Read our editorial on the significance of strikes here.
Home healthcare workers are resuming a hunger strike outside city hall in New York City on July 28 after Speaker of the New York City Council Julie Menin refused to submit legislation ending 24-hour shifts.
Workers had initiated a two-week sit-in outside Menin’s multimillion-dollar Manhattan penthouse on July 14 demanding she bring the No More 24 bill to a vote.
The sit-in follows a hunger strike in May, part of home healthcare workers’ years-long campaign to end round-the-clock shifts that lead to exhaustion, injury, and stolen wages.
Council Speaker Menin put forward an amended version of the bill that failed to meet the workers’ key demand: to cap working hours to 12 hours within any 24-hour period. Menin’s version allows unionized home healthcare workers to work 24-hour shifts until 2028 or until their current contract expires.
A sit-in attendee told The Worker that the provision for unionized workers was particularly egregious because the unions have been complicit in enforcing the 24-hour workday.
Sit-in leaders have spotlighted a letter from the United Nations condemning the 24-hour workday as a violation of international law. The letter conveys the experiences of Lai Yee Chan and Luz Estrella as examples of home healthcare workers’ poor working conditions.
One part of the letter reads, “When [Ms. Estrella’s] daughter had a baby at the age of 15 via C-section, Ms. Luz Estella was not able to be with her at the hospital. Additionally, she could not be at the hospital when one of her sons had surgery. When her other son was ill and vomiting blood, she had to wait a full week for a replacement before she could take time off work to care for him.”
In another part of the letter, Lai Yee Chan said she “could not sleep for days in a row.” When Chan complained to her employer, the Chinese-American Planning Council (CPC), the CPC threatened to send her to jail. Demonstrators at the sit-in explained that workers who report their full hours are often threatened with lawsuits.
The letter explains that the CPC was sued for wage theft and forced to establish a fund of at least $30 million for home care workers.
The CPC’s abuses extend beyond home healthcare. Michael Lee, who is the director of the Home Attendant Program, is also the president of the Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA). In 2019, MOCA received a $35 million grant, described as a bribe by community activists, in exchange for supporting the construction of a prison tower in Chinatown. Activists of the Chinese Workers and Staff Association point to such deals as evidence of collusion among New York City’s wealthiest residents to maximize profits and immiserate workers.
Image: Home healthcare workers stage a sit-in outside Menin’s Manhattan penthouse. Credit: The Worker.
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