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Tuesday, March 19, 2024

Black Carrier employees still feel the squeeze

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In five-and-a-half years Vickie Burrus can retire with full benefits. 

That’s all she needs: five-and-a-half years.

Five years passes quickly, but a lot can happen during that time. 

Not too long ago, retiring from Carrier seemed like a sure thing. Now, not so much.

“I don’t know if the plant’s going to be there in five more years,” Burrus said. “I’m this close to retirement. Who’s really going to hire me?”

Burrus has worked at Carrier for

21 years. She survived the layoffs, the most recent on Jan. 11, and is one of the 795 people still employed there. 

Carrier joined Rexnord — both manufacturing employers on Indianapolis’ west side — in sending jobs to Monterrey, Mexico last year. Unlike Rexnord, however, Carrier didn’t shut its doors and send all jobs south of the border.

To determine how much can happen in five years, consider Marion County lost 1,169 manufacturing jobs in a five-year period ending in 2016, according to the Indiana Department of Workforce Development. While the unemployment rate in Marion County was 3.1 percent as of Nov. 2017, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, those numbers don’t tell the whole story. Unfortunately, high-paying manufacturing jobs are being replaced with lower-paying service industry jobs. The average hourly pay at Carrier was $22 and $25 at Rexnord. 

Education levels also affect job prospects. Though Marion County’s unemployment rate is low, it also has a low number of residents with a four-year degree — about 29 percent, according to the U.S. Census. 

“Manufacturing is basically becoming nonexistent,” said Robert James, president of United Steel Workers Local 1999. James has worked for Carrier for 19 years. “Jobs like Carrier, Rexnord, some of these other facilities — people are not going to be able to come out of high school like they used to and make money. People’s biggest thing now is insurance. A lot of these jobs are non-union. They don’t have the protections that they have had in the past,” James said. “Twelve, $13 an hour when you need a job is something you have to do, but it’s kind of hard to swallow. How do you pay your bills? Those are jobs, but they don’t take the pressure off the people. That’s the sad part about this, but people do what they have to do in order to maintain for their families. There are a lot of people out here working two jobs. We talk about a middle class. There’s not a middle class anymore.”

The loss of jobs is even more striking in the Black community and about half of Carrier employees were Black. Blacks make up 28.5 percent of the population in Marion County. 

Many of those employed in factories like Carrier and Rexnord are family members, Burrus added. 

“We’ve got spouses out there, both of them are losing their jobs at the same time,” Burrus said. “That’s stressful. At the time of the announcement, I had nine family members working out there. I had my daughter, my son, my daughter-in-law, three nephews, one niece.”

Burrus said her daughter, niece and two of her nephews found jobs after leaving Carrier, but those jobs pay less.

For now, it’s business as usual, but for how long?

“I don’t think you’ll see people have that (high) level of trust (anymore),” James said.

The average hourly pay at Carrier was $22 and $25 at Rexnord. 

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