Help wanted: “Remove viscera and other inedible parts from carcasses”

I’ve often been struck by one aspect of the way in which management-labor disputes are usually reported in the media. Percentages are typically given (e.g., "the union is demanding an initial wage hike of 8 per cent,” “the agreement includes wage increases of 14 per cent over five years”), but only rarely are we given any idea of the raw numbers. Needless to say, an 8 per cent or a 14 per cent increase when you’re being paid $15 an hour is a very different thing from an 8 per cent or a 14 per cent increase when you’re being paid $120,000 a year.

A recent example is the dispute at the Cargill slaughterhouse in Guelph, Ontario. I drafted a letter to the editor on this topic earlier this month; the Globe and Mail published a slightly shortened version of the letter's first paragraph in its June 16 issue, under the rather unfortunate heading “Don’t have a cow.” I cut the second paragraph myself before sending the letter; including a second paragraph, I realized, would take the letter over the Globe's 150 word limit.

Unsurprisingly, the media reports that I’ve seen have not included any information as to how the non-human animals at Cargill facilities are treated.

Your coverage of the strike at Cargill (“Cattlemen’s worries grow as Guelph slaughterhouse strike backs up supply chain” – 10 June) focuses very largely on the plight of cattlemen, and on whether or not Cargill has done too little to mechanize production. Only in passing are we told that “few people want to work in the difficult and unsavory environment of a slaughterhouse.” Indeed they don’t. The Government of Canada job bank has posted information on jobs at the plant, including a position posted in February of this year with starting pay of $19.25 an hour, the job description for which begins as follows: “slaughter livestock and remove viscera and other inedible parts from carcasses.” The Globe reports that Cargill has offered workers a 16% increase over four years. Let’s do the math; that offer would increase a $19.25 hourly wage to the princely sum of $22.33—by 2028.

But can Cargill afford to increase wages? Bloomberg reports that the company's profit declined from $6.69 billion in the year ending May 31 2022 to "only" $3.81 billion in the year ending May 31 2023. Cargill itself has reported that it has 160,000 employees worldwide. Again, let’s do the math; even with the drop in Cargill’s profit, total profit is over $24,000 per worker.

The dollar figues for Guelph, Ontario slaughterhouse wages are Canadian dollars, of course; $19.25 Canadian translates at current exchange rates to about 14 American dollars.