City of Coffins

For two brothers that are undertakers in El Salvador, Juan Carlos Pacheco and Carlos Stanley, bodies are an everyday occurrence in a country that has an estimated 11 murders a day. This is the highest per capita in the world and has caused the World Health Organization to label it as an epidemic. Gang activity is on the rise again in the country, increasing from the truce negotiated by the Catholic Church in 2012 between the two major gang rivals.

Together the brothers have embalmed 500 people in the last two years, the majority of which were deaths related to gang violence. Between the two they can embalm and prepare a body for its wake in 3 hours, and typically charge around $100 for their services. Though the brother are relatively new to the funeral business, death has been as feature in their lives since childhood. They grew up in the town of Jucuapa, made up of 18,000 residents and 30 coffin factories. The coffin industry is booming in such a manner that many of the locals are abandoning their farms, bakeries, and other businesses to make the “wooden pajamas.” Workers are paid by the coffin, and good carpenters can make $250 a week while painters can make $150 per week.

The majority of the coffins sold are the economy model, económico, costing $90. The owner of a factory in Jucuapa, Jorge Cárdenas, says that the majority of deaths associated with gang violence are young males will minimal resources. “When it comes time for the funeral, it’s normally the town hall that pays for the coffin, and the state always chooses the cheapest option.” Cárdenas acknowledges that he is making money off the tragedy befalling his country, and that if the gang murders dramatically decreased, so would his business.

See Matthew Bremner, City of Coffins: Bloomberg Businessweek, MatthewBremner.com, March 24, 2019.

Special thanks to Joel C. Dobris (Professor of Law, UC Davis School of Law) for bringing this article to my attention.