At Gonzales Design, workers also complain of ventilation problems and forced overtime. Steelworkers organizer Pete Vargas says that mandatory overtime is often announced half an hour before the shift ends and sometimes extends to six days a week. Wages remain at less than half the industry norm. Similar conditions prevail at Piston Packaging, which produces paper pallets, corrugated boxes, and set-up boxes for the auto industry. Vinnie Johnson, former Detroit Pistons star, is the principal owner.
Workers complain that there are no working water fountains.
If they want to drink water, the employees have to bring it from home and hope it doesn't run out. That is the only raise workers that have been there for two and a half years have ever seen. Lunches, apparently, are at the supervisor's discretion. The company tried to make it up to the workers the next day by promising to buy them pizza, but as far as I know they still haven't gotten any. Recently, President Clinton went on a tour to promote Empowerment Zones as the solution for the country's poor.