Amazon Targets High Schoolers in a Warehouse Recruiting Blitz (theinformation.com) 57
Amazon is launching a big recruiting push aimed at teens who are about to graduate high school, in the e-commerce giant's latest effort to keep its sprawling network of warehouses staffed up in a tight labor market. The Information: In a hiring drive set to kick off next month, Amazon will attend events at schools across the U.S. and Canada, a person briefed on the matter said. The effort will involve recruiters going to hundreds of high school career days to talk up college tuition benefits and other perks of working at Amazon, the person said. Not having enough workers has already eaten into the company's bottom line. Amazon said operational disruptions from not being able to staff up its facilities during the 2021 holiday rush, along with inflationary pressures pushing up labor and transportation expenses, cost the company $4 billion in the fourth quarter. Further reading: Amazon workers made up almost half of all warehouse injuries last year.
I hope they give the complete picture. (Score:1)
Perhaps if they addressed some of those issues, they wouldn't have so much trouble finding workers.
Re:I hope they give the complete picture. (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope they also talk about their surveillance, quotas, limited bathroom breaks
Same as high school. So the new workers are already used to the conditions.
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Burger flippers....warehouse workers, etc.
Good to see what some actual labor and job responsibilities is like, especially if you don't aspire to be more than a regular high school grad.
After doing this, they may be tempted to do much better in college or go to a trade school...anything to earn more money in a "real" job.
Re: I hope they give the complete picture. (Score:2)
Re: I hope they give the complete picture. (Score:3)
If they've graduated high school, they're very likely to have already done many adult things in their life. Some things even uncommon among slashdotters, like losing their virginity. Either way, they're not children.
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I've been working W2 jobs since I was 16yrs old.
Before that, I was working odd jobs in the neighborhood...mowing lawns, baby sitting, etc.
You don't think kids should work today?
A little hard work never hurt anyone.
It sure showed me I did NOT want to do that as a career.
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I want the next generation to have things easier than my generation did. It seems to me that conservatives want things to remain static, and send their kids into the
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A little hard work never hurt anyone.
Unless you work at Amazon... https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/0... [cnbc.com]
Re: I hope they give the complete picture. (Score:3)
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Have you ever even met anyone that works in an Amazon warehouse? Of course not, you heard a commentator describe the conditions somewhere as bad, so no one should work there...
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The conditions were brutal. The workload was at the unsustainable level, it was extremely hot with poor ventilation, it was hard to stay hydrated with limited water and bathroom breaks. If you got hurt you just had to keep going because you would get fired for not working.
Workers had to line up early to get into the facility and they were not on
Re: I hope they give the complete picture. (Score:2)
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According to CNBC, "Amazon warehouse workers suffer serious injuries at twice the rate of rivals, study finds"
And Amazon has a new policy of denying sick leave for injuries.
"Amazon warehouse workers in the U.S. suffered serious injuries at twice the rate of rival companies in 2021, according to a new study.
There were 6.8 serious injuries for every 100 Amazon warehouse workers, compared with 3.3 serious injuries per 100 workers at all other employers in the warehouse industry, the Strategic Organizing Cente
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Hey..these ARE just the kind of starter jobs that teens need.
Burger flippers....warehouse workers, etc.
Good to see what some actual labor and job responsibilities is like, especially if you don't aspire to be more than a regular high school grad.
Good to see what some actual indoctrination and surveillance is like, especially if your corporocratic overlords don't want you to aspire to be more than a serf for the rest of your life. FTFY
I agree with your point about young'uns needing to learn what an honest day's physical labour is like five days a week. But Amazon? Give your head a shake man!
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A job with flexible schedules, decent pay, available health benefits, and tuition reimbursement - the horror!
A young, healthy person is perfect for a warehouse job - I suspect the majority of workplace injuries at Amazon facilities are the older workers with significant health issues.
That will go over well (Score:2)
I suspect the average teenager is not inclined to work to the level Amazon demands. I know when I was a teen, that held true, and for many other teens I knew we worked as slack a job as possible.
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No one really is including to do the jobs they dislike but there's often no choice. You want to eat to you gotta work. I certainly had to do jobs I didn't want to do as a teenager.
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Truth. I worked Waffle House and retail sales as a teenager (and Amazon is becoming the new retail) all in the steps to a better position with more responsibilities, more flexibility and better pay.
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Likely safer than military (Score:5, Interesting)
When I was in college, UPS plastered the campus with flyers. I recall the pay was 2-3x minimum wage. The work day was before the first class. I imagine 20 hours a week helped a lot of people.
We canâ(TM)t begrudge corporations for expecting an honest days work. We can support unions to insure reasonable working conditions, pay, and work hours. And what we need are low skilled jobs for students who choose not to maximize learning in school. I had a programming job six months after graduation. Not all high school graduates have such foresights, or the ability to succeed in college.
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Probably safer than the military - maybe that is a more common benchmark in the US, but elsewhere I suspect people look at many other options first.
And with Amazon, it sounds like you absolutely should be looking at other options first - this new data [businessinsider.com] showing Amazon musculoskeletal injury rates are ~5x higher than other warehouse jobs.
Anecdotally, I have a mate who worked in an Amazon warehouse - he is a fit, gym going, long distance running bloke - and he has said how physically demanding the work is even
Re: Likely safer than military (Score:2)
Grammar is important ... (Score:2)
"[...] a big recruiting push aimed at teens who are about to graduate high school [...]"
Why is Amazon focused on teens who are going to mark their high schools with regularly-spaced lines [wiktionary.org]? Surely we should be punishing those paint- or marker-wielding vandals instead of rewarding them with employment!
Seriously, how difficult is it to write the term correctly as "about to graduate from high school"? It's as if the editors aren't even trying to maintain the historically low standards of writing quality /. has been known for. This isn't an instance of "language evolving" ... it's plain and simple
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It's considered correct as it is [merriam-webster.com].
graduate
transitive verb
to be graduated from:
"joined the navy after graduating high school"
.
There's always more than one way of saying a thing.
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More detailed explanation from the same link:
In the 19th century the transitive sense (1a) was prescribed; the intransitive "I graduated from college" was condemned. The intransitive prevailed nonetheless, and today it is the sense likely to be prescribed and the newer transitive sense (1b) "she graduated high school" the one condemned. All three are standard. The intransitive is currently the most common, the new transitive the least common.
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Why is Amazon focused on teens who are going to mark their high schools with regularly-spaced lines?
Learn your grammar. Ergative verbs change the sentence order a bit. When you say that ice melts, it doesn't melt itself - it is the thing being melted.
This is an instance of language evolving. Your link even lists that form. But it's not recent. Here's writing from 1832 from someone educated enough to be on the Supreme Court (see page 30):
https://www.google.com/books/e... [google.com]
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English is not prescriptive. Try switching to speaking French if you want a central authority. The form was literally in the link that you yourself posted. And has been in continuous use for at least 2 centuries.
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I have a master's in English, you insensitive clod. :-D ...
Someone with a master's [sic] in English should know that the apostrophe does not belong there.
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Someone with a master's [sic] in English should know that the apostrophe does not belong there.
Someone who doesn't know history shouldn't comment on things s/he doesn't fully understand. The name of the degree today reflects that this was once, literally, a master's degree - "master" in the sense of "teacher," from the Latin magister [wiktionary.org] - as noted here:
The original meaning of the master's degree was thus that someone who had been admitted to the rank (degree) of master (i.e. teacher) in one university should be admitted to the same rank in other universities. This gradually became formalised as the licentia docendi (licence to teach).
(Source: "Master's degree" [wikipedia.org])
Go read a book.
Amazing education experience here, kids! (Score:2)
It's to Curb Unionization (Score:3)
The more part-time workers who will genuinely work only a few years means lower pay and benefits to shell out and probably makes it harder to get sites to unionize. Amazon is not doing this to help the youth.
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Bingo. Like states lowering the age of child labor because “nobody wants to work anymore”
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Bingo. Like states lowering the age of child labor because “nobody wants to work anymore”
... for the peaunts they want to pay.
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> ... for the peanuts they want to pay.
Minimum wage would be $23 if the dollar kept its buying power. silverwage.com
Hey, Kids! (Score:4, Funny)
Having trouble deciding what to do after graduating from high school? Come work for Amazon!
- We offer lots of hard work and long hours for mediocre pay!
- Do you like parkour? Dodging our autonomous robots is exciting and fun!
- Free food! (if you bring it from home)
- We even give you your very own pee container!
Apply now at https://www.amazon.com/deadend... [amazon.com] !
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You left out college tuition reimbursement, available healthcare, and likely a 401K program.
It Worked for Wal-Mart (Score:1)
When the first Wal-Mart opened in my town in the early 90's, they held an assembly in my school for everyone aged fifteen and older that was basically a recruitment drive. It was a rural high school (my graduating class was 60 kids) and a lot of people thought Wal-Mart would be a good opportunity.
It doesn't surprise me at all that Amazon would try the same tactic. Frankly, I'm surprised it took this long.
Re: It Worked for Wal-Mart (Score:2)
I imagine that if kids worked in the mom and pop stores that the Walmart replaced, the pay would've been as good or even better. They may have even been able to own the store one day if the owner thought their performace was very satisfactory.
No chance in hell of that ever happening with Walmart.
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Mom & pop retail paying $17-18/hr to HS grads? Doubtful.
Eventually own the store? Yeah, if they stick around until the owner dies or etires, AND they saved their meager earnings for a decade or more.
Amazon is a transition job with good benefits, perfect for someone that wants to work their way thru college.
Re: It Worked for Wal-Mart (Score:2)
"Eventually own the store? Yeah, if they stick around until the owner dies or etires, AND they saved their meager earnings for a decade or more."
Yeah, my thinking might be stuck back in the past when everything wasn't so 'fast'.
Now it's fast everything, and even products oriented to the youngest kids prepare them for a lifetime of ADHD and attention spans of a flea.
Life is moving so fast that people are missing it.
Call me a troll if you will, but... (Score:3)
If Amazon is looking for an untapped labor pool, they don't need to look any further than the US-Mexico border [cnn.com].
Because one man's illegal immigrant is another man's economic opportunity.
Besides, these people are probably already accustomed to peeing in plastic bottles. Thanks, I'm here all night.
Which is worse? (Score:2)
Re: Which is worse? (Score:2)
At least there are benefits to joining the military, and just because you join does not mean you are automatically sent off to die in a foreign land.
What benefits does Amazon provide except getting royally fucked over and not knowing exactly when in the future?
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I wonder if Amazon will come up with their own version of the ASVAB, so they can figure out what department to put them in.
Send the folks with technical skills over to AWS, put the former linebackers in security, and send everyone else to the warehouse!
Awesome (Score:3)
A dead end job with no real future and working for someone who is just dying to replace me with a robot.
"I always wanted to be on the welfare rolls" said no kid ever.
While we're at it... (Score:2)
Targeting (Score:1)
Fine but robots will kill this job soon. (Score:1)
It's not a career. Amazon is actively trying to remove humans from the warehouses. That's like 100k jobs that could go in a few years (or less).
Don't Talk To Strangers (Score:2)
No different...except the job itself (Score:2)
How is this any different than other companies running career fairs, internship programs, etc. 'targeting' high school and college students?
I mean, other than amazon being an awful, abusive company of course. See recent article how they employ ~1/3 of warehouse workers but account for ~50% of warehouse worker injuries.