Walmart Worker Strike Hits Washington, DC, Area

Workers are striking to protest Walmart’s attempts to “silence and retaliate against workers for speaking out for improvements on the job,” according to a news statement cited in a recent Huffington Post story.

The strike was organized by the United Food and Commercial Workers union.

The story traced the strike from 60 Walmart employees walking off the job in Los Angeles on Friday, Oct. 5, to Tuesday’s protest by employees in stores in cities including Washington, DC, Dallas, Seattle, San Francisco, Miami, Orlando, Chicago and Sacramento, as well as Walmart locations in Kentucky, Missouri and Minnesota.

Protests are planned at Walmart’s headquarters in Bentonville, AR, during today’s annual investor meeting.

Workers at the Laurel, MD, Walmart have already been on strike as well.

One Walmart employee told the Huffington Post that he has worked for the company for three years, and makes less than $9.00 per hour. 

The worker went on to describe the situation at the Dallas Walmart where he works as one where employees borrow “money from each other just to make it through the week." The article compares the workers financial plight to the wealth of the six heirs of Walmart founder Sam Walton, who are worth an estimated $89.5 billion.

A spokesman from Walmart told the Huffington Post writer that the striking workers “aren’t representative of our entire associate base.” He also detailed some of Walmart’s policies for handling worker complaints.