housing accommodation and transport conditions. The Bielefeld Clinic was the first hospital in the region to respond to the Covid-19 cases.²²⁶

The whole matter soon brought a renewed focus on the poor working conditions in the meat processing sector, with workers in previous, outbreaks elsewhere reporting they also had to live in shared accommodations.²²⁷

Later on that same day, NRW Health Minister Karl-Josef Laumann told the “Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger” which specific deficiencies had been found in the housing accommodations for the slaughterhouse workers. It concerned (1) Overcrowding; (2) Mold infestation; (3) Danger of collapse of parts of the buildings; (4) Leaky roofs; (5) Disastrous sanitary facilities; (6) Rat infestation; and (7) Fire protection deficiencies. Four apartments had to be evacuated due to significant construction defects. According to the Minister the health of the employees had been seriously neglected, apparently for reasons of profit maximization. The Minister said that he would no longer accept the situation and that he would take action to remedy it.²²⁸ By 7 PM of the same day, the results of 983 tests were made available. Of these, 657 slaughterhouse employees had tested positive for Covid-19.²²⁹

By 19 October 2020, the meat processing plant’s board announced that it had taken firm measures to limit the risk of further spread of the Covid-19 virus. All infected employees working at the plant, as well as those with whom they were in contact, were to be quarantined. That quarantine applied to anybody who had been working on the slaughterhouse’s premises and who had not yet been tested.²³⁰

On 19 June 2020, after the Covid-19 outbreak in the Tönnies meat processing factory was announced to have caused 730 registered infections, NRW Health Minister Karl-Josef Laumann declared that he wanted the meat processing industry to be scientifically researched. The Minister announced that he would launch a scientific committee that would investigate the causes of the Covid-19 outbreak in Gütersloh epidemiologically.²³¹

Shortly after, a video from the canteen of the Tönnies slaughterhouse that already had been made public on 17 June 2020, started to cause further outrage. On the video recording, it was shown how employees sat close together to eat—obviously while disregarding Covid-19 distance rules. On 19 June 2020, it became clear that press spokesman for Tönnies, André Vielstädt, had been caught lying about the video. The Tönnies spokesman had told the Bild editorial team before that the video had already been recorded in March 2020. But this information appeared to be false—the video was recorded later, at a time when the hygiene ordinance issued by the state of North Rhine-Westphalia was already in force. Apparently, the SWR had discovered the false claim when it examined the metadata of the video clip, mentioning as recording date 8 April 2020, at 8.39 a.m.²³²

Also on 19 June 2020, new test results concerning Tönnies labourers were made public, bringing the total of Covid-19 infections at 803. By then, it had also become clear that the outbreak at Tönnies harboured an enormous spreading risk. All forces were to be mobilized to contain what was happening. A further problem discovered after the mass flare-up at Tönnies, was the wide distribution of the worker’s residences: most of the labourers working at Tönnies were spread over the districts of Gütersloh, Warendorf and Soest and the cities of Hamm and Bielefeld.²³³

On 20 June 2020, at 2:45 p.m., it was reported that 1,029 Tönnies employees had been tested positive for the Covid-19 virus. This was announced by the district administrator of the Gütersloh district, Sven-Georg Adenauer, who also emphasized that there had not occurred any significant entry of Covid-19 cases into the general population. On the same date, the NRW police prepared for a large-scale operation in order to investigate the Covid-19 mass outbreak at Tönnies. A so-called “BAO”—or “Besondere Aufbauorganisation”, literally translated as a “special organizational structure”–, was set up at the Bielefeld police force to coordinate possible operations across the country. Also on 20 June 2020, the city of Verl set up a quarantine zone in the Sürenheide district. Several apartment buildings in which Tönnies labourers were housed, got quarantined. In the afternoon, the entire area was cordoned off, with a hundred police officers on duty. Mayor Michael Esken emphasized that strict compliance with the quarantine was essential. At the same time, city workers started putting up construction fences. According to the city, 78 residents had tested positive for the Covid-19 virus on Zollhausweg alone, one of the three streets secluded. The district health office announced that it would take a throat swab from all residents of the zone who had not yet been tested. The German Red Cross started providing packed lunches and drinks for the first two days of the quarantine. For the remaining days, a supply centre with food and hygiene items for daily needs was to be set up within the quarantine area. Meals were also kept ready for the Tönnies employees. The Zollhausweg was completely cordoned off. According to the city, 60 children and young people lived in the houses in question, 20 of them are younger than three years.²³⁴

By 21 June 2020, shortly after midday, the number of Tönnies employees who tested positive amounted to 1,029. The authorities had already quarantined around 6500 employees of the enterprise. By 3:22 PM, there were a total of 1331 confirmed Covid-19 contamination cases. By then, almost 7000 tests had been carried out on the Tönnies employees with the help of the Bundeswehr and the DRK. The by then 7000 people who were quarantined, were reported to live in 1300 apartments. The authorities announced that it could not be ruled out that sick people had left the Gütersloh district and gone home.²³⁵

According to another source, approximately 1400 employees at Tönnies, ultimately, tested positive.²³⁶

On 28 June 2020, it was announced that the indicator of new infections per 100,000 inhabitants for the Gütersloh district within the preceding seven days was still well above the decisive mark of 50. According to RKI figures, the Gütersloh district was then the only district in Germany above the important mark of 50 new infections per 100,000 inhabitants within the preceding seven days. The NRW districts of Gütersloh and Warendorf had been in regional lockdown—the first in Germany—as of 24 June 2020. The lockdown was limited to 30 June 2020.²³⁷

As of 8 July 2020, three weeks after the Covid-19-indicated closure of the Tönnies meat processing factory, a first section outside of production could be reopened. An exemption granted by the mayor enabled the administration sub-area at the main Tönnies location to be gradually brought back into operation.²³⁸

A week later, on 15 July 2020, around four weeks after the Covid-19 outbreak at Tönnies, the city administration lifted the ordered production stop for slaughter with immediate effect. This meant that the company in Rheda-Wiedenbrück could, once again, accept animals from farmers and gradually ramp up production.²³⁹

All in all, the Tönnies-facility in Rheda-Wiedenbrück was closed for almost a month. Ever since, Tönnies has installed a new hygiene protocol, which included adjusted ventilation. This was because, at an earlier stage, it had already been concluded that (bad) ventilation had played a major role in the spread of the Covid-19 virus.²⁴⁰ In addition, all employees were in the period afterwards being tested twice per week. By the end of July 2020, 7300 additional tests had been carried out, of which 30 were positive. According to Tönnies itself, in total 22 of these concerned older positive cases.²⁴¹

On 20 July 2020, Tönnies released on its website an “Immediate Action Plan for extended pandemic prevention and for modification of the work, living, and animal husbandry arrangements”.²⁴²

On 28 July 2020, the enterprise announced that it wanted to build new apartments for its labourers. 70 houses with 1500 apartments were planned. The aim was to provide cheap and well-equipped apartments according to a fixed standard (e.g., fully furnished single apartments of 16 m² for 300 euros rent/month including heating, or apartments for couples of 27 m² for 400 to 450 euros rent/month including heating, the price depending on the locations).²⁴³

Although this may have been well-intentioned in the minds of Tönnies’ leading stakeholders, their approach mainly demonstrates the extent to which capitalist rulers, in their continued pursuit of ever more profit (and even after having had several deaths on their consciences shortly before), always keep sticking to their classic methods of exploitation.

Notwithstanding these announced measures, already as early as October 2020, a new Covid-19 outbreak would occur in one of Tönnies’s (other) meat processing plants. On 8 October 2020, it was announced that the meat group Tönnies was again hit by Covid-19 and that it was again struggling with high infection rates among employees. The Emsland district immediately responded by closing the doors of the infected site which was located in Sögel. In total, 112 of the approximately 1100 employees had tested positive for Covid-19, notwithstanding the fact that the Sögel slaughterhouse site was at the moment no longer operating at full capacity. Under normal circumstances, 12,000 pigs per day could be slaughtered; in the days preceding the October 2020-outbreak, there had only been 7000 pigs per day slaughtered. The Tönnies slaughter site in Sögel was not the only slaughterhouse where new infections occurred. Several employees had also been tested positive at the slaughter site of “Vion” in Emstek, where in total, 63 employees had contracted Covid-19. All labourers infected were reportedly employed in the cutting department. Landkreis Emsland decided to close the site for a period of 22 days, starting on 11 October 2020 and running until 3 November 2020.²⁴⁴

7.11.1.2.3.4 Change of the Law

Already by 29 July 2020, the Federal “Bundeskabinett” had worked out a proposal for stricter rules for the meat industry. A draft law presented by Federal labour Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) provided for a ban on temporary labour contracts and subcontracting in large slaughterhouses and/or meat processing factories. In addition, more controls were planned. Stricter regulations were, furthermore, to ensure better accommodation. With these new regulations on occupational safety, the federal government was explicitly responding to the massive Covid-19 outbreaks in the Tönnies slaughterhouse in North Rhine-Westphalia and other meat plants in Lower Saxony. Minister Heil aimed for the new regulations to be implemented as quickly as possible.²⁴⁵

On 22 December 1920, the Bundestag adopted the “Occupational Safety and Health Control Act” (“Gesetz zur Verbesserung des Vollzugs im Arbeitsschutz’, or in short ‘Arbeitsschutzkontrollgesetz”).

The new law, which entered into force on 1 January 2021, introduced orderly and safe working conditions for the meat processing industry and strengthened the efficiency of state supervision. However, the “Occupational Safety and Health Control Act” also provided various other branches nationwide with uniform rules.

The law included the following regulations:²⁴⁶

• (1) A prohibition of external personnel: In the meat industry, subcontracting arrangements were to be prohibited as of 1 January 2021, and temporary work as of 1 April 2021.

  The new rule implies that slaughtering and cutting may, by said dates, only be carried out by a factory’s own permanent staff. The butcher’s trade (= outsourcing to small enterprises with fewer than 50 employees) is excluded from this. In the case of order peaks in meat processing, exceptions to the rule are possible, but only on the basis of a collective agreement limited to three years and subject to strict conditions and controls.

• (2) Standards for employee accommodation: The Workplace Ordinance will determine how the communal accommodation to accommodate employees must be equipped, even away from the company premises.

• (3) Increase in the density of controls: The labour protection authorities of the federal states should monitor companies more frequently, in order to safeguard workers’ rights in occupational health and safety.

• (4) Electronic time recording: With the exception of the butcher’s trade, employers in the meat industry are required to electronically record the start and end of the daily working hours of their employees.

• (5) Increase in fines: Fines for violations were to be increased to 30,000 euros.

7.11.1.2.4 The Netherlands

At the beginning of the Covid-19 epidemic, the Dutch meat processing industry showed similar characteristics to that of Germany, especially regarding employment systems. About 80% of the labourers in the Dutch meat processing industry were from Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and were hired through temporary employment agencies. They were paid the minimum wage, with many completely dependent on their employer—often a temporary employment agency—not only for work, but also for housing accommodation and transport. The accommodation in which said labourers were located was in most cases overcrowded, which made physical and social distancing impossible. Many migrant and cross-border workers simply lived together in large groups, sometimes in apartments, but often in bungalows or in caravans. All of these were conditions that in 2020 would contribute to the spread of the Covid-19 virus.²⁴⁷

The temporary employment agencies that hired the workers and made them available to the meat processing plants were in most cases based in the Netherlands. This meant that the labourers had to have an employment agreement with a Dutch temporary employment agency and that the labour relationship was subject to Dutch law. As a result, most of the labourers got subjected to the Dutch collective agreements applying to the temporary work sector as well. The labourers in most cases did not speak or understand the Dutch language. The posting of (temporary) labourers through temporary employment agencies which were based in another EU Member State (especially the home country of the thus recruited labourers) was a less common practice in the Netherlands than the recruitment of foreign workers with the help of a foreign recruitment agency, and then hiring them through a local Dutch temporary employment agency.²⁴⁸

Demands for more decent housing for migrant and cross-border labourers had already been made in times pre-Covid-19. Another demand that had been formulated in the past was that meat processing enterprises would employ their labour force directly and not abuse the legal method of hiring their services through temporary work agencies that employ labourers on flexible agreements which are in most cases disadvantageous to the labourers themselves.²⁴⁹

Under pressure from Germany, systematic testing for Covid-19 began to be undertaken at a Vion meat processing factory that was located in the Dutch town of Groenlo, in close proximity to the border between The Netherlands and Germany. The reason for the demands made by Germany was that the majority of the labourers employed at the Groenlo factory were at the time living in Germany. When 45 people effectively tested positive for Covid-19, the slaughterhouse was shut down on 20 May 2020. Another round of additional testing for Covid-19 was then carried oud, which resulted in more than 20% of the labourers testing positive for Covid-19, amounting to 147 labourers out of a total 657. After these positive tests, the factory was temporarily closed, and all labourers were quarantined at home. In addition, in the same week, another Vion pig meat processing factory, this time located in Apeldoorn, also had to be shut down for a day after it was found out that social distance rules were not respected in 17 vans used for the transport of the (mainly foreign) labourers from and to the factory premises. It appeared, moreover, that a few weeks earlier, at another Vion poultry processing factory located in Scherpenzeel, 28 labourers had also contracted the Covid-19 virus.²⁵⁰

In May 2020, the Dutch slaughterhouse “Van Rooi Meat” was similarly forced to close after many of its employees had tested positive for Covid-19.²⁵¹ At the time, “Van Rooi Meat” housed the entire processing of pigs, from farm to fork, on 62,000 m²(+/- nine football fields) located at Helmond. The supply of the livestock, the slaughtering process, the first cut and the boning all took place in one continuous flow. This implied that at the factory, the meat was immediately processed into end products, especially into bacon. During 18-hour working days, Van Rooi Meat managed to process one million kilos of meat per day.²⁵² Van Rooi Meat was at the time the second largest meat processing enterprise in The Netherlands. It purportedly employed 1700 people, although few on the basis of a permanent employment agreement. In 2019, the enterprises enjoyed a turnover of 650 million euros and made a profit of 35 million euros.²⁵³ On 22 May 2020, it was announced that, as of 23 May 2020, all labourers of Van Rooi Meat had to be tested for Covid-19. The reason for this was that two inspectors from the “Animal Sector Quality Inspection Service” (KDS) and a veterinarian from the food authority “NVWA”, who had worked in Helmond, had been tested positive for Covid-19. Vets and inspectors who worked at another slaughterhouse of “Vion” in Boxtel had also tested positive for Covid-19. One of the infected inspectors had worked at both the slaughterhouses in Boxtel and Helmond.²⁵⁴

At the time, almost exclusively labour migrants worked in the mega pig slaughterhouse in Helmond. It concerned mostly Poles and Romanians who, in many cases, also lived together in group accommodations on a camping site in Bakel, amongst other places.²⁵⁵ A large number of these workers were, moreover, employed through an employment agency. The temporary employment agency “Horizon Groep” from Velp was one the major players at Van Rooi Meat, delivering approximately 600 temporary labourers. Of the 21 people who had tested positive, 4 were employed through Horizon Group.²⁵⁶ Similar to the methods resorted to in other meat factories all over Europe, Van Rooi Meat hardly employed permanent labourers, so labourers usually did not dare to come forward when there were complaints. At the time of the Covid-19 outbreak, several people within the factory were ill and some even had severe symptoms, such as fever. In most cases, under the enterprise’s governance policy, people were not tested for Covid-19, as a result of which nobody had any real clue about the number of people who were infected.²⁵⁷

The slaughterhouse had to temporarily close its doors on 28 May 2020, when some of its labourers indeed appeared to test positive for Covid-19.²⁵⁸ On the next day, 29 May 2020, it even appeared that out of a sample of 130 labourers, 21 people were infected with Covid-19 (= an infection rate of 17%), implying that there was a risk that the enterprise is, or could become, a spreading cause for the virus.²⁵⁹ The enterprise was ultimately allowed to reopen its door by the beginning of June 2020. Van Rooi Meat got the green light to go back into production, bit by bit, as of 13 June 2020, after all labourers had again been tested negatively for Covid-19.²⁶⁰ The enterprise was first given permission to start up with a maximum of 300 labourers who all had tested negative.²⁶¹ The reopening of the enterprise was not only to happen in phases but was moreover made conditional. One of the measures to which the enterprise was subjected, was that all labourers had to fill out a health statement at the gate every morning. Anyone who declared that they had complaints which could be related to the Covid-19 virus was then to be sent home immediately. However, many labourers did not comply to these rules out of fear for losing their job, knowing that if they were sick and told the truth, they would not be allowed to return to work anymore. A number of labourers later declared in an interview with the Dutch news service “NOS” that they had even been told to lie by the management of the enterprise. When being asked if they were ill, some labourers had, more precisely, been instructed to respond negatively on the health statements to be completed on a daily basis. Other labourers filled in the health declaration incorrectly of their own accord, fearing that they would never be allowed to return in the event they made mention of Covid-19 related health complaints. According to some of the labourers, compliance with other measures within the slaughterhouse, such as keeping a distance of 1.5 m and an obligation to wear face masks, only took place just before and during an inspection, as the health inspection services announced these checks in advance.²⁶²

On one such inspection by the “GGD” and the “Safety Region (council)” (“Veiligheidsregio”) that took place on 11 June 2020, “Van Rooi Meat” had indicated that 500 labourers were present at the premises, all having tested negatively. This number was, however, more than allowed under the reopening permit. Still, the Safety Region at the time told the TV news network “Omroep Brabant” that it did not consider the violation serious enough in relation to the results already achieved and that it had found the number of people present in the factory acceptable. Van Rooi Meat itself indicated that, although the number was higher than previously allowed, it was considered acceptable. According to the enterprise, there had been a “misunderstanding” on the side of the Security Region, causing the higher number. Later that year, by mid-September 2020, members of parliament asked for clarification from Minister Schouten about the situation, in particular why the Safety Region had not intervened at the time.²⁶³

7.11.1.2.5 Belgium

Even the meat processing industry of small and over-regulated Belgium could not escape Covid-19, exposing similar malpractices in its meat processing industry as in some of its neighbouring countries, be it to a lesser extent than in, e.g., Germany.

At the beginning of 2020, one of the main problems for labourers employed in the Belgian meat processing industry concerned the poor housing accommodation of “posted” and subcontracted labourers. In addition, transport to and from the factory premises was organised by the employer. Belgian affiliates of EFFAT had already in the past made complaints to the Belgian authorities to deal with these problems and had, in addition, called for more and more frequent inspections. The “posting” of labourers at the time concerned a widespread practice throughout the Belgian meat processing sector. This posting of labourers had become attractive for Belgian meat processing enterprises as a method of avoiding Belgium’s expensive mandated insurance contribution scheme. Another widespread practice for reducing costs, especially social security related costs, characterizing the Belgian meat processing industry consisted of subcontracting tasks to registered enterprises operating in the logistics or food trade sectors. This practice allowed meat processors to take advantage of the lower wages provided under collective agreements applicable in these other sectors.²⁶⁴

Already in 2012, Belgian meat processing enterprises had agreed upon a protocol with the Belgian federal government to combat such social dumping and other abuses characterising the sector. As a result, a system of joint liability along the entire meat industry subcontracting chain had been introduced which implied that labour conditions in the Belgian meat processing sector had become much better than in Belgium’s neighbouring countries.²⁶⁵ In addition, in 2013, the Belgian authorities, stimulated by the trade unions, had made an attempt to put international pressure on the German government to get them to better regulate their country’s meat processing industry. There had even been made a formal complaint with the European Commission by the then Minister of Economic Affairs, Johan Vande Lanotte, and the then Minister of Labour, Monica De Connick.²⁶⁶

During the Covid-19 pandemic, the Belgian social partners quickly reached an agreement on clear measures to be implemented at all meat processing enterprises. The sectoral guidelines paid particular regard to labourers employed by subcontractors and to posted labourers. It became mandated to make information posters about the risk of the Covid-19 virus and the safety and health measures to be observed available in several languages (e.g., Arabic, Romanian, Bulgarian, Polish…). Furthermore, in Belgium, Covid-19 was also quickly recognised as an “occupational disease” in certain key sectors (including the food industry). However, this recognition was made conditional to various factors. It applied, moreover, only during the period between 13 March 2020 and 17 May 2020 and only when it had been impossible to maintain a physical distance of minimum 1.5 m.²⁶⁷

Despite these precautions, a serious epidemic, with +/- 90 contaminated persons out of 330 labourers, was reported to have broken out in (at least) one Belgian meat processing factory, namely “Westvlees” of the Lovenfosse group, in early August 2020.²⁶⁸

The meat processing enterprise “Westvlees” in Westrozebeke was at the time one of the most important European producers of fresh and prepared pork. It processed 1.4 million pigs per year into more than 140,000 tons of pork and served customers in 50 countries. A total of 850 labourers were employed at the factory site in Westrozebeke, of which 225 people in the meat cutting department.²⁶⁹

The alarm bells at “Westvlees” had gone off on 4 August 4 2020, after six labourers of Westvlees had been found to be contaminated with Covid-19. Four of them had been of French nationality. Subsequently, 150 to 200 Covid-19 tests were immediately carried out on the labourers of Westvlees’ cutting department. On the next day, there were at least 16 positive cases, but it was said that the numbers were likely to increase. As a precaution, the cutting department of the enterprise was closed,²⁷⁰ with the rest of the factory remaining open. 225 further labourers got tested and quarantined in their homes for at least a week. The food safety agency FAVV emphasized that there was no risk of consuming the enterprise’s products.²⁷¹ By 7 August 2020, when more test results became available, there were 67 confirmed Covid-19 contamination cases.²⁷² By 10 August 2020, 60 additional tests were conducted, of which 7 appeared to be positive, bringing the total of Covid-19 contamination cases to 74.²⁷³ By 14 August 2020, after some more testing, that number had risen to 94.²⁷⁴ None of the contaminated labourers had to be hospitalized.²⁷⁵

According to the major of Westrozebeke, Francesco Vanderjeugd, it had not been considered advisory to close the entire enterprise, as the affected department was deemed to have functioned sufficiently separately from the rest of the enterprise.²⁷⁶ There were, moreover, not yet known cases at the other departments and no infections had been found at the enterprise before. The activities of the cutting department were, in addition, immediately taken over by another Belgian site of the enterprise, located in Aubel, Liège. Major Vanderjeugd pointed out that, although there were certain similarities to the situation in Germany’s meat factory ‘Tönnies”, there were also clear differences, such as much better living conditions of the labourers of the Belgian meat processing company.²⁷⁷

7.11.1.2.6 The United Kingdom

In the English regions, the need to consider local lockdowns first became apparent after an outbreak of Covid-19 in meat processing plants in Leicester. The Leicester outbreak revealed what has been referred to as the “open secret” of overcrowded labour conditions and extremely low wages endured by racial minority groups employed in the meat processing sector.²⁷⁸ During the first half of 2020, there were several confirmed Covid-19 contamination cases of people employed in in the meat processing sector throughout the United Kingdom, in some cases resulting in site closures.

As in most other countries, meat processing factories in the United Kingdom mostly employed migrant labourers who lived in poor and cramped accommodation, where several occupants worked and lived together. As most of these labourers only received low wages, it was for most impossible to own their own car as a result of which most relied on carpooling or on public transport, which was usually overcrowded. In addition, most of the migrant and cross-border labourers did not speak or understand English, while in the United Kingdom, the information about the risks posed by the Covid-19 virus was only provided in English.²⁷⁹

On 18 June 2020, the “2 Sisters” poultry processing factory located in Anglesey announced that it would close for a fortnight, after local health authorities had announced that there had been 58 Covid-19 contamination cases among the site’s 560 staff members. Two other food processing factories—more precisely the Kober meat factory in Yorkshire, which supplied bacon to Asda, and Rowan Foods in Wrexham, which manufactured food for UK supermarkets—also had to close due to outbreaks of the Covid-19 virus. Tests undertaken at the Kober-plant indicated that there were 165 positive Covid-19 contamination cases; all labourers testing positive were placed in quarantine for 14 days with health authorities resorting to contact tracing as well. According to Kober’s management, the factory was allowed to partially reopen in the week of 22 June 2020, however only with staff members that had tested negative and found fit to return to work.²⁸⁰

Employers in the UK meat processing industry have been criticised for a slow response to the emerging Covid-19 crisis and for having been too reluctant to resort to social and physical distancing measures. E.g., “Unite the Union” had strongly called upon the meat processing enterprises to adopt strict health and safety measures after 1000 labourers had walked out of a Moy Park factory located in Northern Ireland on 25 March 2020 only to resume work after having been formally assured that stricter health and safety guidelines were underway. The social unrest had occurred after four food industry labourers had died of Covid-19 in May 2020, one labourer at Moy Park located in Northern Ireland and three at a meat processing factory located in Barnsley.²⁸¹

At the time, union representatives operating in meat processing factories throughout the United Kingdom had raised concerns over meat production lines not being subjected to physical and social distancing guidelines. In addition, risk assessments, if carried out at all, had little or no input from the unions. Under pressure from the unions, some factories decided to change labour hours and made alterations to the layout of common areas (e.g., changing rooms and canteens). As of June 2020, the 2-meter physical distance guideline was still not respected in the meat processing areas of most factories because the UK government had only issued “guidelines”, which were not legally binding.²⁸²

Surprisingly, production levels increased dramatically (by over 40%), purportedly in order to meet the increased demand resulting from a public procurement panic. As a result, meat processing enterprises demonstrated little willingness to slow down production lines in order to allow physical or social distancing between labourers.²⁸³

As in the case of the meat processing industry in other countries, the same systematic risks in UK food production were reported, such as the fact that the workforce, already exposed to a wide variety of vulnerabilities and malpractices, such as low wages, lack of rights and limited access to union representation, became exposed to additional health and safety risks and difficulties because of Covid-19. Recurring problems included²⁸⁴

• A reluctance to call in sick for fear of loss of income.

• Threat of loss of hours and jobs, both implicit and explicit.

• Need to work in large numbers, where physical and social distancing was impossible.

• A lack of adequate PPE for essential and non-essential work.

• Expectations on labourers to integrate the new responsibilities into their work.

• Poor labour union consultation, with little or no union involvement.

• A lack of transparency by enterprises on the number of Covid-19 cases and deaths.

After the Covid-19 pandemic had started, meat processing industry labourers were often scared to go to work, but simply could not afford to stay at home and be without an income for a prolonged duration. In addition, sick pay was extremely low, amounting to only £95 per week, which did not suffice to live on and pay for utilities such as rent and electricity. A survey among GMB members at the time revealed that over 65% of meat processing labourers could simply not afford to not show up at work.²⁸⁵

By the end of September 2020, it was feared that the actual number of Covid-19 contamination cases in food processing factories supplying UK supermarkets and restaurants was more than 30 times higher than had previously been reported. This concern was raised in a study by “Pirc”—in full: “Pensions & Investment Research Consultants Ltd.” (an enterprise advising shareholders on ethical investments)²⁸⁶—in which it was, further explained that employers had too much impact on the official data. Already before, it had become clear that food manufacturing in general—and meat processing in particular—had been at the centre of several major local spreading events of the Covid-19 virus in the United Kingdom, with labourers all over the country making complaints about cramped labour conditions and being put under pressure not to take days off even when they showing Covid-19 symptoms. Nevertheless, as of 27 September 2020, only 47 official reports of occupational Covid-19 outbreaks—and no Covid-19 related deaths whatsoever—had been reported to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) by food processors, which together employed 430,000 people throughout the United Kingdom.²⁸⁷

7.11.1.3 Long-Term Policy Considerations

From the moment a large number of employees of the German meat producer Tönnies had become infected with Covid-19 (cf. before, Sect. 7.11.1.2.3.3), Germany’s largest meat processing factory has come under heavy criticism. Not only the disregard for physical and social distance rules, but also the precarious living accommodations of many immigrant labourers who had come to Germany as guest labourers were said to have ensured the rapid spread of the Covid-19 virus. However, this certainly was not a purely German problem.²⁸⁸

In a recent report of June 25, 2020 (entitled “Covid-19 outbreaks in slaughterhouses and meat processing plants”), the “European Federation of Food Agriculture and Tourism Trade Unions” (EFFAT) indicated that the reasons for the disastrous Covid-19 outbreaks in the meat processing industry, on a global scale, are to be found in the poor working and living conditions which affected thousands of meat labourers in many European countries, but also elsewhere.²⁸⁹

Numerous meat producers in EU countries such as Belgium, France, Ireland, Spain, Poland and the Netherlands saw waves of Covid-19 infections among their employees since the beginning of April 2020. Within the EU, after Germany, one of the countries whose meat processing industry was hit hardest by contaminations at slaughterhouses and meat processing factories was Ireland: Already by the end of June 2020, it was reported that a total of 950 workers in 19 Irish meat processing enterprises had been infected with the Covid-19 virus, and in some cases a quarter of the workers had become ill. Even so, none of the factories in Ireland had been closed by June 26, 2020. When more than 20% of the labourers at a Dutch slaughterhouse in Groenlo, located near the German border, became infected, the plant of the food producer “Vion” was closed at the end of May 2020. Nevertheless, tests were only carried out under pressure from the German authorities, as the majority of the labourers of the Dutch company lived in Germany and commuted across the border.²⁹⁰ In France, two slaughterhouses in the West of the country had been affected with Covid-19 in mid-May 2020. 180 employees had at the time tested positive for the Covid-19 virus. Only one of the plants in Val de Loire, where around ten percent of labourers had fallen ill, was closed by local authorities. Similarly, around 200 Covid-19 cases occurred at the manufacturer “Litera Meat”, in the Spanish municipality of Binéfar.²⁹¹

However, as has already been explained before, by far the largest Covid-19 outbreaks occurred in Germany. According to the EFFAT trade union confederation, the problems in Germany reached such an extreme proportion because of practices of social dumping resorted to in the preceding years. While Germany is the largest meat producer in Europe, many of the labourers employed in the meat processing industry come, through subcontractors, from Eastern Europe, Africa and South America in order to work for German and other European meat producers. The EFFAT union estimated that around 80% of meat production in Germany was accomplished through mainly Eastern European migrant labourers.²⁹² As explained before, the main reason for the use of subcontractors was avoiding regulation. This typically went as follows: A slaughterhouse or meat processing factory concludes a so-called “work contract” with a subcontractor for the slaughter and cutting of a certain number of animals. The subcontractor would then decide how to organize the actual, physical work. How many labourers to employ for the job what to pay them, etc., is no longer officially the responsibility of the slaughterhouse or meat processing operator. Since the guest labourers are not directly employed by the enterprises that own the slaughterhouses, said labourers have little or no socio-economic security in the EU and accept labour agreements involving long working hours, without adequate breaks. They get housed in cramped collective accommodations that do not meet basic hygiene standards. Any precaution in the actual workplaces becomes useless if the workers get infected in their shared accommodation.²⁹³

Another problem with this precarious employment method has been that, if a labourer became sick, he still went to work for fear of being fired. This has been indicated as a further reason why working with subcontractors made the meat industry all over Europe a centre for the spread of the Covid-19 virus.²⁹⁴

According to the EFFAT union, the only way of dealing with this situation is to gain control over the unreasonable working and living conditions of the immigrant labourers (ab)used by the meat processing industry.²⁹⁵

In Germany, in the aftermath of the Covid-19 outbreaks of May-June 2020 in the meat processing factories of Tönnies, Germany’s Federal labour Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) announced that he wanted to ban work contracts with subcontractors and temporary labourers for the entire German meat industry. EU trade unionist Bragaso, moreover, pointed to the similarities with the situation in the United States. There, the number of infections in meat operation factories had risen to similar numbers as those in Germany. Several enterprises in the United States had in a similar manner been forced to temporarily stop production, after a total of at least 5000 labourers in the sector had tested positive. However, in the United States, many plants simply opened again in May 2020, when US President Donald Trump declared the meat industry to be a “critical sector” for reasons of national security, by presidential executive order (cf. Sect. 7.11.1.2.2.1). Trump’s main policy concern had been to do something against the displeasure about meat shortages in the supermarkets, which had started to affect “the American way of life” too much. From his side, the at the time democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden compared conditions in American meat processing factories to “war zones”. Also in the United States, it had often been immigrants, especially originating from Latin America, who were employed in the large American meat producing corporations, under extremely poor conditions.²⁹⁶

The methods used by meat producers to set the lowest possible wages and let their labourers work and live in precarious, poor conditions in order to keep production costs and prices down, were, furthermore, similar all around the world. Media reports from Great Britain, Canada, Brazil and Australia all pointed to similar problems concerning the meat processing industry.²⁹⁷

Moreover, it has been known for years already that the meat industry is both highly profitable on a global scale, as well as being a major driver of both antimicrobial resistance and climate change.²⁹⁸ (Cf. Sect. 2.2.2) A wide range of scientific research has shown that the continuation of the current meat industry is problematic for a number of reasons, which go far beyond the occurrence of waves of virus-based contamination in slaughterhouses and meat processing plants. Here we need only refer, for example, to a study by Allen and Hof (in which reference is made to a wealth of other scientific research), from which it clearly appears that the livestock slaughter and processing industry, amongst others, is a major contributor to climate change, with estimates of global greenhouse gas emissions from the livestock industry ranging from 12 to 18%.²⁹⁹

It is, therefore, not surprising that, given the consequences of meat consumption, several scientific studies have also urged for a change in food consumption practices. In developed countries in particular, meat consumption rates are very high and for some people account for up to 40% of diets, while alternative plant-based diets are still to be considered as “niche markets”. According to Allen and Hof, it is not clear how much longer our planet can support these lifestyle choices. According to these authors, radical lifestyle changes are drastically needed if we are to avoid what they refer to as an “ecological Armageddon”.³⁰⁰

Another problem caused by meat consumption is that many ecosystems created by traditional agricultural practices have virtually disappeared due to the increasing intensification of agriculture, especially in developed countries, although greater biodiversity in commercial grasslands could lead to greater economic value. (Cf. Sect. 2.2.2) E.g., the high demand for livestock food products has in the past continuously led to attempts to increase the level of meat production, where the tendency has been to intensify agricultural practices, e.g., by moving livestock “from pastures to barns”, so that agricultural areas can be exploited more intensively. This “intensification of agriculture” has been yet another driver of loss of biodiversity and, while traditional farms provided important habitats for biodiversity, under the industrialization of agriculture, many of these important biodiverse habitats are in decline or have already been lost.³⁰¹ In Chaps. 1 and 2 of this book, this last point has already been mentioned as one of the reasons for the interspecies viral transmission of viruses such as Covid-19. (Cf. especially Sect. 2.2.2)

The challenge, therefore, remains to change both the relationship between man and nature, as well as the preferences and behaviour of consumers.³⁰² In the further opinion of Middleton, we can only hope that a sufficient number of people will soon think about how they get their meat, what they are prepared to pay for it and what conditions they expect from animals and workers in order to be able to eat it,³⁰³ provided that they still want to.

7.11.2 Revisiting the Case of Amazon

7.11.2.1 The Issue of Labour Conditions in the Amazon-Empire Before the Covid-19 Pandemic

Already in the pre-Covid-19 era, many press articles pointed to the problematic nature of the way the Amazon empire treats its labour force (although very rarely making the connection to the underlying economic doctrines, especially those of economic neoliberalism, that have caused this situation).³⁰⁴

According to the press coverage in 2018, the many problems faced by Amazon labourers went far beyond the issue of (too low) wages, but also involved labourers facing many other difficulties and dangers in the workplace on a day-ily basis.³⁰⁵ In general, labourers in Amazon warehouses were reportedly faced with outrageous work quotas and cruel labour conditions that left many people sick and injured.³⁰⁶ These problems have, moreover, not only occurred in the United States, but also in many other countries, such as the United Kingdom, Spain, Italy, Poland and Germany.³⁰⁷

More generally, it was reported that in 2018, none of Amazon’s approximately 600,000 employees worldwide were bound by a comprehensive labour agreement.³⁰⁸

The Amazon empire’s extreme enforcement of the Iron Law of Wages, alongside the appalling general working conditions, even prompted US Senator Bernie Sanders in September 2018 to introduce a bill in the Senate—the “Stop Bezos Act”—that would force large employers like “Amazon.com” and “Walmart” to pay the government back for support that the government provides to the labour force of such large employers under the form of food stamps, public housing, Medicaid and other federal assistance received by their labourers. The name of the bill was reported to be an allusion to Amazon CEO Jeffrey P. Bezos and stands for “Stop Bad Employers by Zeroing Out Subsidies Act”. Senator Sanders’ legislative initiative sought to establish a 100% tax on government benefits granted to labourers at enterprises with 500 or more employees.³⁰⁹

The 2018 bill came just one day after Amazon had reached USD 1 trillion in market capitalization, a milestone that had solidified its position as one of the world’s richest and largest enterprises.³¹⁰

As Senator Sanders noted at the time on Twitter:³¹¹

Amazon is worth $1 trillion. Thousands of Amazon workers have to rely on food stamps, Medicaid and public housing to survive. That is what a rigged economy looks like.

If Sander’s initiative had become law, it would have created an additional tax on enterprises whose labourers were paid so little in formal wages that they had to receive additional government assistance through the abovementioned methods (e.g., food stamps). Obviously, Sander’s bill was unlikely to become law. Sanders has (and still is) been referred to as “an independent socialist” who often sides with the Democrats. At the time Sanders had submitted his aforementioned proposal, the US Senate was controlled by Republicans. It was even unlikely that many Democrats would have supported the proposal, given how “radical” its content was perceived. But none of this mattered much. After a combination of legislative threats and public pressure, Amazon decided to make a big change of its own: Amazon voluntarily raised its minimum wage for all of the US personnel to USD 15 an hour, achieving in this manner much the same results as the Sanders Act would have. This was no small feat for Amazon either—moving to USD 15 an hour was likely to cost the enterprise at least an additional USD 1.75 billion a year in wages. This voluntary adaptation by Amazon was, hence, a total victory for Sanders. And with this victory in hand, Sanders (and Ro Khanna) then turned his attention to Walmart, introducing a new bill, the “Stop WALMART Act”, which stands for “Stop Welfare for Any Large Monopoly Amassing Revenue from Taxpayers Act”.³¹²

According to Robert Reich,³¹³ the emergence of entrepreneurial behemoths such as Amazon and the retreat of the trade unions that made this possible has been one of the most dramatic changes in American capitalism in the last fifty years. In the opinion, of Reich, the resulting imbalance has led to: (1) almost unprecedented income and wealth inequality (referred to by many authors and investigation centres), (2) the complete corruption of American democracy by big money and (3) the abandonment of the American working class. As Reich, in addition, pointed out, the appalling conditions in Amazon’s warehouses include issues such as strict and high production quotas, 10-hour labour days with only two half-hour breaks, dangerous protocols and procedures, arbitrary dismissals and the monitoring of every labourer movement. To thwart the union campaign, Amazon has even forced its labourers to attend anti-union meetings while simultaneously intimidating and harassing the union organisers. As to the question of why Amazon abuses its labourers to such an extent, the simple answer, in the opinion of Reich, is that it can. Reich in this regard recalled to the fact that 50 years ago, General Motors, had still been the largest employer in America. The typical GM labourer, thereby, earned USD 35 an hour in today’s dollars and was, moreover, granted a significant say in labour conditions. In the course of 2020, the largest American employers were Amazon and Walmart, each paying about USD 15 an hour and both treating their labourers like cattle. Still according to Reich, the typical GM worker was not intrinsically “worth” more than twice as much as today’s Amazon or Walmart labourer, and had certainly no more valuable knowledge about how work had to be organized in an optimal manner. The difference between today’s Amazon labourers and yesterday’s General Motor’s labourer, is that half a century ago, GM workers had a powerful union, which assembled the collective bargaining power of more than a third of the entire US labour force. By contrast, today’s Amazon and Walmart labourers are basically on their own. And with only 6.4% of American private sector labourers still unionized in 2020, there is little to no collective pressure on enterprises the likes of Amazon or Walmart to treat their employees better. In the days before Ronald Reagan’s presidency, “big labour” still had enough political impact for ensuring that labour laws were effectively enforced, and that the government made sure that giant enterprises like GM to helped supporting the middle class. By 2020, after decades of neo-liberal public policy, the political clout of unions had become minuscule by comparison.³¹⁴

This also explains why business empires such as Amazon (of Jeff Bezos) and Tesla/SpaceX (of Elon Musk) are so anti-union and will do everything in their power to prevent the formation of a union in their midst, as we shall explain in more detail in Sect. 7.11.2.2.3.

7.11.2.2 Amazon in Times of Covid-19

7.11.2.2.1 Rising Market Shares

According to Palmer, by the end of July 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic had claimed more than a million people casualties on a global scale, besides having devastated the global economy, crippled industries, caused massive layoffs and, in the case of the retail sector, had led to the slow demise of already struggling department stores’ chains around the globe, with Amazon being one of the few exceptions worldwide. Upon the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, Amazon had virtually become what Palmer refers to as “the default retailer” of the planet and an essential service provider for many consumers all over the world. This was because, faced with shop closures and empty shelves in almost every Western country, consumers had first been massively turning to Amazon for products needed for protection against the Covid-19 virus, ranging from hand sanitisers, face masks and disinfectants. Consumers subsequently began ordering from Amazon to stock up on everyday household products and groceries. As the Covid-19 crisis persisted, consumers also started ordering office supplies and fitness equipment in large quantities in order to accommodate being locked in their houses. E.g., between February and March 2020, sales of toilet paper were said to have jumped 186% on Amazon, compared to a year earlier, while sales of cough and cold medicines were even said to have jumped 862% year-over-year.³¹⁵ An ever increasing flood of online purchases soon brought Amazon to record sales during Q1 2020. Amazon itself also reported spending billions on Covid-19-related investments itself, such as safety equipment for labourers and the development of its own internal testing initiative, which was given the name “Project Ultraviolet”. While the rest of the United States faced widespread unemployment and economic problems, Amazon managed to continue hiring new labour forces: Between March and mid-April 2020, Amazon was said to have hired more than 175,000 new warehouse and delivery labourers needed for meeting its customers’ growing online purchases. Amazon, moreover, added another 36,400 personnel members over the next three months (through 30 June 2020), bringing its labour force to 876,800 by that date, a 34% increase in comparison to the previous year. By the end of July 2020, Amazon announced that it expected to exceed a milestone USD 100 billion in quarterly revenue in Q4 2020.³¹⁶

Despite the above, it was not a given that Amazon would prosper to such an extent while so many other enterprises were facing extreme hardship due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Indeed, the unexpected influx of online purchases had initially caught Amazon completely off guard. As a result, during the early days of the Covid-19 crisis, Amazon first struggled to meet its famous “two-day delivery time” to which it was committed towards its Prime members as part of their annual membership fee of USD 119. Amazon was also quickly itself facing shortages of high-demand products, such as hand sanitiser and paper disinfectant towels. In addition, Amazon had to confront widespread price gouging, besides having to scramble to adapt its own logistic warehouse operations in order to ensure the safety of its personnel without slowing the pace of work all too much. While, according to Palmer, global enterprises the likes of Amazon are, in general, well equipped for handling “normal” supply chain disruptions, even Amazon was not prepared for what happened as a result of the Covid-19 outbreak. Notwithstanding Amazon’s sprawling end-to-end logistics network of warehouses, airplanes, trucks and vans, it was unable at the onset of the Covid-19 outbreak to maintain stable operations. The Covid-19 pandemic demonstrated that Amazon’s policy to bring most of its fulfilment operations³¹⁷ in-house “could be both a blessing and a curse”.³¹⁸

Nevertheless, thanks to this unprecedented consumer demand, Amazon shares began to peak as of April 2020, with Amazon stock continuing to rise thereafter as well, which purportedly added hundreds of billions to Amazon’s market value. As a result, by mid-August 2020, the investors’ gains on Amazon’s shares amounted to more than 86% compared to the beginning of 2020.³¹⁹

Already by the end of July 2020, Amazon was said to have doubled its quarterly profits to an amount of USD 5.2 billion, up from “only” USD 2.6 billion in the same period in 2019. Amazon’s net sales had risen by 40%.³²⁰ By mid-August 2020, the enterprise was worth more than USD 1.7 trillion. This implied that Amazon had become the second most valuable enterprise in the United States, preceded only by Apple.³²¹ The surge in demand was also behind Amazon’s spectacular results of Q2 2020, when Amazon’s revenue exceeded USD 88.9 billion and when Amazon reported even higher profits than had been expected, despite the fact that Amazon had had to spend billions of dollars on Covid-19 related expenditure.³²² By 26 August 2020, Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, saw his own personal wealth surpass USD 202 billion, purportedly becoming the first man to cross the USD 200 billion threshold. At the time, Bezos was already USD 78 billion richer than Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, who then ranked second on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.³²³

Between January and October 2020, Amazon was reported to have added 427,300 labourers to its staff on a global scale. There were, moreover, rumours that Amazon would add more than 1000 new small facilities in US suburbs to its empire in order to meet same-day deliverance demands. It was similarly reported that Amazon would hire thousands of additional grocery labourers for Amazon Fresh. No other enterprise in history—not even Walmart, at the time the largest private employer in the United States—had ever added so many labourers in a single year. As of December 2020, Amazon was said to employ 1.3 million people worldwide. In Q4 2020, Amazon generated USD 125.6 billion in net sales, which amounted to its largest quarterly revenue ever.³²⁴

7.11.2.2.2 Impact on Amazon’s Labourers of Covid-19

Given Amazon’s history (cf. Sect. 7.11.2.1), it is hardly surprising that Amazon faced intense public scrutiny related to its treatment of warehouse labourers throughout the Covid-19 pandemic.³²⁵

By the end of March 2020, Amazon was considered to be at the forefront of dealing with the Covid-19 outbreak in the United States, especially through delivering vital goods at times when more than half the American population faced government orders to stay home. However, reports that a handful of Amazon’s hundreds of thousands of American warehouse labourers had themselves been contaminated with Covid-19, raised fears of future site closures and operational disruptions.³²⁶

At the time, these Covid-19 cases within Amazon resulted into huge unrest among some of Amazon’s personnel. In late March 2020, at an Amazon warehouse that employed more than 5000 people in Staten Island, New York, fifteen workers had simply left the enterprise’s premises, which made Amazon fire one of these workers for having violated a paid quarantine. Around the same time, employees in other countries, including dozens employed at a facility of Amazon near Florence, Italy, began to raise their voices as well.³²⁷

Warehouse labourers complained that Amazon had not gone through enough trouble to protect them from the Covid-19 virus as they themselves had continued to pick, pack and ship Amazon orders at a frenetic pace. Policy makers, regulators, labour rights movements and some Amazon employees themselves all joined the call for urgent action. The enterprise defended itself from these criticisms by arguing that it had implemented more than 150 process updates across its warehouses to stem the transmission of the Covid-19 virus, ranging from improved cleaning, enhanced physical and social distancing measures, to stricter face mask requirements. Amazon also stepped up Covid-19 testing of its labourers.³²⁸

Notwithstanding these measures, Amazon’s warehouses across the United States continued to report new contamination cases of Covid-19. By July 2020, at least eight Amazon labourers were said to have died from Covid-19.³²⁹

By April 2020, several French trade unions made the move to take Amazon to court, claiming that the enterprise’s working places were not safe after the Covid-19 virus had appeared in some of them. This resulted in a court order from the “Tribunal Judiciaire de Nanterre” on 14 April 2020³³⁰ which mandated Amazon to stop selling anything that was not “essential”. This court order, in practice, resulted into the temporary closure of Amazon’s six fulfilment centres located in France. Amazon would later be allowed to reopen in May 2020, but security-conscious campaigners qualified the events as proof that even a giant enterprise of the size of Amazon can sometimes be brought to its knees.³³¹

According to Robert Reich, Amazon had fired at least two labourers who had publicly complained about the lack of PPE on Amazon’s premises during the pandemic.³³²

In the United Kingdom, the main union for Amazon labourers at the time was the GMB, which counted 600,000 members. Although Amazon had been unwilling to formally recognise this union as an entity with which to negotiate, GMB officials had always been given permission to support labourers during internal disciplinary meetings. Hence, GMB also did its best to keep monitoring what was occurring in Amazon’s processing facilities. Already prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, GMB had regularly raised questions about labourer safety. Hence, it did not come as a surprise that in the second half of 2020, GMB started to make a lot of noise about health and safety issues in the Coventry fulfilment facilities, where there had been at least 30 Covid-19 containment cases in the course of a Covid-19 outbreak that had occurred in October 2020.³³³ As a result, Amazon had started testing UK frontline labourers on its own accord as of October 2020, then sending the test results to Public Health England, which then handed them to NHS Test and Trace and equivalent government agencies in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.³³⁴

Moreover, on 1 October 2020, Amazon publicly announced that as of that date, 19,816 of its frontline labourers at Amazon and Whole Foods in the United States had tested or pre-screened positive for the Covid-19 virus, shedding a formal light for the first time on the impact of Covid-19 on its labour force.³³⁵ Previously, Amazon had over and again refused to share data about the exact number of confirmed Covid-19 contamination cases on its premises with both the general public and with its own labourers. Despite the rumours about huge numbers of confirmed Covid-19 contamination cases in Amazon’s warehouses throughout the United States and around the world, Amazon had always just downplayed the importance of making both site-specific and aggregate numbers available, which made it impossible to get a clear picture of overall contamination cases at Amazon’s sites.³³⁶ However, on 1 October 2020, Amazon changed course: in a blog post of said date, Amazon shared with the general public that it had conducted a

thorough analysis of data on all 1,372,000 Amazon and Whole Foods Market front-line employees across the United States employed at any time from March 1, 2020, to September 19, 2020.³³⁷

The aforementioned number of 19,816 Covid-19 contamination cases came down to a positivity rate of about 1.4%, based on the total labour of American frontline labourers—more than 1.37 million—that were employed by the enterprise’s Amazon and Whole Foods businesses between 1 March 2020 and 19 September 2020.³³⁸

Amazon had already a couple of times before been urged by many to formally disclose its official Covid-19 figures, but until 1 October 2020, Amazon had always refused to give in to these demands. The reason why Amazon, ultimately, decided to comply has apparently been that the figures that could be released on 1 October 2020 were, overall, and especially when comparing Amazon’s figures with the American national averages, not that bad. Indeed, Amazon’s reported positivity rates appeared to be lower than the average rates in 49 of the 50 American states. The only state where Amazon labourers appeared to be more positive than the general population was West Virginia. In releasing its Covid-19 figures, Amazon, furthermore, revealed that it had been expecting to have 33,952 cases on a national basis, provided that its positivity rate would have remained equal to the one of the general American population measured over the same period of time. However, the actual number of positive Covid-19 contamination cases at Amazon appeared 42% lower than this expected rate.³³⁹

This was thought to be great news for Amazon in various ways:

• (1) Amazon could start using this information to assure that the cardboard packaging from its warehouses was safe to handle at home.

• (2) Amazon was at the time trying to resolve labour relations following allegations of unsafe working conditions before and during the Covid-19 pandemic.

• (3) Amazon was preparing to hire an additional 100,000 labourers for handling purchases in the United States and Canada in order to help the enterprise in coping with increased demand.

Observers at the time noted that it was not clear whether the enterprise would also have reported the official case numbers if they had been less favourable to the enterprise. It is also unclear whether the labourers tested also included temporary labourers and contractors, such as “delivery drivers” and “customer representatives”.³⁴⁰

Mid-November 2020, it was estimated that sending out the average Amazon package required only one minute of human labour. This implied that, although Covid-19 made people’s spending to shift from physical shops to internet shopping, the average amount of work related to shopping, as well as the human contact between people involved with shopping, was continuously decreasing. By mid-November 2020, Amazon again announced its intention to hire an additional 8000 labourers in the United Kingdom alone. Meanwhile, and in contrast, during the first eight months of 2020, 125,000 jobs had been lost in the UK retailing sector.³⁴¹

By mid-November 2020, more than 19,000 of Amazon’s labourers employed in the United States alone had contracted Covid-19 since the start of the pandemic (which was said to be 42% lower than the number of contamination cases in the “general population”, according to Amazon itself).³⁴² In mid-February 2021, it was still reported that Amazon labourers kept risking their lives as Covid-19 spread through the enterprise’s warehouses.³⁴³

7.11.2.2.3 Failed Attempts to Unionize

With regard to institutionalising labourers’ rights, for two decades, as Amazon grew from a virtual bookstore to a USD 1.7 trillion behemoth, it strongly—and successfully—resisted all efforts to unionise labourers, while making it clear that it would continue to do so in the near future as well.³⁴⁴

During the Covid-19 pandemic itself, “Amazon Workers International” was set up as an umbrella group aimed at bringing together labourers from a wide variety of countries such as Germany, Poland, Spain, France, Slovakia and the United States, many of whom had played a core role in work stoppages and protests in Amazon’s warehouses. In the United States, there was also much enthusiasm for the so-called “United 4 Respect” initiative, which came down to a pressure group focused on ameliorating the lives of retail labourers. A further coalition of organisations that saw the light of day was called “Athena”, which intended to “stop Amazon’s growing, powerful grip over our society and economy”. All these initiatives coalesced into informal networks of people resorting to social media to vent about (often past) experiences working for Amazon, as well as to highlight problems arising from its Amazon’s market dominance.³⁴⁵

While some labourers had effectively acted during recent years to bring about real change, e.g. in states as Staten Island, Chicago, Sacramento and Minnesota, Amazon had always succeeded in keeping their impact negligible.³⁴⁶

However, the arrival of Covid-19 in 2020 brought further turbulence to the Amazon empire. As explained earlier (cf. Sect. 7.11.2.2.2), the Covid-19 pandemic had as effect that it had turned Amazon into a critical source of supply for millions of stranded people and that it had, in addition, redefined the enterprise’s already troubled relationship with its warehouse labourers. Like many service sector labourers, Amazon’s labour force, more precisely, appeared to be very vulnerable to the Covid-19 virus. As society itself largely locked down, Amazon labourers were also less capable of simply changing job when they experienced problems at work, which implied that they were practically forced to stay at Amazon for the duration of the Covid-19 pandemic.³⁴⁷

All of these factors contributed to a climate conducive to a renewed attempt of establishing a union in order to organize labourers employed in the United States by Amazon.³⁴⁸ As a result, in March-April 2021, Amazon had to undergo a Union vote at one of its warehouses located in Bessemer, Alabama. This unionizing attempt has been indicated as one of the largest and most viable union challenges in the enterprise’s history. In accordance with this unionizing attempt, nearly 6,000 labourers had until 29 March 2021 the time to decide whether or not they wanted to join the “Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union”. The stakes for this unionizing attempt were believed to be extremely high, both for Amazon’s labourers as for Amazon itself, as a union victory would have likely energised labourers in a variety of other American cities, where Amazon had more than 800 other warehouses, in total employing over 500,000 people.³⁴⁹ On 9 April 2021, it was, however, announced that Amazon’s Bessemer labourers had, after all, voted against unionising the enterprise’s site’s labour force. The “National Labour Relations Board” (abbreviated as “NLRB”) on that date made the announcement that out of 3041 potentially valid votes, 1798 labourers employed at the BHM1 fulfilment centre had voted against unionisation, while 738 of the labourers had voted in favour. In addition, while the union had previously claimed to have collected a total of 3215 ballots, the eligibility of 505 ballots had been challenged, especially by Amazon itself; to the extent that more than half of the total votes were against unionisation, it was decided not to open the challenged ballots.³⁵⁰

It was, furthermore, not the first time that a unionization attempt within Amazon had failed. Already in 2014, a previous unionisation attempt had taken place among technicians employed at an Amazon warehouse located in Middletown, Delaware. If this 2014 attempt would have been successful, it would have implied the first Union for Amazon. Union elections at the time were announced to take place in Middletown and to be organised by the National Labour Relations Board. A first step had been to gauge interest, from which it appeared that at least 18 of the 30 technicians employed in Chester had returned cards in which they had indicated their willingness to be represented by the union. In response, Amazon had resorted to spending vast sums of money to intimidate its labourers. The National Labour Relations Board ultimately scheduled the election date on 4 March 2015. A simple majority of all the votes cast would have sufficed for establishing union representation. Amazon itself then brought in a team from the “Employee Resource Centre”—basically its human resources department—with as aim to reverse the momentum. One labourer wishing to remain anonymous for fear of even further retaliation, later said to The New York Times that members of this Employee Resource Centre had been following labourers around and, while pretending to be nice, had but tried to find out the individual labourers’ position on the union drive. While job security had been one of the main concerns of the Amazon’s technicians who were at the basis of the unionizing initiative, they had also been concerned about pay equity—with machinists making claims that they were paid differently for basically doing the same job—and about their lack of autonomy. Part of the intent for starting a union within Amazon had been to make the enterprise’s management less arbitrary. Amazon to an increasing extent fiercely opposed the unionizing attempt. Several of the technicians who had been involved with the attempt later declared that they remembered having been told during a meeting that if they would vote in favour of a union, each of them would be looking for a new job the next day. Others remember that, during another meeting, those most in favour of establishing a union had been described as “a cancer and a disease to Amazon and the facility”. As the intimidation of the labourers continued, the machinists’ union even resorted to filing a formal complaint with the labour board in July 2015, in which they alleged that Amazon had been guilty of unfair labour practices, amongst which unwarranted surveillance, threats and informing labourers that voting for the union’s representation would be futile. In early 2016, Amazon ultimately reached an agreement with the labour board which also put an end to the unionizing attempt. The thrust of the two-page agreement was that Amazon would post a notice to labourers promising good behaviour, while for the rest admitting nothing.³⁵¹

After Amazon had successfully defeated this 2014 unionizing attempt in Delaware, the enterprise declared that his had implied a victory for “open lines of direct communication between managers and associates.” The places where Amazon subsequently developed its direct communication lines with the labourers was in its warehouse bathrooms, as part of what got referred to as the “inSTALLments” program. Under the “inSTALLments” program, fact sheets were offered containing, e.g., facts about Jeff Bezos’ meeting schedules, besides a variety of random and demeaning messages, such as this one with regard to unpaid leave: “If you go negative, your employment status will be reviewed for termination.”³⁵²

The labourers behind failed Bessemer initiative had felt that the automatically enforced productivity metrics, had made work “gruelling, stressful and dehumanizing”. At the time, Amazon more precisely tracked two metrics: on one hand, the average speed at which labourers completed an assignment, called “takt time”, and, on the other hand, the time labourers spent not scanning merchandise, called “time off task”. If labourers failed to maintain a sufficiently fast pace, they were either reprimanded or fired. The situation had even gotten to the point where Amazon management had started to complain that labourers were losing time visiting the bathroom and subsequently coming back, while then being reprimanded for the fact that their off task time had increased too much. This did not concern single incidents but was a common complaint among labourers at both BHM1 and other Amazon facilities.³⁵³

The labourers behind the new unionizing attempt had high hopes that a union would allow for the improvement of labour conditions and for the creation of a less arbitrary dismissal process, so that people would generally be treated with more respect.³⁵⁴ The labourers behind the initiative also hoped that a union would manage to negotiate higher wages. In addition, many of Amazon’s labourers were at the time acutely aware that both Amazon and Bezos themselves had succeeded in performing staggeringly well during the Covid-19 pandemic, with Amazon’s profits purportedly up by 84% in 2020 and with Jeff Bezos’ personal fortune having increased by around USD 70 billion. Meanwhile, many BHM1 labourers had, by contrast, seen their salaries fall. This was due to the fact that BHM1 had only opened in March 2020, at a moment in time when Amazon had just been applying an additional USD 2 per hour hazard pay, a programme that the enterprise however ended in June 2020, in this manner reducing labourers’ pay to a mere USD 15.30 per hour. A complaint often heard among Amazon labourers was that while Bezos received billions of dollars out of all of his facilities established during the Covid-19 pandemic, nothing of that money trickled down to Amazon’s labourers, who felt—literally—like they were slaving in the trenches for making Bezos rich. Moreover, while the Covid-19 pandemic soured labourers’ grievances, the “Black Lives Matter” protests that arose during the summer of 2020 in reaction to the murder of George Floyd, helped galvanise many of these labourers into concrete action. The majority of Amazon’s BHM1 labourers were, furthermore, black, with many of them having participated in the Black Lives Matter protests around Birmingham.³⁵⁵ Around that time, it had also become very clear that black labourers were all over the United States over-represented in critical, high-risk jobs (such as jobs in Amazon’s warehouses), especially jobs on the Covid-19 front lines and/or jobs of a lower-paying nature. In the case of Amazon itself, black workers made up 27% of Amazon’s labour force at the time, compared to making up only 13% of all labourers in the United States. In particular within Amazon’s Bessemer warehouse, union activists estimated that 85% of labourers were black.³⁵⁶

It was, hence, believed that Amazon’s disproportionately black labour force risked their lives during the Covid-19 pandemic, while Amazon itself had hardly shared any of its astonishing profits with them. More precisely, throughout 2020, Amazon had made an additional USD 9.7 billion in profits, a staggering 84% increase over 2019. The enterprise’s share price as a result rose 82%, with founder Jeff Bezos adding USD 67.9 billion to his fortune, 38 times the total hazard pay Amazon at the time had paid to its one million labourers considered together as of March 2020.³⁵⁷ The foregoing is further illustrated in Fig. 7.2 which gives an overview of Jeff Bezos’s Covid-19 wealth increase versus all hazard pay for all Amazon workers between 18 March 2020 and 15 March 2021.

Fig. 7.2

Jeff Bezos’s Covid-19 wealth increase versus all hazard pay for all Amazon workers between 18 March 2020 and 15 March 2021 [Source: Perry et al. (2021)]

The NLRB later found that Amazon had both been threatening and dismissing labourers who had protested against the enterprise’s way of dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic.³⁵⁸

In the opinion of Day and Soper, when comparing labour conditions at Amazon to similar work environments, they appear to be much worse. In the past, logistics jobs had often been a source of social mobility, and unionised warehouses’ wages had typically been double those paid by Amazon. From a Bloomberg analysis referred to by Day and Soper, it even appeared that that when Amazon opens a new facility somewhere, average wages at other warehouses located in the neighbourhood often drop.³⁵⁹ In addition, Amazon’s appalling methods of monitoring workers and enhancing productivity—all characteristics of labour conditions at Amazon that had prompted the BHM1 facility to unionise in the first place—had similarly contaminated the rest of the logistics industry, with other enterprises in the same sector, or even in other sectors, trying to compete with Amazon by copying its labour methods. Dzieza made reference to Benjamin Sachs, a professor of labour and industry law at Harvard Law School and a renowned expert in labour law and industrial relations, who had qualified Amazon as a “bellwether company” due to its leading role in redefining the labour market and in setting out the future of labour, in a likewise manner as the auto industry had once done at the beginning of the twentieth century. According to Sachs, as referred to by Dzieza, the at the time historical unionisation of the car industry, which had been aimed at reforming labour law, had set out labour market trends for decades afterwards. It was hoped that the unionisation attempt at Amazon would cause a similar effect.³⁶⁰ If the Bessemer effort had succeeded, it would have shown that such a unionization of Amazon was feasible after all. And indeed, soon after the initiative at the Bessemer location had been announced, labourers at other Amazon facilities expressed a similar interest in following BHM1’s example. According to Dzieza, it was, moreover, expected that such a chain reaction could have implied more than a simple alteration to the labour conditions under which hundreds of thousands of Amazon labourers have to perform their job. Because of Amazon’s huge size and because of the increasing geographic reach of its logistics network, the quality and wage level of Amazon’s jobs had an important effect on the quality and wage level of jobs elsewhere. Amazon itself was, moreover, fully aware of this and had in, the near past, even touted this effect in its advertisements lobbying for a USD 15 minimum wage. It had thereby appeared that back in 2018 when, Amazon had increased its starting wage to USD 15 per hour (in response to the Bernie Sanders legislative initiative mentioned above; cf. Sect. 7.11.2.1), wages at some nearby employers had also increased.³⁶¹

However, according to Reich, in the case of a full-time labourer, an hourly wage of 15 USD per hour amounts to about USD 31,000 on a yearly basis, which is still considerably less than half the median family income in the United States at the beginning of 2021. Reich also pointed to the fact that labourers at Amazon did not get paid sick leave. And notwithstanding the small effort of increasing hourly wages, Amazon’s warehouses still continued to impose severe production quotas and to subject labourers to an arbitrary dismissal policy, total monitoring and working days of 10 hours on average and with only two half-hour breaks—which in many cases leaves not enough time to go to the bathroom and be back at one’s job post in time.³⁶²

Amazon itself reacted extremely negatively to Bessemer’s unionization attempt. The enterprise started its efforts to thwart the unionisation attempt by resorting to an aggressive social media campaign. Amazon, e.g., sent its labourers several text messages per day in which these were urged to vote against the unionization proposal. Amazon also started running Facebook ads linking to a website that warned labourers that, in case a union would be established, they would have to pay union dues.³⁶³ Amazon’s management also began putting banners on walls and signs on toilet doors, containing messages such as “Where will your dues go?” and “Unions can’t, we can!”³⁶⁴

Following a standard corporate textbook for dealing with unionization attempts, Amazon, in addition, brought in specialist anti-union consultants in the run-up to the union vote that was due to start in February 2021. Such anti-union consultants specialise in convincing labourers to vote against having a union and in coaching employers in how to stifle union support.³⁶⁵ While under the at the time prevailing law, enterprises could not legally retaliate against a labourer for wanting to establish or join a union, or even question him about his leanings on this matter, penalties for violating this law are believed to be notoriously weak. Often, an offending enterprise is simply instructed to hang a poster in which it acknowledges that it has violated the law. In addition, employers in most cases have a strong incentive to skirt as close to the legal limits as possible if this keeps a union out.³⁶⁶ That is why Amazon used at least two (expensive) consulting firms specialized in advising an employer how to avoid unionization.³⁶⁷ Amazon, moreover, hired the leading management-support law firm “Morgan Lewis” for handling its labour board disputes. A spokesperson of Amazon later declined to say how much money the enterprise had been spending on such consultancy and how many consultants it had precisely hired, with more information in this regard expected to be provided in future filings. One lawyer was quoted having estimated the total expenses to be in the millions of dollars, if not eight figures.³⁶⁸

Amazon also resorted to mandatory meetings at its warehouses, referring to these as “training sessions”, when in fact they were about nothing else than “union bashing”.³⁶⁹ Amazon labourers who attended these meetings later referred to them as “very strange”. It was reported that sometimes a handful of “bossy-looking” people had been standing aside, leaving in the middle whether they were consultants, managers from other warehouses, security people … Some of the people posing as labourers were also said to have been asking obsequious-looking questions that raised doubts it they were actual labourers or plants.³⁷⁰ And according to these declarations made by labourers, there had been many such meetings.³⁷¹

From research, it appears that such anti-union campaigns may be very effective and can even swing election results. In a 2009 analysis of union elections, Cornell labour specialist and researcher Kate Bronfenbrenner, found that unionization elections were only won in 47% of the cases when employers organized meetings with captive audiences, compared to 73% of the cases when they did not. From this research, it also appears that other strategies may be effective in thwarting unionization attempts as well, e.g., spreading anti-union literature, videos and emails.³⁷² Jamieson has quoted long-time election organiser Gene Bruskin in saying that the anti-union message ultimately becomes successful because of fear.³⁷³

According to Dzieza, Amazon resorted to even more aggressive and unorthodox measures. After having lost the fight to have the unionization election held in person, Amazon started sending mailers to its labourers with clear instructions on how to fill out their ballots with a “no” vote. The e-mail messages, furthermore, instructed the labourers to drop their ballots in a special mailbox set up at the entrance of the warehouse. Afterwards, in late 2020, Amazon asked the county to change the timing of the traffic lights to make work for Amazon labourers harder.³⁷⁴

The result of all this animosity has been an extremely hard-fought election campaign on both sides. Organisers, hence, expected the vote to be a very close one. Towards the end of the election campaign, the unionisation attempt even got the support of a wide range of renowned outside supporters, including US President Biden who posted a video message on Twitter in March 2021 in which he made reference to the unionization vote.³⁷⁵ US Senator Bernie Sanders and activist and rapper Killer Mike even paid visits to the warehouse on Friday 9 April 2021, the latest in a series of official and celebrity delegations for supporting the Bessemer unionisation initiative. While this high-profile support is believed to have altered some people’s minds, the extremely long voting period meant that some labourers had already handed in their ballots and would have had to request new ones in order to still change their vote.³⁷⁶

The results of the 9 April 2021 vote implied a devastating loss for the RWDSU and for the wider labour union movement. The union itself decided to fight the election results—raising objections under the argument that Amazon’s campaign had violated several aspects of labour law—but it was deemed unlikely that these challenges would be able to alter the election outcome. After having put their hopes on a domino effect that was expected to unionise Amazon’s warehouses throughout the United States, organisers instead had to start fighting to keep their dream of re-unionising American labourers alive.³⁷⁷

But while what has been referred to as a “lopsided result” may have come as a surprise to some, it is nevertheless but a part of a long and frustrating history, dating back to the days of “Reaganomics” when official neoliberal policy had been about abandoning unions as much as possible. Simply put, since that time, few American labourers had remained unionised.³⁷⁸

Amazon’s case is, moreover, far from unique. Similar practices of systematically thwarting unions were reported in 2020–2021 about Tesla, the enterprise belonging to another of the world’s richest people.³⁷⁹

One important handicap working against union organisers is believed to be US labour law itself, which gives employers ample leeway to promote anti-union policies in the workplace. In the case of the Bessemer campaign, Amazon had been running an aggressive campaign against the union during several months, posting anti-RWDSU leaflets in warehouse bathrooms and bombarding labourers with targeted text messages. But while union organisers may have experienced these tactics as part of an unfair fight, they all fell within the bounds of US labour law.³⁸⁰ There was, however, a particular hope that, under President Joe Biden, the National Labour Relations Board would start to alter the legislation on captive audience meetings and similar anti-union tactics.³⁸¹ There is another factor that helps to explain why the Bessemer’s unionisation attempt has ultimately failed, namely the region’s economy: as in much of the United States, Alabama’s unemployment rate had skyrocketed during the Covid-19 pandemic, rising from 2.6% to 13.6% from March 2020 to April 2020. This implied a huge economic shock to the region, which may have overshadowed the union effort as well.³⁸²

Be this as it may, the failed Bessemer unionisation campaign has drawn attention to the tactics that are used for breaking union drives. As noted, the Democrats responded with a proposal for the most radical reform of labour law in more than half a century, namely the PRO Act. If voted successfully, the bill would, inter alia, prohibit the kind of captive audience meetings that Amazon had organized (with the Bessemer’s failed unionisation campaign serving as “Exhibit A” for progressive lawmakers).³⁸³

But overall, there was concern that the Bessemer results would prove to be a major setback for future unionisation attempts both at Amazon and elsewhere. Thanks to the Alabama campaign’s publicity, the union had before the result of the Bessemer elections were known, collected more than 1000 signed cards from other Amazon facilities. The Bessemer election results were likely to make a lot of these labourers change their mind. The failed unionisation attempt also sparked further debate about whether it is possible at all to win NLRB-run union elections in Amazon’s warehouses, given the labour conditions, the enterprise’s deep pockets, its lack of conscience and its deplorable tactics.³⁸⁴

7.12 Conclusions

The problems facing modern, neoliberal societies, especially regarding the consequences of (1) the principle of the primacy of the economic domain and (2) the subordination of all other values to the interests of the economy (read: to the interests of the wealthy entrepreneurs)³⁸⁵ (cf. Sect. 2.2.7) go back to the period when capitalism, which is still the prevailing socio-economic model today—even though the advocates of this model nowadays prefer to call it the “free market model”—took shape, especially the seventeenth–eighteenth century. It is during this turbulent period that the conceptual frameworks which form the building blocks for political-liberal societies and their counterpart in the economic domain, capitalism in particular, have taken shape.³⁸⁶ As Erich Fromm rightly pointed out in his book “The Sane Society” which was first published in 1955:³⁸⁷

In spite of great changes which have occurred within this system [Capitalism], there are certain features which have endured throughout its history and, with reference to these common features, it is legitimate to use the concept of Capitalism for the economic system existing throughout this whole period.

According to Fromm,³⁸⁸ these features that post World war II-societies had in common with early-day capitalism, are, briefly stated: (1) The existence of politically and legally free men (= members of “liberal” societies that started to take form as of the eighteenth century); (2) Probably more important, the fact—or perhaps belief—that free men (i.e., “labourers”, “workers” or “employees”) may sell their labour to the owner of capital on the labour market, by contract (cf. Sect. 7.1.2, on the voluntary association theory); (3) The existence of the commodity market as a mechanism through which prices are determined and the exchange of the social product is regulated; (4) The principle that each individual acts with the aim of seeking a profit for himself, and yet that, by the competitive action of many, the greatest advantage is supposed to accrue for all.

Not much has changed since then, except that, under neoliberal thinking, the idea that free people, on a contractual basis, make their labour available as a commodity on the free market(s), resonates even more strongly in the socio-economic order. As already explained above, this is because for the adherents of neoliberal thought—and in particular for one of the foremost, self-proclaimed philosophers of this school, Ayn Rand—workers’ relations should be fully fleshed out through individual contracting (the so-called “voluntary association”-doctrine), which partly explains the phasing out, from the 1980s onwards, of systems of collectivization of labour relations. As a result, the idea that an employment relationship is established through individual contracts between free people dominates more than ever, having prompted Joseph Stiglitz to write that the fear of job-loss has become one of the greatest motivators of the working person.³⁸⁹

The consequences of this vision on the working man, still a new figure in the seventeenth-eighteenth century, crystallized further in the course of the nineteenth century, according to Fromm, much like capitalism itself: at first slowly and then with increasing acceleration.

Given the crucial nature of his insights, for a proper understanding of the ethical dimension of what happened—and went wrong –, let us again quote the words of Erich Fromm himself:³⁹⁰

The living human being, with his desires and woes, loses more and more his central place in the system, and this place is occupied by business and production. Man ceases to be “the measure of all things” in the economic sphere. The most characteristic element of nineteenth-century Capitalism was first of all, ruthless exploitation of the worker; it was believed to be a natural or a social law that hundreds of thousands of workers were living at the point of starvation. The owner of capital was supposed to be morally right if, in the pursuit of profit, he exploited to the maximum the labour he hired. There was hardly any sense of human solidarity between the owner of capital and his workers. The law of the economic jungle was supreme. All the restrictive ideas of previous centuries were left behind. One seeks out the customer, tries to undersell one’s competitor, and the competitive fight against equals is as ruthless and unrestricted as the exploitation of the worker.

(…)

The capitalistic principle that each one seeks his own profit and thus contributes to the happiness of all becomes the guiding principle of human behaviour.

The market as the prime regulator is freed from all traditional restrictive elements and comes fully into its own in the nineteenth century. While everybody believes himself to act according to his own interest, he is actually determined by the anonymous laws of the market and of the economic machine.

In this approach, which has remained virtually unchanged to this day, an illusion of freedom prevails within the political domain (to be observed, e.g., in systems such as free elections in which everyone can participate, in addition to constitutional freedoms, such as the freedom of association, the freedom of religion, the freedom of speech, etc.), although their value cannot be properly addressed because the individual has become totally unfree in the socio-economic sphere, a much more important determinant in shaping his daily life.

Erich Fromm has explained this as follows:³⁹¹

The worker who has to accept the wage rate offered him on the labour market is forced to accept the market condition because he could not survive otherwise. Thus the “freedom” of the individual is largely illusory. He is aware of the fact that there is no outer force which compels him to enter into certain contracts; he is less aware of the laws of the market which operate behind his back, as it were; hence he believes that he is free, when he actually is not.

The generalization of this socio-economic model, as of the 1980s, on a global scale, has resulted in a fundamental undervaluation of work, of human effort and skill, amongst others, characterized by extreme discrepancies in compensation.³⁹² As Fromm has phrased this: “The miner earns a fraction of the income of the manager of the mine, though his personal effort is greater if we consider the dangers and discomforts connected with his work.”³⁹³ And it is this fundamental imbalance that has continued to characterize industrial relations ever since, only to be further magnified in the current neoliberal era.

Moreover, this evolution was accompanied by an ongoing reversal of the principle of solidarity that had characterized medieval societies, to be displaced by modern capitalist exploitation.³⁹⁴

With the welfare state model (roughly speaking in the period after World War II until the 1970s), an attempt has been made to restore a certain degree of solidarity through systems of workers’ protection and social security, although from the 1980s on, again under the impetus of economic neoliberalism, the results of these efforts were largely phased out.

All this has resulted in a devaluation—or dehumanization—of the human being. In the further opinion of Fromm, it is precisely because of this that man, a living human being, has ceased to be an end in himself, and has become but the means for the economic interests of other men than himself, or of an impersonal giant, the economic machine or, phrased differently, “the economy”.³⁹⁵

Again, according to Fromm, this also translates into a clear value scale:³⁹⁶

In the capitalistic hierarchy of values, capital stands higher than labour, amassed things higher than the manifestations of life. Capital employs labour, and not labour capital. The person who owns capital commands the person who “only” owns his life, human skill, vitality and creative productivity. “Things” are higher than man. The conflict between capital and labour is much more than the conflict between two classes, more than their fight for a greater share of the social product. It is the conflict between two principles of value: that between the world of things, and their amassment, and the world of life and its productivity.

The result of this has been that life in a capitalist economy makes everyone concerned about one thing: making enough money. People are forced to make their bare survival the central goal in life. This has transformed interactions with other people. In the struggle to earn enough money, people see colleagues, strangers, and perhaps even friends, merely as elements of this pursuit, rather than as proper human beings on their own accord.³⁹⁷ In such a socioeconomic order, practically everyone is forced to perform what Halliday and Trasher referred to as “alienated labour”.³⁹⁸

It is also precisely this dynamic—and the inverse scale of values on which it is based—that has determined how the Western world has dealt with the Covid-19 pandemic, which immediately explains why, instead of waging a “realpolitik”, many Western countries have responded to Covid-19 in terms of a mythological worldview—the palace of smoke and mirrors that makes up neoliberal thinking.³⁹⁹

The sensible response when a(n airborne) virus pandemic breaks out, is the elimination strategy as deployed by most Asian countries (drawing on previous, various experiences with infectious virus outbreaks that had been more or less successfully contained in the past, such as “Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome” (SARS), the “Middle East Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus” (MERS-CoV), the “Ebola virus”, the “Swine Flu”…).

The principles for fighting such viruses are not that difficult—and in essence they can even be reduced to but a few basic ideas, namely: “testing”, “contact tracing”, “isolation”/”quarantine”, and “hygiene”.⁴⁰⁰

It is by acting upon these simple basic insights in a very conscientious manner that the elimination approach to fighting airborne viruses, such as Covid-19, has been very successful. Many Asian countries follow the idea that “there is no other realistic way out other than reducing viral transmission to zero”. When an outbreak of a(n airborne) virus is detected in these countries, all guns are brought to bear to achieve the necessary testing, contact tracing, face mask distribution and wearing, and, when needed, isolation, resulting in sustained—and strictly monitored—lockdowns, voluntary and imposed isolation, hard quarantine measures for arriving non-residents, etc. The measures are harsh, but short-term, requiring both a far-reaching solidarity between members of society, and a sufficient degree of discipline from the population. The strategy has, as a general rule, demonstrated high success rates in fighting (airborne) viruses.⁴⁰¹

But the purportedly “free” Western world, and certainly its political leaders, do not like this approach. It even seems that the aversion to such NPI measures increases to the extent that someone adheres to the neoliberal ideology, ranging from the EU’s political elite (and the heavy, authoritarian bureaucracy it relies on) and the leading politicians of many of the EU member states, to the leaders of the Republican party in the United States, and probably the worst of all, President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil.

One common element is that they all strongly hold on to an illusory idea of political freedom that took shape from the eighteenth century on, which is of no use to the common citizenry. Those who depend on an income from labour to effectively enjoy these nominal political freedoms. This is impossible under languishing socio-economic conditions.⁴⁰²

The political elite of the Western world brings to mind the story—true or not⁴⁰³—of the French queen who, when she learned that the Parisian population was dissatisfied because there was no bread, asked why they simply did not eat cake.

Adhering to this illusory idea of freedom has been decisive for various (usually wrongheaded) responses to the Covid-19 pandemic in the Western world. It, e.g., contributed to the weeks of inactivity of EU leadership. When Covid-19 reached the European continent, their primary concern seemed to maintain the EU treaty-law on “freedom of movement”, the EU’s insidious rule stipulating that everyone within the boundaries of the EU must be able to circulate freely. But above all, they were deeply concerned about their own freedom to travel, in order to attend their purportedly important meetings and other events. Illusions of freedom also explained “the six missing weeks” in the United States, during which the American President did not do much else other than downplaying the Covid-19 threat to justify inaction. (Cf. Sect 2.5.4.1.) It also explains why the Covid-19 outbreak has not been quickly responded to with travel restrictions. Within Europe, restrictions on carnival festivities and ski tourism in February 2020 were never considered, allowing for unchecked travel back and forth between clean and contaminated areas, and for everyone to freely throw themselves into all kinds of festive debauchery, supercharging the spread of Covid-19. Even though the WHO had already sounded the alarm at the time, quarantine measures simply were not on the table, not even for returning tourists.

It does not even occur to the supporters of such an erroneous view of “freedom”, that their freedom restrained by the freedom of others, namely other people’s freedom from harm and their right to life.

But in no other domain have the dictates of classical liberal and modern neoliberal thought made themselves felt so harshly than in that of industrial relations. The more sensible (and scientifically more responsible) method of responding to the spread of an airborne virus, is to temporarily restrict economic functioning. Especially in cases, such as the EU and the United States, where one has not successfully resorted to an elimination strategy at the start of an airborne contagion, avoiding a further spread of such a virus may require that mutual contacts between infected and non-infected people are stopped as much as possible. This also concerns all contacts on the working floors, in factories, in shops, etc. Only the most essential services can still be allowed to function, and only under very strict conditions.

But not so in the “free” West, where neoliberal policymakers usually first want to see from which way the wind blows. Hence, at the outbreak of the Covid-19 in January 2020—and even after the WHO had sounded the alarm-, various Western political eminencies still diminished the whole situation, basically demonstrating a classic negationist response—to be traced back to the (neo)liberal “laissez-faire, laissez-passer” idea that teaches that a government should interfere as little as possible with anything that happens, preferably just leaving it all to the functioning of the free market. (Cf. Sect. 2.2.4.)

When, about a month and a half later (by mid-March 2020), the realization had finally set in that Covid-19 was more than a common winter flu, the illusory idea of freedom still stood in the way of an adequate response. Meanwhile, the Covid-19 virus had been allowed to take its course, as a result of which contamination levels began to reach proportions unseen in the past century (perhaps giving Asian leaders and scientists pause as to what they were up to in the so-called “free West”).

Only at the point of complete escalation did the Western, neoliberal governments start taking more severe measures, albeit still very reluctantly, and while initially still aiming to affect the supposed freedom of their population as little as possible. As a result, harsh lockdown measures only followed as of the second half of the month of March 2020 and only because there were no other possibilities left. But by then it was already too late: under the free movement of people that the Western world holds so dear, Covid-19 had, in a mere 2 months, been allowed to spread to the farthest corners of the world.

Moreover, as soon as the belated lockdown measures, started to show some good results (as they did in the countries that had resorted to them), neoliberal leadership already started giving in to loud calls to “open up societies and their economies” again. The lack of freedom within the socio-economic sphere of life ironically became in this manner the leading principle of neoliberal, public policy.

Clearly, both the captains of industry and the neoliberal political leadership they have installed throughout the Western world, do not like it when the mob idly sits at home, even if most of them continued to work via telework. For a good neoliberal, the mere idea of the working classes sitting around doing nothing is a sheer aberration. Circling back to Fromm, we know that in such a (neo-)liberal vision, a fellow human being has no inherent value, except as an economic production factor, which implies that everyone should be at work all the time, regardless of age or risk.

It is, therefore, not surprising that shortly after the Covid-19 lockdown measures had been announced, the business world and neoliberal governments all over the West, started demanding that the working classes be put back to work. Otherwise, the economy (which from a neoliberal point of view is inherently much more important than human lives) would suffer serious further damage, which had to be avoided at all costs.

Since then, the aversion to harsh lockdowns or comparable measures has continued to determine policy in the Western world. The policy of fighting Covid-19 has in fact been turned into a sort of “accordion policy” (cf. Table 2.1), whereby containment measures were relaxed and tightened again in function of statistical data on the pandemic. It was clear that a few deaths as a result of such a policy, did not raise much cause for concern among neoliberal leadership.

In this context, it may even be worth recalling the idea of a universal basic income that could provide working people at least with some resilience against all these capitalist methods of exploitation.⁴⁰⁴ But obviously, such proposals still meet with great resistance from neoliberal policymakers (and neoliberal academia). These same people then turn a blind eye to the trillions in aid that are needed at every crisis to keep banks and other enterprises afloat (cf. Chaps. 3 and 4), under the classic justification—going back to Adam Smith himself—that tiny bits of this aid will “trickle down” to the lower classes, who should be happy with this.

The question remains, if and when the reversal of values on which this (neo)liberal body of thought is based, can be reversed again, once more placing people above the economy (or, put differently: putting “labour” above “capital”).⁴⁰⁵ We ourselves, at any rate, continue to devote ourselves to this in our own writings, repeating the models which we have already advocated in the past, and to which we shall return in the final concluding chapter (cf. Chap. 11).