Despite Market Basket’s reputation as a sterling employer, Market Basket’s part-time employees—who make up about 80 percent of chain’s workforce—have much less favorable working conditions than the full-time workers. According to the Boston Globe, those part-timers earn about $8 to $10 an hour, significantly less than the oft-cited $12 hourly starting wage for full-timers. And while the part-time workers receive bonuses, and those who work at least 1,000 hours a year are eligible for a profit-sharing program, they don’t get Market Basket’s vaunted health insurance and retirement benefits. Those conditions make Market Basket look less like an exception and more like the rule in an industry dominated by non-union retailers such as Walmart and Target, both of which compete with traditional grocery stores. It’s unclear whether the sale to Arthur T. will allow the company to maintain even these standards, however. According to The Guardian, Arthur T. financed his acquisition of the company with $550 million from private equity giant the Blackstone Group. Industry analysts told the Boston Herald that the new creditors will expect “immediate returns,” which may force changes to Market Basket’s business model. That could mean raising prices, but it could also mean lowering costs through various cuts to payroll.
It’s unclear whether the sale to Arthur T. will allow the company to maintain even these standards, however. According to The Guardian, Arthur T. financed his acquisition of the company with $550 million from private equity giant the Blackstone Group. Industry analysts told the Boston Herald that the new creditors will expect “immediate returns,” which may force changes to Market Basket’s business model. That could mean raising prices, but it could also mean lowering costs through various cuts to payroll.
Equal pay for equal work means little when the wages for all are on the way down. You would be hard pressed to find a self-proclaimed feminist, even of the most neoliberal variety, who doesn’t argue in favor of equal pay, but this focus has often served, as I have argued, to stifle discussion of other concerns in the workplace. As Marilyn Sneiderman, lifelong labor organizer and director of the New Labor Center at Rutgers University, told me for Dissent, the fight for fair pay might seem an individual struggle for high-end workers like Abramson, but for a hotel housekeeper, a nurse, a janitor, the best way to improve your job isn’t to get promoted through the ranks, but to organize with your fellow workers. Neoliberal feminism is a feminism that ignores class as a determining issue in women’s lives. It presumes, as Tressie McMillan Cottom pointed out in an article on her personal website, that giving power to some women will automatically wind up trickling if not power, than at least some lifestyle improvements down to women with less power.
Neoliberal feminism is a feminism that ignores class as a determining issue in women’s lives. It presumes, as Tressie McMillan Cottom pointed out in an article on her personal website, that giving power to some women will automatically wind up trickling if not power, than at least some lifestyle improvements down to women with less power.