Supermarket workers getting infected

If hospital workers can't get enough PPE to do their jobs, how would you expect a supermarket worker to get it? A nurse in NYC just died because of lack of PPE.

Most retail stores use this euphemism now. Many who work in retail work less than 40 hrs.a week, not because they want to but because the store doesn’t give full time hours to anyone below the management level. I don’t know if just calling workers employees has legal ramifications, but this surprised me as much as it did you when I first heard about it.

My first job (1970) was after school and Saturdays during the holiday season at the London Harness store on Franklin St. My official title was “salesclerk”. We assisted customers, wrote out a receipt, then put it and the cash in a canister which went via a tube to a cashier, at a separate station at the back of the store. She was the only person who handled money. Later, I worked summers at Jordan Marsh. They had their own peculiar name for employees: we were all “fellow workers”. This name came from a statement by the president of the company from about WW I to the early 30’s who had worked his way up in the store from salesclerk. There is a plaque to this effect by the old Fellow Workers’ entrance on Chauncey St. Both Jordan Marsh & Filene’s were run by progressive families who believed in the well-being of their employees and providing them with a living in return for their work. Jordan Marsh, in fact, was popularly known as, “The House of Progress”. Eben Jordan was an amateur musician. He built Jordan Hall and gave generously to the New England Conservatory, the Majestic Theater, and subsidized the Boston Opera Company, amongst other philanthropic endeavors. His competition across the street was no different. (Abraham) Lincoln Filene, in the early 1900’s, instituted profit sharing for his employees and provided them with a health clinic, insurance, and a retirement plan. He also funded the investigative journalism of Lincoln Steffens and the campaign for women’s suffrage. Unlike many of his business peers, he was an outspoken supporter of the New Deal. The foundation he established in his and his wife’s name went on to supply the bulk of the funds for creating WGBH.