Manufacturing Worker Correspondent
Google cut our shifts manufacturing their AI [artificial intelligence] data center servers at Quanta Computer in La Vergne, TN throughout October and November.
Quanta management in production says they are cutting shifts because there are no materials, but we see a full warehouse ready to go. We know these cuts are because Google’s intense production goals and work speeds have impacted the quality of the servers and caused four workers to be hospitalized or injured this month.
My coworker on the Google production line was taken out on an ambulance after passing out on the line on Nov 5. They didn’t have a wheelchair so they put her in a plastic office chair. We have not yet heard from her. This happened a month after two workers were injured in separate warehouse door injuries and another worker was run over by a forklift. It’s common to see older women forced to move at least 48 massive carts per shift filled with heavy batteries, motherboards, and other components to each line.
Google forced us to produce up to 400 servers per shift to keep pace for their $5 billion data centers being built in ~1,500 acres in West Memphis and Little Rock, Arkansas. The recent cuts have been hitting us hard while coworkers in other departments got transferred into the Amazon production line. We have been given no update how long the cuts will persist.
Whenever Google comes by to do an inspection, management gives us new drills and uniforms when they usually give us so few and many of our uniforms have holes.
Our workplace has gotten increasingly hostile since the commencement of the union-busting campaign that has already led Quanta to have federal labor violations filed against them for illegal union busting meetings. We are protected by federal law won by workers to talk about our work conditions on our breaks, during lunch and outside the office and to pass these newspapers.
Management tried to sweeten us up and told some workers they would get a $1 raise but the monopoly keeps cutting our paychecks despite reporting record revenue of more than $34 billion in the third quarter of 2026 according to Central News Agency. Management also claimed that they would install proper air conditioning in the warehouse and that more men would be moving the orders instead of the older women but none of these things have happened. Instead, we’ve seen more work exhaustion, mistreatment, and less pay. Women are even getting told by management that their leggings are to blame for the sexual harassment and assault happening on the line.
Management is increasing its regime of terror against the workers with its extremely strict point system where we can lose our jobs for clocking in 1 minute late or out 1 minute early even though sometimes the clocks are broken and read incorrectly. We also get points when we go to health checkups or the massive amount of us being forced to go to Memphis for ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] removal hearing court. We either use up all our limited Paid Time Off (PTO) or vacation time, or we get points even if we give a doctor’s note or a letter from the court.
Monopolies like Quanta lie and threaten us because they’re scared of how powerful we are when we are organized. A worker rebellion at a Quanta factory in Shanghai during Covid lockdown shows that when workers unite and fight back, they can improve their conditions.
We are looking for worker correspondents: cashiers, drivers, nurses, construction workers, cleaners, warehouse staff—anyone who wants to report on what’s really happening at work. Share a story, a tip, a victory, or a fightback. We’ll help you turn it into an article. Contact us at theworkerpaper@proton.me.
This article was edited on November 9 to fix a typo regarding the sex of a coworker.
Image: Seagate’s clean room in China, 2008. Credit: Robert Scoble, retrieved from Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0).
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