Management Charged Them $100 a Week to Work, Workers Say. They’re Fighting Back. (opens in new tab)

When Evelyn began work at New Bedford, Massachusetts, seafood processing center Marder Trawling, she learned of an unusual condition of employment: She’d need to quietly pay her manager $100 per week for the privilege of working, she said. “I didn’t have work, and I have kids,” she said. “So I told him, ‘All right,’ just to have a job. “There were times I didn’t have money for rent, bills, or food for my kids,” she told Labor Notes, but her manager was happy to oblige: she could skip a week’s...