By Associated Press
April 14, 2023
WASHINGTON (AP) — Andre Blount has been serving food to dignitaries at World Bank headquarters for nearly 10 years and says he has gotten exactly one raise — for 50 cents.
This week, as leaders from around the world are in D.C for the spring meeting of the poverty-fighting organization, Blount and his coworkers are trying to bring attention to what they see as a galling situation:
The workers who put food on the table for an organization whose mission is to fight poverty are themselves struggling to get by. Union leaders say a quarter of the World Bank food workers employed as a contract laborers through Compass Group North America receive public benefits, like SNAP, or food stamps, just to make ends meet.
“It’s sickening,” Blount, 33, said as he joined red-shirted union members this week on a picket line outside the development bank on a hot afternoon. “They go around the world looking for how to help people, but you have hundreds of employees in D.C. who are struggling.” read more