As the stories pile on about vast economic inequality that only seems to be compounding, and as the allegedly "liberal" media continues to reinforce the narrative that progressive taxation is "wealth redistribution" (dun dun DUUNNNNN), then it seems like this problem will only worsen.
But after looking at one individual situation in the heart of impoverished rural Mississippi, we see not only the problems, but the obvious solutions as well. It involves taking an approach not aligned whatsoever with the current status quo, but solutions that can fix inequality in the rigged feudalistic systems in the Mississippi Delta can also be applied to the rest of America.
Step with me into the shoes of one catfish plant worker in Isola, MS below the fold. It helps if you're listening to something with slide guitar while reading.
(I'd include photos with this from my photobucket, but I submit that it is literally impossible to post photos on DKos unless you are fluent in html. I tried ever single "share" option on phptobucket, and all I got from this site was "photo not allowed" with indecipherable html jargon. Can anyone help a brotha out?)
Unchanged Since the Great Depression
An aged Corinnelier Howard flexes her worn fingers lined with dozens of small cuts, emerging from a small local church in Isola, Mississippi. She’s still wearing her work clothes and the hairnet from the factory. The pungent smell of raw fish lingers from her clothing.
"They need to get done with that vote," The 57 year-old says flatly. "I gotta take a shower and cook me some dinner."
The April sun is setting, and the 6 o’clock union meeting discussing the present contract offer is still continuing. Delta Pride Catfish employees will eventually vote 99 to 1 to reject the last, best and final offer made to them by the owners of Consolidated Catfish Companies, LLC. Howard makes $9.50 an hour, and works six days per week. I ask her if she just finished working a full day.
"Mm-hmm. Shoot, I worked me about 10, 12 hours today," She says, flexing her fingers some more.
Looking out from the parking lot of the church just outside Indianola, Mississippi, flat land stretches onward to the horizon across wide expanses of early crops poking green through cracked, sun-kissed Delta plains in Humphreys County. Here in the heart of the Mississippi River Delta, time seems to have stopped in the 1930s. Ramshackle cabins dot the landscape every few miles in the midst of acres of corn, soybean and cotton fields. Describing the region as "impoverished" would be like describing the BP Gulf oil spill as "messy." It’s 2010, and some rural communities are finally gaining broadband connections. Nevertheless, a fair percentage of families here have to walk outdoors with a bucket to get water. It’s an area where nobody has much, so everybody looks out for each other. Every time I stopped on Highway 49 to take pictures of the beautiful Delta landscape, another car would almost immediately pull over and ask if I needed any help.
The federal government would help, but to do that, census takers in the rural Delta would need to have access to maps and addresses that aren’t ten years dated to get an accurate count. Instead, thousands go uncounted as many of the roads on census takers’ maps have been renamed, and some addresses are simply not posted. Thus, populations steadily dwindle, the few remaining employers relocate to modern areas with access to basic utilities, and the Delta remains unable to shake itself from crippling poverty.
If the Delta were annexed, Mississippi would move from 51st out of 50 states plus DC in every social welfare category to the top 20s. Mississippi is last in public health, median income and well-being of children. However, we’re first in adult and child obesity, and come in a close second amongst the rest when it comes to diabetes rates and reported cases of domestic violence. Mississippi gets back $1.20 in tax dollars for every dollar paid to the federal government, but it barely even puts a dent in the Delta’s myriad problems.
Only in the Mississippi Delta can a genre of music like blues develop, flourish and grow to consume the entire planet in its awe-inspiring, powerful, enigmatic genius, much as Miles from the novel "Sideways" describes Northern California as the only place in the world where the pinot grape can prosper and live to its full potential. Delta blues is the only music borne of the daily struggles and toils of those who were born with nothing, lived with little, and died empty-handed. Standing on Route 49 in Isola, a short drive North and East will lead to Itta Bena, where Riley "B.B." King was born. Blues Guitar Icon Muddy Waters hails from Issaquena County in the Southwestern corner of the Delta, where even today, only 2200 people inhabit her borders. The crossroads where Robert Johnson allegedly sold his soul to the devil lies an hour and a half North, in the heart of Clarksdale. Isola is literally surrounded by Delta blues in all directions. It is from this type of lifestyle and environment where the world’s greatest bluesmen draw their inspiration.
The key to 21st-century economic security for the working class could lie in this small Delta community, where deplorable living conditions of the ordinary citizens are contrasted with the complete dominance of one man’s empire in a forgotten corner of the world. Here, monopoly of a local economy and an apparent lack of respect for human dignity can turn one person into a near autonomous dictator of a small rural population. And confronting the plight of Isola’s working class merely involves addressing its uncanny comparisons to the feudal system.
Catfish and Capitalism
The transition American society must make is the same necessary transformation our founders endured from the rule of a monarch to a constitutional republic. Our greatest imperative today must be to transcend beyond our present oligarchy to a sustainable representative democracy. And for the Delta to pull herself out of despair, her feudal systems must also morph to more modern, just societies. To best understand the problem and potential solutions, a small example lies in the story of Isola, and the empire housed in Humphreys County, Mississippi.
The emperor’s name is Dickie Stevens. The empire is Consolidated Catfish Companies, LLC.
Consolidated Catfish, made up of both Country Select Catfish and Delta Pride Catfish is the largest employer in Humphreys county, most other jobs limited to either toiling in the fields, maintaining homes, local government or running registers at the select few small businesses still in operation.
Approximately six hundred of the workers at both of Dickie Stevens’ catfish processing plants are enrolled in the local 1529 chapter of United Food and Commercial Workers. With a federal mediator standing between the two, local 1529 and Dickie Stevens are currently feuding over the final offer given to union employees by Stevens. This offer’s stipulations include things like a seven-day work week, the removal of the word "reasonable" when describing mandatory safety standards at cutting stations, denying any employees paid time off, even in the event of a death in the family, among other provisions involving grueling food processing labor, conditions reminiscent of those described in Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle.
"They get mad if you spend too long in the bathroom," Howard says of her employer. "They keep track of how minutes you’re in there each time. If you in there a lot, they have someone come talk to you."
If the name Delta Pride rings a bell, it’s because in 1990, local 1529 workers at the plant collectively decided to strike in opposition to the very same conditions now laid out in the 2010 offer. After a great deal of national attention and the never-ending struggle of figures like Union President Lonnie Shepherd and Union Attorney Roger Doolittle, plant owners reluctantly allowed workers fairer pay and hours, and proper safety regulations as defined by OSHA. Consolidated Catfish workers have threatened to strike if an agreement between Stevens and union employees cannot be reached with federal mediation. Workers have already demanded the company address requests for better health insurance coverage and fairer pay, having not received a raise since 2006.
Dickie Stevens’ camp alleges that, in order to stay competitive in a global market with catfish producers in places like Vietnam and China, this contract is the best that can be offered in the midst of a recession. However, Doolittle contends that requests to view Consolidated Catfish’s finances have been refused time and again. Current president of Local 1529, Leon Shepherd, says in similar situations, union protests were called off when companies surrendered their books for examination, where evidence of hardship suffered from international competition was in plain view. However, Dickie Stevens has yet to allow Local 1529 to view the company’s financial records.
A Grim Reality
I ask Howard if she plans to strike with her coworkers if mediators can’t forge an agreement between Consolidated Catfish and Local 1529.
"No sir," She says quickly. "This is the only job I can get in this county. I got grandchildren gonna be in college soon. "
"It’s a bad deal, but I’ll take what I can get," Howard says.
Unfortunately, Howard’s acceptance of defeat and willful submission to brutal working conditions, hours and pay, could be the only option, given the extent of Dickie Stevens’ influence in Humphreys County. In addition to owning Consolidated Catfish, Stevens is also the president of the Humphreys County Board of Commissioners. Two other commissioners, the mayor of Isola and several of the community’s police officers also work at his company. Were Consolidated Catfish a feudal system, Dickie Stevens would be the king, his barons would be the local authorities on his payroll and the serfs would be toiling beneath the rest of them, powerless to the only entity that gives them a paycheck that pays the rent and puts food on the table.
Perhaps if workers do strike, Stevens will again relent as he did 20 years ago and allow them a fairer deal. But if Stevens’ case of the need to be competitive indeed holds merit, this will only delay the inevitable. Eventually another standstill between Local 1529 and Consolidated Catfish will likely ensue, and history will repeat itself. For the Mississippi delta and modern society to be able to overcome economic disparity and poverty, solutions will have to be found by looking outside the box.
Poultry farms in Mississippi have been producing electricity from chickens, and green energy innovators like Leo Turnipseed of the Clean Biofuels Coalition of Mississippi have been experimenting with ways to generate biodiesel and ethanol by converting row crops into feed stock. Similar efforts are springing up around the nation as a green energy industry quietly develops with help from infusions of tax dollars from the Obama Administration. The Wind Energy Corporation, based out of Western Kentucky, has been growing their business by selling patented wind turbines to local businesses and small communities in areas conducive to wind power. CEO Jim Fugitte has laid claim to employing as many as 30 different American companies in the installation of one wind turbine, from the parts manufacturing to shipping to installation and maintenance.
But without significant, smart investments of tax dollars from the state legislature and Congress in new private sector growth in the renewable energy sector, the Mississippi Delta will be unable to even provide an environment suitable for economic expansion, much less afford basic amenities for families who have lived in the Delta for generations. For now, residents of Isola will have to continue fighting for rights already won by other workers nearly a century ago.
Representatives from Consolidated Catfish have declined multiple requests for comment.