In a move highly unusual for nonunion workers, more than 500 employees walked out yesterday at the Smithfield Packing Company?s hog-killing plant in Tar Heel, N.C., the largest pork-processing plant in the world. Workers involved in the walkout said it was fueled by anger over Smithfield?s recent decision to fire several dozen immigrants who the company said had presented false Social Security numbers in applying for a job. Several of the workers said their action had largely crippled production at the plant, which employs 5,500 people and slaughters 32,000 hogs a day. But Smithfield officials said production had merely been slowed a little.
See "Hundreds, All Nonunion, Walk Out at Pork Plant in N.C.", Steven Greenhouse, The New York Times, November 16, 2006