Marcy Kaptur: “many people do not think of trade agreements as an issue particular to women. But a briefing I held last week along with…”

“many people do not think of trade agreements as an issue particular to women. But a briefing I held last week along with the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Waters), the gentlewoman from Illinois (Ms. Schakowsky), the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Solis), and the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Harman) made clear how disproportionately the proposed CAFTA agreement will negatively affect women. We tend to forget about women in forgotten places like the sweat shop zones in Guatemala, Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Costa Rica. But let me tell some of their stories. One worker, woman in Guatemala describes the way supervisors treat workers in the maquiladora, the sweat shop where she works. She says, ``Sometimes the supervisor grabs a piece of cloth you're working on and throws it in your face. Once when a supervisor did that to me, I finally grabbed the piece from him and threw it back in his face. I did not cry. If I had cried, I wouldn't have been able to answer him. Instead, I told him that he needed to start respecting the women that worked for him. I could have accepted it if he had just said the piece was no good, but to throw it in my face, I won't stand for that.'' How about the thousands of women who work in the banana packing plants? Who speaks for them? For the treatment that the woman in the textile company received, she earns $68 every 2 weeks including over time and bonuses, working many more than 8 hours a day.…”