Amazon Workers To Stage Coordinated Black Friday Protests in 15 Countries (vice.com) 130
On Friday, Amazon warehouse workers and social and environmental justice activists around the world will stage a series of coordinated protests, strikes, and actions to demand the online retailer respect workers' rights to participate in union activity, stop circumventing tax laws, and commit to higher environmental standards, according to the event's organizers. From a report: The day of action, which is being called #MakeAmazonPay, coincides with Black Friday, one of Amazon's biggest sales events of the year and the start of its peak season, when warehouse worker injuries are highest and workloads for warehouse workers and delivery drivers skyrocket. On Friday, protest actions will take place across Amazon's supply chain in Brazil, Mexico, the United States, the United Kingdom, Spain, France, Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg, Italy, Poland, India, Bangladesh, the Philippines, and Australia. As many as 3,000 workers will strike at six Amazon facilities in Germany. Garment workers in Bangladesh who manufacture clothes sold by Amazon will also protest. Trade union members and environmental groups, including the climate-focused Extinction Rebellion, will demonstrate outside Amazon's European headquarters in Luxembourg. In the Philippines, contracted Amazon Ring call center workers, who face 'subhuman' conditions according to a recent Financial Times article, will hold a virtual action. At Amazon's Seattle and Northern Virginia headquarters, community activists from social justice organizations, including Justice for Muslims Collective and La ColectiVA, will hold their own protests.
Scheduled like their delivery times (Score:5, Informative)
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It's always a pleasant surprise when it finally happens.
My order finally shipped yesterday so I say go for it!
Re:Scheduled like their delivery times (Score:4, Informative)
Brilliant one step plan to twart them: (Score:5, Funny)
1) Double their pay.
Those bastards will never see it coming! ;)
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1) Double their pay.
Those bastards will never see it coming! ;)
They'd claim victory, and that would just piss off Bezos.
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"Oh look, your numbers aren't up to snuff."
Re:Brilliant one step plan to twart them: (Score:4, Funny)
Ah yes, rule of acquisition #76.
"Every once in a while, declare peace. It confuses the hell out of your enemies."
Tax laws (Score:5, Interesting)
I thought the big problem was that Amazon was actually following the tax laws, just that the way the laws are written, Amazon is being taxed in the favorable jurisdiction where they are headquartered, as opposed the various locations where their customers actually live. I assume the workers would be better off staging street demonstrations to get corporate tax law changed in their localities as opposed to just going on strike (they probably could do both).
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I thought the big problem was that Amazon was actually following the tax laws
Yup. Amazon follows tax and environmental laws to the letter.
Amazon also offers benefits only to the extend required by law, and not a drop more.
When it comes to workers conditions however, sure the law makers are also to blame for letting such conditions even be legal in the first place, but that doesn't absolve Amazon for choosing the bare minimum.
They know full well most people don't have other options for work and take full advantage of that by being bottom feeders.
Think of it this way. How many thing
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Amazon also offers benefits only to the extend required by law, and not a drop more.
Horse pucky. Pay and benefits at Amazon exceed the legal requirements. They wouldn't be able to attract enough workers otherwise.
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Horse pucky. Pay and benefits at Amazon exceed the legal requirements. They wouldn't be able to attract enough workers otherwise.
Even before Covid underemployment was rampant. Finding workers is no problem. The low unemployment rates were a lie, as they are always a lie, although they are designed to not count people who have given up looking or who have been looking for a long time. Consequently, the worse things are, the more of a lie the unemployment rate is — automatically.
That's why there's no problem finding people desperate enough to work for Amazon even though they treat workers like dogshit.
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I won't dispute your statement, I want to quantify it from a different perspective :
C-level: Pay and benefits at Amazon exceed the legal requirements, YES- Way way out there in benefits
B-level: Pay and benefits at Amazon exceed the legal requirements, YES- great benefits
A-level: Pay and benefits at Amazon exceed the legal requirements, YES- very good average and above
The above 3 groups have a direct, non-commodity, level effect on the chain.
A c-level or b-level dies, it will cost the company shitload
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Amazon could offer people to sell their kids into indentured servitude and some people would take it.
Possibly. But they are offering much more. Which explains why only 0.3% of Amazon's workers are participating in this protest.
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Or maybe the failing economy and fear of unemployment with little to no safety net is what keeps people from protesting.
Another issue is that turnover rates are very high, i.e. most people just leave and have little interest in trying to improve things.
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Which explains why only 0.3% of Amazon's workers are participating in this protest.
How do you arrive at that figure? TFS say 3,000 will participate in the protest in Germany. This article [thelocal.de] says that 2,500 are expected to protest, and that Amazon employs "more than 16,000 people in Germany and has taken on an additional 10,000 seasonal employees ".
2,500 out of 26,000 doesn't sound like 0.3% to me. It remains to be seen what the turnout will be for the rest of the world.
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A warehouse job isn't a sit-down job, they have chairs in the break rooms, what warehouse do you know of that litters their warehouse with seats and benches for employees to sit on during their shift?
Of course, you wouldn't be comparing your "white-collar" "work from home" job with their "Report to the Big Fucking Building" and "push heavy boxes around all-day" job, are you - because there are more than a few differences.
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I'm sure the amazon workers that have similar job titles as OP get chairs as well. Maybe even a coffee maker.
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I thought ... Amazon is being taxed in the favorable jurisdiction where they are headquartered, as opposed the various locations where their customers actually live.
The sales tax in Seattle, where Amazon is headquartered, is over 10%.
When you purchase something on Amazon, they calculate the tax based on the shipping destination, not the purchaser's location. I just purchased some gifts for my kids and had them delivered to their home in a different state. The tax on the purchase is almost half of what I would pay if they were shipped to me.
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That's sales tax, the GP was talking about corporation tax. Amazon does the same as many big international companies, setting of "franchises" in each country it operates in which pay crippling fees to use the Amazon branding. The fees go to a company in a tax haven, often Ireland. That way the "franchises" don't pay much tax because they make next to no profit, it all gets swallowed up by licencing fees.
In the UK Amazon paid just £6.3 million in corporation tax, on sales of £14 billi
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Yes, but the politicians that run the world signed all these practices into law. So why is blaming amazing for following the law the problem? Maybe the politicians should be doing more for the voters instead of the big business.
We both know that won't be happening any time soon.
Strike makes no sense (Score:4, Interesting)
If this were a pro-union strike, then maybe it would make sense, assuming unionizing at Amazon made any sense at all. Which maybe it does or maybe it doesn't. The turnover rate at FCs is so high that bringing in a union would be a bit goofy, to say the least.
But demanding that Amazon comply with tax laws and be more environmentally-friendly? Uhhhh, aren't the protesters aware that those changes would probably cause Amazon to cut pay and/or reduce headcount?
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Activists, will tack on whatever causes will get them most people to participate. Bring them another 500 people who feel there should be a right to decaf coffee in the break room, and they'll add that to the list of causes. Welcome to the 21st century, where a small portion of society thinks they can get anything they want just by being loud about it.
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Amazon is making money hand over fist. They can do those things and still be obscenely profitable. Meanwhile, those workers live in the world with the rest of us, where those things matter as much to them as they do to us.
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Duh. You know they'll still take a chunk out of their employees' hides if they're forced to start spending more money on environmentalism and suchlike. Ditto if they start paying more in taxes.
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If this were a pro-union strike, then maybe it would make sense, assuming unionizing at Amazon made any sense at all. Which maybe it does or maybe it doesn't. The turnover rate at FCs is so high that bringing in a union would be a bit goofy, to say the least.
But demanding that Amazon comply with tax laws and be more environmentally-friendly? Uhhhh, aren't the protesters aware that those changes would probably cause Amazon to cut pay and/or reduce headcount?
The protestors are primarily not Amazon employees. They organize a protest, and then try to recruit Amazon employees to join in. It is a publicity stunt for the organizers pet causes.
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Yeah it's just stupid that some of the employees would join it.
I need employees (Score:4, Interesting)
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They are cult followers. Remember them? They still breathe.
Re:I need employees (Score:4, Interesting)
Maybe your warehouse isn't convenient for them to work at?
Maybe they question if your warehouse will be around next year - Amazon ain't going out of business anytime soon...
What benefits do you offer compared with Amazon?
At Amazon there is the possibility of training and promotion to higher-paying professional jobs, tuition assistance, etc - how about your warehouse workers, do you offer tuition assistance?
There are more considerations than the per-hour rate of pay.
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I wish them good luck on that (Score:2)
Re: I wish them good luck on that (Score:1, Troll)
The unions are still plenty powerful, in NYC and CA the teachers union forced the government to close down schools where there is currently a 0.26% positivity rate for COVID (the limits set elsewhere are 3%).
Amazon isnâ(TM)t afraid of unions, they are afraid of the weak kneed politicians that will give in to the 3000 out of the 1M workers and make government intrusion and union rules mandatory (as is the case in Europe). If they suddenly had to pay the Cadillac of health insurance and retirement plans
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The unions are still plenty powerful, in NYC and CA the teachers union forced the government to close down schools where there is currently a 0.26% positivity rate for COVID (the limits set elsewhere are 3%).
I have never before heard anyone say that the unions had anything to do with the decision. Do you have a source for that? I can't find any support for it.
and pay a starting rate of $45/h per worker regardless of their productive value (which is what happened in the US auto industry), it would shut down their business.
Comparing warehouse work to automobile assembly is absurd in terms of both skills and expected pay. I have not heard anyone suggesting that a raise anywhere near that would be expected for Amazon. Furthermore with the movement towards automation in the automotive industry, nobody would even attempt to make an argument that they were dying from wages
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The unions are still plenty powerful, in NYC and CA the teachers union forced the government to close down schools where there is currently a 0.26% positivity rate for COVID (the limits set elsewhere are 3%).
I don't know about NYC, but in CA the teacher's unions didn't force the government to shut down anything. Something like 95% of CA schools were closed by the middle of last March, and their closures were decided by the individual districts/counties involved. Districts in northern California were closed first, districts in the rest of the state soon followed suit. None of them needed any pressure from any teacher's union to close their schools.
What the unions in CA have been fighting about is the criteri
I'm guessing.... (Score:3)
Striking when unemployment is high (Score:2)
Black Fiday protest (Score:3)
Does Black Friday mean anything in any other country (besides USA) ?
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It has shown up here in Canada the last few years, a month after our Thanksgiving.
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"The last few years"? Try the last few decades.
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Maybe depends on what part of Canada? Or perhaps I haven't paid attention but it sure seems relatively recent that the local stores have got on the Black Friday wagon.
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Well, we were both wrong. It's more than the last few years but it's not even been a full decade.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Sounds about right. With age time does seem to pass quick :)
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Does Black Friday mean anything in any other country (besides USA) ?
Yes. Several countries have "Black Friday" sales, although not all are on the same day.
Black Friday - Around the World [wikipedia.org]
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Black is good, as in making money
"Red" is bad, as in lossing money
nothing more, nothing less.
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We have Black Friday in the UK now but it's not as bad as the US. Some physical shops tried it a few years ago and there were riots so it's mostly online now, and also most shops are shut anyway due to COVID at the moment.
It's mostly a rip off, loads of fake deals that are actually more expensive than they were previously anyway.
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good luck to them. (Score:2)
Sounds like multiple causes here? (Score:2)
This is the thing that, IMO, has weakened or rendered irrelevant almost ALL of the major protests or riots in recent memory. Instead of picking a single issue or grievance to get behind, you wind up with multiple groups, each with their own agendas, protesting under the same "banner". There's no cohesive message beyond something really basic, like "Amazon is evil!" -- and the majority ignores it.
I mean, look.... I have first-hand experience with how Amazon works and treats its employees. There's PLENTY t
Oh noes! (Score:2)
I'll have to wait two more days for my packages to arrive.
Really... If you want to get management's attention, disrupt the website on Black Friday. Not the supply chain.
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There's no "black friday" (Score:5, Funny)
It's 2020 now, and it's called a "friday of color".
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"#000 Friday"
FTFY
In Germany, they do it several times a year (Score:2)
Nobody ever notices anything, since Amazon is a logistics firm, problems like these are their forte.
I'm confused as usual (Score:3)
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Constitution = U.S.A. only
Amazon = worldwide
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The US Constitution does not have an Article 11, and free association is based on the 1st amendment. They probably mean the German Constitution (the main country to which this story refers.) Because of a different organization, the German constitution has a lot more articles (each closer in size to an amendment in the bill of rights) and starts with the bill of rights style freedom guarantees. They probably meant Article 12, which covers workplace rights instead of Article 11, which covers freedom of tra
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I blame the lack of caffeine in my blood stream.
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Yeah, my sans-caffine slashdot posts are dumber than yours. It happens. Sorry if I was rude.
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Don't worry, I see an asshole that's much more rude than you every morning when I go to the bathroom. The fucker keeps giving me this empty blank zombie stare from the medicine cabinet mirror that's hanging above the toilet.
Re: Just Sack them (Score:4, Interesting)
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Not so fast! If any of those displaced workers get in to coding, the robots might end up with a 'strike mode' added in a field upgrade.
Re:Hope and run mouth off about it and they're do (Score:5, Informative)
Most of the rest of the western world is not 'At Will' employment.
For example, in Australia.
The minimum wage is around $20/hr (USD14)
I you are employed causally, you paid 15% more than this.
All wage earners are paid 9.5% superannuation on top of their wages.
If you work for the same employer more than 6 months you can opt to be permanent.
permanent staff get the following
- 4 weeks paid annual leave
- Paid 17.5% more while on leave
- 5 annual sick or bereavement days
- 3 months paid long service leave every 10 years.
You cannot be fired unless it was either a gross breach (eg criminal or safety) or you have been given 3 warnings.
If you are made redundant, it has to be genuine and comes with generous payouts.
This is just the mandatory stuff. Different industries add more on top of this.
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News for you, in Australia there is very specific list and procedures for a "protected strike." This proposed thing isn't covered, fines or termination of employment are possible.
Re:Hope and run mouth off about it and they're do (Score:5, Informative)
You're correct. The point I was trying to make, is workers in the USA seem to get treated like cattle compared to the rest of the western world because... well money usually...
Re:Hope and run mouth off about it and they're do (Score:4, Insightful)
That's the elementary school level understanding. Now read up on rent seeking, hydraulic despotism, and any number of other wrinkles and twists (don't forget company stores, monopsony, etc) and join us in the real discussion.
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Everything except the water policy is most likely correct
I happen to get weird out by the idea that someone else can control the water supply. I consistently teach others the ability to store rain water ( in Florida ), share it in simple manners by proper precleaning ( via gravel, rock and sand filters ) and re-introducing it to the dirt so it can make it back into the aquifer, increase the output of the garden via proper water, mulching and sunlight management. ( FYI proper mulching increase the carbon sto
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There is nothing un-capitalist about setting minimum standards for employment. There is certainly nothing un-capitalist about preventing any single entity from having undue level of control over any vital resource. It fact, a healthy market requires regulation to work at all.
Sears was a great disruptor in it's day. The Sears Catalog was the amazon.com of it's day. Ironically, the final death blow to Sears was, in fact, amazon.com. None of that changes if Amazon pays it's workers well and watches out for the
Re:"Hydraulic despotism" (Score:4, Funny)
The 1950's called. They want their Red Scare back.
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Also what Australia has sounds rather liberal compared to the way things are here and from the way you talk I'd suspect you're a conservative therefore what Australia is doing must sound like sacrilege/heresy to you. The fact of the matter is however that their system ap
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Part of that is probably because with the other rules in place, there's less need to strike in the first place.
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News for you, in Australia there is very specific list and procedures for a "protected strike." This proposed thing isn't covered, fines or termination of employment are possible.
Obviously - because the law stepped into the fray and basically forced both sides (labour and business) to play nice for the good of the nation. Which is how it should be.
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Fired or worked to death or fight back. The US Unions need to Union again before it gets worse. They used to use the national guard to shoot Unionist, don't let it get that bad again. No such thing as LGBT or anything else in unions, all workers are just that workers, demanding to be treated equally, demanding the right to a living wage and working conditions fit for the living. The new demand, demanding to be personally treated by the employers, personal service, person to person.
In a Democracy the majorit
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You should learn how to read.
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First of all, you don't cite your source for "one million workers", secondly you seem to assume that it's only 3000 workers worldwide. Your 0.3% is baseless.
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I was about to ask the same this, last time I looked
https://www.google.com/search?... [google.com] ( that's the google search link ), it showed about 1.1
Wiki page shows 2019 798K https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Whichever the case it's a lot of people that are employed, and the striking group is hoping to help the entire workforce to have better improvements.
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3,000 is just the workers in Germany. And you didn't even have to read the article to see that. 1 million worker is worldwide.
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The claim is it will happen in 15 countries. The 3,000 number is specific to Germany:
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the grad students' relatively cushy lifestyle
Most grad students barely make minimum wage, and that is only if you pretend that they are only working 40 hours a week (even though their pay rate is often based on 30). PhD students are teaching courses and grading both tests and homework, while also conducting research.
high level of freedom in choosing what to work on
Most students get to make that choice only once as a grad student. They pick their adviser, and
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>My wife gave birth to our first child while I was in grad school
My wife gave birth to our first child while *she* was in grad school. She got the PhD on schedule too.
Re: So their demands are (Score:1)
Iâ(TM)m sure you never actually worked at a University. Grad students are well payed, well above minimum wage, simply for the privilege of completing their education.
And you canâ(TM)t get grad students to come for an after hour or weekend shift to deal with human subjects, not even undergrads will do that, you better hire some real staff since they wonâ(TM)t complain to the dean. And the fact is that most undergrads and even grad students are complete idiots, the majority donâ(TM)t even
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Iâ(TM)m sure you never actually worked at a University. Grad students are well payed, well above minimum wage, simply for the privilege of completing their education.
Ours did research that fulfilled a contract from a sponsor. That contract money went to all the things contract money goes to. Our Grads earned their keep.
And you can't get grad students to come for an after hour or weekend shift to deal with human subjects, not even undergrads will do that, you better hire some real staff since they won't complain to the dean.
Who the heck are your students - philosophy or gender studies majors? Ours came in and worked along with the rest of us. If it was evening or weekend, they were there, because it was part of their work.
And the fact is that most undergrads and even grad students are complete idiots, the majority donâ(TM)t even plan on staying in the field, the intention is that they learn during their work periods so they literally know nothing when they get there.
Assuming you are not just trolling, you must be hiring the wrong people. Students wanted badly to get with us. They got to gain practical skills not taugh
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IÃ(TM)m sure you never actually worked at a University. Grad students are well payed, well above minimum wage, simply for the privilege of completing their education.
First of all, you're dead wrong. But keep slinging assumptions and mud around if you want, I won't stop you.
You must be talking about some country I have never lived in. Grad students in the USA - especially in the hard sciences - barely make more than McDonald's employees. That is why grad schools in the big cities almost exclusively hire young grad students because only they can get by on the wage - and only if they are sharing a rent-controlled apartment with other grad students.
And you canÃ(TM)t get grad students to come for an after hour or weekend shift to deal with human subjects
Two important thin
Re:So their demands are (Score:4, Interesting)
to do things that will drive up their operating costs. And those costs will get passed on to...that's right! Millions upon millions of customers! Each of whom I'm sure won't mind paying extra for their junk so that some guy can have better benefits than them.
Drive up operating costs by allowing reasonable bathroom breaks? Drive up operating costs by slowing things down a little so workers don't have to run around the warehouse to keep up with a computerized task master? How much will costs go up from dialing down the pace a little?
Amazon warehouse workers already enjoy benefits like Medical, prescription drug, dental and vision coverage. About the only other thing workers could ask for is higher wages. If they were to negotiate a 10% higher wage, how much more do you think the cost of your smartphone case would go up?
As you said, these costs will be passed along to customers. In the US, there's 120,000,000 of them. Personally, I won't mind one little bit if I have to pay a buck more on a $100 purchase knowing that Amazon's warehouse workers don't have to piss in bottles anymore.
This reminds me of the time when I was in college almost two decades ago when a wave of labor organizing was sweeping through the universities in the US. The grad students (not all of them, of course, mainly the socialists and the labor-vs-managment equivalents of male feminists who were looking to score with them) tried to strike.
They got zero sympathy from university leadership (no shit), but what was interesting and heartening to me was that they also go zero sympathy from university employees, who looked on the grad students' relatively cushy lifestyle (young, no family responsibilities, high level of freedom in choosing what to work on) and scoffed at the idea that they were "labor." The paying customers of the university (read: undergrads) afforded them even less sympathy: "shut the fuck up and grade my homework so I can pass my classes and graduate," was the general attitude.
Cool story, bro. Yeah, the work done by grad students in a university setting is totally analogous to warehouse workers doing physical labor.
That's the rub of labor politics. If you can make the management a believable villain, you have a shot.
Given the reports of Amazon's anti-unionization tactics, I don't think it will take much effort on that front.
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Personally, I won't mind one little bit if I have to pay a buck more on a $100 purchase knowing that Amazon's warehouse workers don't have to piss in bottles anymore.
If you are truly worried about the workers at the Amazon facilities, perhaps you should consider patronizing another retailer, rather than making yourself feel better with trivial imaginary voluntary cost increases that will all go to the "worker" - it will never happen.
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If you are truly worried about the workers at the Amazon facilities, perhaps you should consider patronizing another retailer
I'm truly worried about workers all over the US, and I don't buy from Amazon very much at all. 8 orders over the past year totalling less than $500. Other retailers get the vast majority of my spending.
I'm willing to support workers at Amazon or anywhere else by putting my money where my mouth is. If Amazon passes the cost of better pay and working conditions down to me, I have absolutely no problem with it. In fact, Amazon will absolutely get more of my business if they do such a thing. What are you
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Fuck that billionaire slave driver.
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I don't think you can afford his hourly rates unless you're a woman with a big chest. A big chest full of money, that is.
Re: well thank God the SJWs are here (Score:1, Redundant)
Take pride in being the problem.
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Roadhouse. - Peter Griffin
Re: Shortage of coffins expected after Thanksgivin (Score:2)
There is a certain irony to history if thanksgiving celebrations cripple America...