Weaving Voices

Episode 8

Labor's Lever & a Just Transition for Fast Fashion Workers

[00:00:00] Rebecca Burgess: Given the wide and global scale pattern we've experienced over the decades to move a significant number of our textile production systems outside of the United States, we sometimes forget that there are tens of thousands of people working in the garment industry right here in Los Angeles, California.

[00:00:21] Rebecca Burgess: Enter the Garment Worker Center, also known as G W C, an LA-based garment workers labors rights organization. It's been working successfully to improve LA's labor conditions and set in motion increasingly equitable systems for how our clothing is made. The G W C has been at this a long time, and the issues they've been fighting are ones that have plagued this industry for centuries.

[00:00:48] Marissa Nuncio: It's incredible to think that workers are made to earn their livelihood pennies at a time, and so workers will forego bathroom breaks. They'll forego lunch breaks, or just [00:01:00] be denied lunch breaks and as fatigue sets in, because they're not resting, they're more susceptible to injuries. 

[00:01:09] Rebecca Burgess: That's the Center's director, Marissa Nuncio.

[00:01:12] Rebecca Burgess: And I'm Rebecca Burgess, the host of Weaving Voices.

[00:01:27] Rebecca Burgess: This Whetstone Radio Collective podcast, stitches contemporary textile stories, economic philosophy and climate science into a quilt of understanding. Designed to transform our thinking and actions, both as citizens and material culture makers and users. Weaving voices aims to explore the nexus of modern day economic design and our textile systems.

[00:01:55] Rebecca Burgess: Nuncio is based in Los Angeles, the capital of garment production within the [00:02:00] United States. She says there's still quite a significant hub here that represents a multi-billion dollar a year industry. Any article of clothing that says Made in the USA has about an 80 to 85% likelihood of being made in Los Angeles, if not more.

[00:02:18] Rebecca Burgess: Their current statistics show that approximately 45,000 garment workers live and work here, including sewers and presser, trimmers, folks that cut the fabric, those that do embellishment and those that dye the materials. Nuncio has found people are often surprised to hear there's still such an intense and significant workforce here.

[00:02:41] Rebecca Burgess: The Port of Los Angeles being where it is has a lot to do with why this continues to be such an important hub. A bit of background about our guest, Nuncio identifies as Chicana. She's from a working class community in Houston, Texas called Magnolia, which she described to me as nestled [00:03:00] close to the port and close to what they call the ship channel, where a lot of oil refineries exist.

[00:03:07] Rebecca Burgess: And this first started out as a location where there were worker barracks, and then finally a community was established. Her father worked in the oil industry and her immediate and extended family was consistently impacted by the volatility in the market forces and the lack of protection that was provided to labor.

[00:03:27] Rebecca Burgess: She noted her family members could be let go at any moment, and there was just no job security. Her father was often misclassified as a contractor rather than an employee, and therefore they lost certain rights and insurance for the family. 

[00:03:43] Marissa Nuncio: You just experienced that and I could really experience what the ripple effects are within the individual, within the home, and then within the community.

[00:03:51] Marissa Nuncio: I sort of took that kind of inkling in my younger brain and went to school, had the privilege to [00:04:00] study and go to college, and I chose to study abroad in Mexico a couple of years after the North American Free Trade Agreement passed. And that was very pivotal for me because I really learned what the push pull factors of horrible trade policies, the push pull factors of migration and how trade policy is connected and got to meet a lot of groups of workers on both sides of the border.

[00:04:27] Marissa Nuncio: And it was just a pivotal moment for me, realizing that that was where I wanted to give back and to contribute the resources I was learning and just to get involved in the labor movement. 

[00:04:40] Rebecca Burgess: Nuncio said she found out about the garment worker center as it was about to open in 2001. She describes being on the ground floor as the organization was developing and what an honor it was to be part of its formation.

[00:04:53] Rebecca Burgess: She got really excited about the connection and the intersection between law and organizing, and she went on to become a [00:05:00] labor and employment attorney. In 2013, she came back to the Garment Workers Center in what she calls a beautiful and full circle moment. She loves being at G W C to be part of building out strategies both in Los Angeles and beyond.

[00:05:17] Rebecca Burgess: The genesis story around Garment Workers Center is a powerful one and really began several years before the doors opened with an unfortunate and horrific series of events. 

[00:05:29] Marissa Nuncio: In 1985, a group of workers from Thailand were discovered to have been working in an apartment building that had been converted to factories, essentially. 

[00:05:44] Marissa Nuncio: They had been trafficked in, they had been recruited in Thailand with the promise of work. When they arrived in the US their passports were taken away and they were placed within this sort of strange, [00:06:00] horrible, work barrack slash sweatshop living situation and not allowed to leave.

[00:06:07] Marissa Nuncio: One worker was able to get away and find resources and authorities and there eventually was a raid, and this all came to light. The workers, because they were victims of trafficking in a display of how our system does not respond appropriately, they were actually put into immigration detention. At first in a number of immigration advocates, as well as labor advocates came together to support these workers, to support them to gain their freedom, and also to support them as they navigated their labor remedies. 

[00:06:44] Rebecca Burgess: Parallel to this modern day slavery example, it was not lost on the workers and advocates involved that the garment industry in Los Angeles as a whole was paying wages, which equated to pennies for each job a worker was tasked to do. 

[00:06:59] Rebecca Burgess: The industry [00:07:00] was really very few steps away from that worst case example. So the workforce realized there needed to be a central resource for garment workers, and they dreamed up with their Thai counterparts, the Garment Worker Center. In 2001, they opened their doors. Simultaneously while many advocates were working on the Garment Worker Center developments,

[00:07:24] Rebecca Burgess: some of these same advocates were working on AB 633. This was the first piece of legislation to begin building protections for workers into the law. The bill was designed to acknowledge and provide protections for those experiencing extreme labor exploitation, and wage theft. The bill actually created a registry of garment manufacturers and a restitution fund that would support the workforce who was unable to collect their wages.

[00:07:50] Marissa Nuncio: So it was very significant landmark legislation. And so the Garment Worker Center, when we opened our doors, we also [00:08:00] used that moment and used that new legislation to build a legal clinic to implement, you know, to use those new tools. And we used it as sort of, you know, we got the word out about workers' new rights.

[00:08:13] Marissa Nuncio: We used that time to really focus on getting the word out about workers' rights, what their remedies were. Get them support through the clinic and then also to begin sort of broader, deeper organizing as workers. And within about, I think it was about within our first year, we launched a campaign against Forever 21 because through the clinic it came to light that they were sort of the worst and repeat offender, we were seeing claim after claim.

[00:08:42] Marissa Nuncio: You know, sometimes these horrible moments expose what is really systemic problem, and I think that really is how we came about. 

[00:08:55] Rebecca Burgess: For years and until very recently, garment workers were making something called the piece [00:09:00] rate. Globally speaking, this is still, unfortunately, a very normal wage practice. Nuncio says it's a very entrenched practice in the garment industry in which you pay workers by the piece, meaning you pay them per operation. If they're hemming a skirt, it's per hem. If they're trimming a garment, it's per garment that they're paid. 

[00:09:22] Marissa Nuncio: Those piece rates, unfortunately, are quite low. They are as low as 2 cents, 3 cents. We've had workers tell us they get paid half a cent for a particular operation.

[00:09:36] Marissa Nuncio: And what we also know from our members is that those piece rates are stagnant. Workers who have been in the industry for 20 plus years have said, I've been getting the same type of piece rate for those 20 years, and in some instances lower than when I was earning, when I first entered the industry. And while the minimum wage has been rightfully [00:10:00] rising locally and across the country, those piece rates are not rising in sync.

[00:10:05] Marissa Nuncio: And so workers can never make the minimum wage at those piece rates. It's just an impossibility. These are seasoned workers. They are fast, they're skilled, but when your piece rate is that low, you would have to sow thousands. And workers do their very best, but on average, what we were seeing that workers were earning around half the minimum wage.

[00:10:31] Marissa Nuncio: You know, it was tracking as the minimum wage went up. If it was $10, we were seeing around $5 and it reached 14. We were seeing around, you know, $6.85, $7 an hour. 

[00:10:43] Rebecca Burgess: Because of this, workers will forego bathroom breaks, they'll forego lunch breaks, or just be denied a lunch break. As fatigue sets in because they're not resting, they're more susceptible to injuries like puncture wounds or putting their eyes in jeopardy.

[00:10:58] Rebecca Burgess: So why does the piece rate [00:11:00] exist? To facilitate a very high production rate and mass production at the lowest possible cost. The result is treating the workforce as an extension of the machine. 

[00:11:13] Marissa Nuncio: It is absolutely a coercive tool to extract labor from workers at the fastest rate they can because their livelihood depends on it.

[00:11:24] Marissa Nuncio: I speak from our experience locally. The majority of the production in Los Angeles is what's known as fast fashion. That's the primary apparel sector that we sort of represent here, and those are cheaply produced, mass produced garments, and so that model of production is very much tied to that type of apparel.

[00:11:50] Rebecca Burgess: The complexity is that machines have not cut up with the skill level of human beings. Robotic sewing arms do exist, but they're not at all able [00:12:00] to carry out the complex skill levels that the humans can. I recounted a recent experience in a public speaking event where a member of the audience asked me if everyone is paid fairly, then how are we going to afford our clothing?

[00:12:14] Rebecca Burgess: Ugh. I was very angered by this question. Nuncio says, unfortunately, it's a common question and one that she always struggles with. The industry itself, and capitalism as an economic system creates this really unnatural demand and desire for mountains of clothing. It also creates this notion of prices that absolutely don't represent the true cost of what's involved to make a garment, but this is how the dominant system currently works.

[00:12:43] Marissa Nuncio: It's been so entrenched, this has happened for so long, that folks were like, yeah, why should I pay more than $20 for a blouse or a dress that had multiple operations that, you know, I think it's something like over 30 hands touched to make a garment. That's [00:13:00] part of the work is to really change that understanding that we have just been for so long, not coming close to paying the true cost of what it takes to make these goods, right? These products. 

[00:13:15] Rebecca Burgess: This economic system is designed so that people aren't earning what is needed to meet their basic needs. The answer Nuncio says, is that we have to be fighting at every level to lift all the boats in the harbor and to fight this labor exploitation across the board, across the globe. She's been investigating this power dynamic over time within the textile system, which continues to show itself in wage disparity.

[00:13:42] Rebecca Burgess: It's very numerically clear who's taking the wealth out of the system. The solution that she and her team and community have been focused upon has been to work legislatively. The Garment Worker Center has worked to tackle the piece rate and other aspects of the industry [00:14:00] systematically. Senate Bill 62, which was passed in 2021, is the most recent successful legislation that was passed in the state of California to protect garment workers.

[00:14:11] Rebecca Burgess: It bans the piece rate unless workers have a collective bargaining agreement and are able to actually bargain for their piece rates. But given that there is almost no union density within the garment industry, workers were adamant that the piece rate just had to go. 

[00:14:28] Marissa Nuncio: It really at its heart is a brand accountability bill.

[00:14:32] Marissa Nuncio: It was intended to really shift the balance of power along the supply chain, away from fashion brands that really are able to take advantage of severe competition for contracts with them to really offer the lowest prices for their garment production. That in turn means that factories are often unable to comply with minimum wage and overtime laws.[00:15:00] 

[00:15:00] Marissa Nuncio: And this is very much shored out by some investigations by our Department of Labor. So the bill is intended to hold fashion brands legally liable for unpaid wages. So it enables a worker to come forward to our state Labor Commission and file a claim for unpaid minimum wage or overtime or unpaid meal and rest breaks, and to name both their factory owner and to name all actors up the supply chain so it creates upstream liability and they can name the brands that they were producing during their time period at that factory.

[00:15:39] Marissa Nuncio: This was very tough. This was tough legislation to pass. 

[00:15:46] Rebecca Burgess: Nuncio says this is considered a really sweeping change. She recalls all of the focus groups and workshops that the members had as they crafted what they wanted the provisions of the bill to be. This bill came from the [00:16:00] workforce. The first priority was brand accountability.

[00:16:04] Rebecca Burgess: She remembers workers saying that's most essential, but if they're still going to work every day and are made to earn penny by penny, they still haven't tackled exploit. And they were correct. They were so astute in their strategy that this had to happen at a very sort of macro and micro level. They sort of came at this issue of wages from two ends of the spectrum.

[00:16:29] Marissa Nuncio: I learned a lot from their assessment in that. And learned to take a step back. Cuz I think a lot of us sort of advocates wanted to say, that's kind of crazy. Like, that's huge. And the workers were like, you know, that's what it requires. They were very adamant about that. If we're gonna do this, we're gonna do this right.

[00:16:50] Marissa Nuncio: And it meant that we had to really assess how we built our power to do that. And we had to really think about the strategies because that's what it [00:17:00] means, you know? You have to build your community power. You have to build your alliances. Then that's what workers did. We partnered with the California Labor Federation.

[00:17:11] Marissa Nuncio: We partnered with our long-term legal advocates. We partnered with, you know, a number of labor councils and community organizations around the state, but we also partnered with ethical fashion businesses. Businesses tha are trying various models of sustainability within either their branch or their manufacturing plant.

[00:17:36] Marissa Nuncio: And that also was a bit of an experiment to say, do we have enough aligned into, like as a labor advocate, we hadn't done that level of cross organizing. We hadn't done that type of outreach. 

[00:17:49] Rebecca Burgess: They weren't sure if they would find those aligned interests, but they mapped out who's producing locally and around the country who might have an interest.

[00:17:59] Rebecca Burgess: They literally [00:18:00] began picking up the phone and making presentations, and in the end, they were able to build a network of 158 brands and manufacturers who endorsed and supported SB 62. Nuncio is still floored by the support. There are ways to think strategically about partnering with businesses that are trying to change this industry From the inside, it is their interest to have a level playing field that makes them great allies with the garment workers.

[00:18:30] Marissa Nuncio: They said, we wanna do this, we wanna be local, we wanna be made in LA or made in California. But how do we do that when we're competing with the guy paying $5.85 down the street? We cannot stay afloat that way. And that's real. That's real. And we were able to get them in front of legislators. And we were able to counter the Chamber of Commerce and these old guard trade associations that said, absolutely not, no business would ever support this.

[00:18:59] Marissa Nuncio: They're [00:19:00] all gonna leave. But when we were able to come with 158 logos, you know, and say that's, that's actually not the landscape. And have them in front of an elected, telling them directly together with a worker why they both support. It worked. It was a strategy that worked. It resonated, it answered questions for sort of the different types of policy makers, and I really think it had a lot to do with why we were successful.

[00:19:29] Rebecca Burgess: It was a brilliant strategy. They also learned in this campaign and in the process as a whole, that there's certain factors that are showing a growth of nearshoring. People have told them that it adds value to their brand to say that they're made in the USA or made in Los Angeles. Certain supply chain disruptions during the pandemic also seem to have made brands look back to domestic production.

[00:19:55] Rebecca Burgess: So it was important to use those moments and learn from them and learn what people are trying to [00:20:00] do. It made the Garment worker center think that if they wanna support workers and transform the industry, they have to understand what the industry is up against as well. What are their values and what are they trying to do?

[00:20:14] Marissa Nuncio: It's a campaign. Then you find that sort of like, alright, this is what we can say together. This is what we're doing. That really is aligned. It actually was far easier than I think we maybe anticipated. I mean it, it was a lot of work, but easier in the sense that, you know, I would say 20 years ago when we opened our doors, I don't think that would've been possible.

[00:20:35] Marissa Nuncio: I really don't. And so I think that speaks to like it is working, that there are workers organizing, that there are advocates out there that are trying to change these systems. And it has generated a new wave of industry, right, of business models within the textile garment industry. I think that's why it's so phenomenal to me cuz I'm like, no, we wouldn't have been able to do this 20 [00:21:00] years ago.

[00:21:00] Marissa Nuncio: But I think some things are working, they're now sustainability and labor classes in design schools. And they come out of that, wanna do something different. That's also rooted in activism. Right. That came from people sort of being the squeaky wheel and you know, raising all the red flags. And so that's sort of heartening and inspiring to me.

[00:21:23] Rebecca Burgess: By doing business in California, brands can now trust that the effect of SB 62 has ensured that none of the people making their clothing will have any wage theft associated with their work, and that they will be paid fairly at minimum wage or higher versus receiving the piece rate. Having a just system is something that brands can now point to and count on as part of their sustainability platform.

[00:21:51] Rebecca Burgess: At the federal level, there's an act that's being put forward called the Fabric Act. Everyone I hear discussing the Fabric Act is basically saying that the Garment [00:22:00] Worker Center laid out the foundation for this. And without SB 62 and the Garment Worker Center, this act would not exist. Nuncio says they are very excited about it, and yes, they have been working on it.

[00:22:12] Rebecca Burgess: At some point during the SB 62 campaign, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, the author of the Fabric Act, reached out to them. Nuncio says, it was very exciting to see that they had been watching their work in Los Angeles and were now ready to take it national. 

[00:22:31] Marissa Nuncio: I think the significance is this, I mean, first and foremost,

[00:22:36] Marissa Nuncio: when workers organize in such a smart, strategic way, it does this, it inspires other pieces of legislation, or it inspires other campaigns. I think we're seeing this quite a bit right now. I think what's happening with Starbucks workers, with Amazon workers, I think we've seen it during like [00:23:00] minimum wage campaigns across the country.

[00:23:02] Marissa Nuncio: There's this synergy and momentum that is created. I love talking to our members about that, of like, you did this, you know, , um, you inspired this, right? 

[00:23:15] Rebecca Burgess: She says, it was a beautiful moment when the bill was introduced and one of the garment worker center members who was key in the organizing of the SB 62 campaign had an opportunity to tell her story.

[00:23:25] Rebecca Burgess: She explained why it was so important to her that the Garment Worker Center was an endorser of this Fabric Act, and to see this launch so that other workers can benefit from the types of protections and shifts and power that they had worked on. It was just a great full circle moment. Nuncio says that's absolutely what these workers see is the significance of the Fabric Act.

[00:23:51] Rebecca Burgess: They see this as a way to create consistency and protection for workers across the country. This work should not have to be done state by state. [00:24:00] 

[00:24:00] Marissa Nuncio: Also, knowing how this industry works and that there's often this chase of fewer regulations and chase of lower labor costs, both in our country and around the world are members as they assessed the Fabric Act said this is important also to protect our industry. Because if a brand or if a manufacturer hears like, I, I still wanna pay the piece rate, right? They can go to Texas at this moment and they can do that. They can go to the Carolinas, they can go to New York, and they can do that. And so it's also important that we have consistent labor law across the country to avoid that.

[00:24:43] Marissa Nuncio: Yeah. And so I think for that reason, it's also extremely significant. It's about creating the strategic model that you can build out. And I think the other thing that's important about the Fabric Act is that, you [00:25:00] know, so it has the regulatory piece, it has remediation, you know, so that workers are able to get their wages back, but it also has this piece to invest in the industry.

[00:25:12] Marissa Nuncio: To try to, to also speak to the potential for heading and running and really to encourage domestic production. There is a piece in there that is a tax credit for a company that decides to reshore. Also a 40 million grant program to invest in workforce development training, upgrades that are needed, training on sustainability practices, things like that that could be built in.

[00:25:40] Marissa Nuncio: And I think that that really spreads the benefits, I think of the Fabric Act sort of beyond just the workers, but really spreads the benefits again, to trying to lift all those boats. If we're investing in the industry in the right way and investing in the industry that is going to comply and do the right thing.

[00:25:59] Marissa Nuncio: [00:26:00] It supports both growing those types of businesses, encouraging more of that type of business, and then it supports the workers. So that's what the bill does. 

[00:26:08] Rebecca Burgess: The community of advocates that came together to endorse the Fabric Act and to build this relationship with Senator Gillibrand are also very mindful of the fact that these policy models have to provide protection and remediation for workers around the world.

[00:26:25] Rebecca Burgess: They are still very much putting their heads together to focus on the next phase of this work, which is the type of policy work that will extend these protections international.

[00:26:38] Rebecca Burgess: When Covid hit and California began quarantining and shutting down, there was a lot that was occurring in the garment worker community that was putting them at high risk in multiple ways. Some workers had no financial cushion and were literally without food in the fridge overnight. 

[00:26:55] Marissa Nuncio: As an organizing space, we had to learn how to [00:27:00] respond more through mutual aid. 

[00:27:03] Marissa Nuncio: We don't consider ourselves a service space, and we're not geared or built with that sort of infrastructure, but we did have to learn to create infrastructure for mutual aid very quickly. But I think that's a good thing. That's a good thing that we've built and that we're continuing to build at GWC, and I think doing better within our community. 

[00:27:23] Marissa Nuncio: Workers were getting sick. This is an enclosed, cramped sweatshop that was always dirty and unsanitary and dangerous, right? So of course it was gonna be a very hard hit industry. It was the second worst industry in our county for outbreaks after the meat packing industry. So there were just outbreak after outbreak.

[00:27:48] Marissa Nuncio: What I think it did sort of create this moment though where workers began to sort of shift some of their organizing efforts [00:28:00] to health that sometimes really has been overshadowed by the urgent need of organizing around wages because that's their livelihood and so often their body became second. Right? The impact of of their work to their health and their body always came second.

[00:28:18] Marissa Nuncio: And this pandemic as they were getting sick, as they were losing coworkers, you know, as coworkers were dying, it really created this moment to really think about how to organize around that differently and, and more urgently. 

[00:28:33] Rebecca Burgess: It exposed workers In many industries, workplaces were often the biggest site of outbreaks across the country.

[00:28:40] Rebecca Burgess: The garment worker center members really began talking. They were making masks and hospital gowns during the pandemic, and they were saying, if you are elevating us to essential workers, you must also elevate our labor standards. 

[00:28:54] Marissa Nuncio: They said, we will not make your mask for 2 cents a mask. We won't do that.

[00:28:59] Marissa Nuncio: We are [00:29:00] providing this life-saving equipment, right? Materials, apparel, and we will not do it for pennies a mask. And that resonated because of the moment. It's like folks really were like, that's absolutely right. That's atrocious. So they just very astutely used that in their campaigns. Workers also locally organized for what is called public health councils.

[00:29:27] Marissa Nuncio: Workers got together and different industries across different industries, including garment, and they said, look, our work sites are vectors and therefore we need to have the right to organize within our factories as sort of committees, as councils to learn what our local health orders are cuz they were constantly changing.

[00:29:51] Marissa Nuncio: And to able to have the support to learn what those orders are, to learn what their rights are and what their employer obligations are, and [00:30:00] to learn how to file complaints if necessary. And so workers organized to push our county. To pass an ordinance that required employers to allow their workers to create these public health councils in certain industries, and garment was one of them.

[00:30:18] Marissa Nuncio: And it required our Department of Public Health to invest resources and contract with local organizations. So that we could do that training with workers. We could get out and do that outreach and that training. These are your health orders. This is how you file a complaint. This is how you bring it to your boss.

[00:30:41] Rebecca Burgess: Nuncio says that is what labor organizing is, and she's really proud of the fact that their members were ready to get involved in the public health council fight as they were fighting for SB 62 at the same time. A big part of the work they're doing now is trying to build councils across the country. There's [00:31:00] intersections within the labor movement occurring right now that she's particularly excited about.

[00:31:05] Rebecca Burgess: For one, they're riding the momentum of having built relationships with sustainable, ethical fashion businesses who occupy different spaces along the supply network. 

[00:31:15] Marissa Nuncio: We're continuing to build on that, including on some local work we're doing to protect out garment district, you know, we have a, a sort of designated kind of a space that is our garment district in downtown LA and it's unfortunately under threat of displacement from a development plan of which is very much a gentrification plan, which would impact them, displace their infrastructure.

[00:31:42] Marissa Nuncio: And so we're working together to fight that and to issue recommendations for how this industry should be protected and invested in. So that's exciting that we're able to sort of take what we built from SB 62, and it's a network that [00:32:00] is strong and growing enough that we can apply that to ongoing issues that we can work together on, and that is really, really exciting and promising to me.

[00:32:12] Rebecca Burgess: They are asking individuals and organizations to endorse the campaign by signing a petition or through sending a letter of support. Nuncio says another intersection between what the Garment Worker Center has built and other industries is that their model supports workforces that are also not heavily unionized already, and she's excited about the strength of worker centers and how that has grown over the years and how they're talking to each other now.

[00:32:40] Rebecca Burgess: They have a local worker center in Los Angeles where they have begun to share strategies and build power together. So at a policy level, they are now sharing campaign models, organizing models, and they're trying to build their infrastructure and resources as a unit. 

[00:32:57] Marissa Nuncio: I am so excited [00:33:00] when our members have a worker exchange with another worker center.

[00:33:06] Marissa Nuncio: We've done it with farm workers through the Polish moly workers, and we're learning about their models for holding brands accountable. I think there's a real fascinating movement for what are known as worker driven social responsibility agreements that are sort of an alternative model to, as you were mentioning earlier, sort of auditing processes that are not working.

[00:33:32] Marissa Nuncio: And they're also an alternative to unions where unions don't exist and so it's wonderful when workers are learning about this from workers that are trying it in a certain industry, and I think we really wanna grow that type of exchange between workers as we explore those types of models. 

[00:33:51] Rebecca Burgess: Nuncio says there's also a worker driven social responsibility network that really pulls these models together and supports organizations that have achieved [00:34:00] them or are exploring them like they are.

[00:34:03] Marissa Nuncio: I am also really like moved by, like I think that around the world in this anti sweatshop movement, I think that there's a much more, I guess, sort of honed focus on brand accountability and corporate accountability. There's a different synergy. And perhaps just experience through the movement over the years, I feel like there's like, we're sort of talking and working in sync a bit better.

[00:34:32] Marissa Nuncio: Garment Worker Center has always been quite a pretty hyperlocal organization that is engaged in solidarity work, but I think we're trying to really learn from and really realize and accept that we're part of this, of a global movement, right? Of a global anti sweat shop movement. But I also just think that there's just, perhaps it's just the, you know, kind of decades of work on this that various folks have done around the world.

[00:34:59] Marissa Nuncio: But I do feel like [00:35:00] maybe we're moving towards kind of common policy models or policy models that are in sync and support each other around the world. 

[00:35:10] Rebecca Burgess: These worker centers are creating visibility to a body of work that is making it clear the communities can and are able to lift up each other's struggles and are willing to do a great job of crafting solutions to their own challenges.

[00:35:25] Rebecca Burgess: We can celebrate the awesome strides that have been made in California and now hopefully will be made nationally. The momentum and energy that's been building and continues to gain steam is such an impressive model. If you'd like to learn more about the Garment Worker Center, you can go to their website at www.garmentworkercenter.org and you can find them on Instagram at Garment Worker Center.[00:36:00] 

[00:36:06] Rebecca Burgess: This episode is made possible because of all the people who work behind the scenes on it. I'd like to thank my producer, Jennifer O'Neil, audio editor, Bethany Sands, an intern Maha Sanad. I'd also like to thank Whetstone founder Stephen Satterfield. Whetstone Head of podcasts, Celine Glasier, sound engineer Max Kotelchuck, music director Catherine Yang, associate producer Quentin Lebeau, production assistant Shabnam Ferdowsi and Sound intern Simon Lavender, the Cover Art by Whetstone art director Alex Bowman. 

[00:36:42] Rebecca Burgess: You can learn more about this podcast at WhetstoneRadio.com, on Instagram and Twitter @WhetstoneRadio. And subscribe to our YouTube channel, Whetstone Radio Collective for more podcast video content. You can learn more about all things happening at Whetstone, at [00:37:00] WhetstoneMagazine.com.