Free Republic

The increase in the number of workers comes ahead of an anticipated spike in package volume that will begin next month and continue through January, according to a UPS news release. “We’re preparing for a record peak holiday season. The COVID-19 pandemic has made our services more important than ever,” Charlene Thomas, the chief human resources officer, said in a statement. The Ontario facility, located at 3480 Jurupa St., is looking to hire tractor-trailer and package car drivers, as well as package handlers for the seasonal work. The pay for drivers starts at $21 per hour, while package handlers will...

Thousands of Romanian seasonal workers on Friday waited to board chartered planes to Germany after the government decided to allow the flights despite the new coronavirus pandemic. Around 300,000 seasonal workers travel to Germany each year, mainly from Poland and Romania, to help with fruit and vegetable harvests, according (to the) German Farmers’ Association. On Thursday, images of some 1,800 seasonal workers waiting shoulder to shoulder in a packed parking lot at the airport in Cluj-Napoca in central Romania were shared widely on television and on social media. Authorities are investigating whether the crowd breached strict social distancing and other...

Top officials at the Department of Homeland Security will import 45,000 extra foreign workers for GOP-aligned small businesses, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal. The newspaper reported February 20: The Department of Homeland Security plans to announce the additional seasonal-worker visas next week, an administration official said. They will become available in two waves: the first 20,000 will be immediately available, while employers can apply for the remainder for jobs beginning June 1. It wasn’t clear whether the White House has fully signed off on the numbers, and an administration official cautioned they could change. The additional...

The H-2B visa-worker program imports roughly 66,000 seasonal workers each year, allowing seasonal companies to lower wages for American seasonal workers and for year-round staff and supervisors. The new amendment will allow CEOs to hire H-2B workers from the two prior years without counting them under the 66,000 annual cap. That legal trick will give CEOs a population of up to 198,000 H-2B workers to help lower wages for a larger number of Americans — even though wages are climbing very slowly in the current good economy, and many younger Americans are far worse off than their parents. The proposed...