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Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

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Re: Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

#71

Post by jjeaff »

madengr wrote: post #52
Asooka wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So why can Costco afford to treat their employees humanely?

Costco has few items compared to a typical big-box or grocery store. Most of the items are in bulk containers, positioned by fork lift, and cost $10+. They don't bag items after check out. The employees don't dawdle around; they are always hustling. It's hard to get out of Costco without spending $100. They must have a large revenue/employee. They probably have $1k/min flowing out of the store; much more than Walmart…

Some Sam's clubs are just as nice as Costcos. It really depends on the market it is in. It just seems that Costcos minimum standard is higher. Because there is variation in Costco quality as well... But Costco is more likely to only locate in the more upmarket locations.

Re: Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

#72

Post by kajecounterhack »

token_throwaway wrote: post #42

This job sounds shitty but have you ever spoken to someone in a domestic role? A postal employee? A trucker? A janitor at your office building? Kitchen staff at a restaurant who do not even have time to take a piss without dropping the ball, let alone timed pee breaks? Lots of jobs are hard. Extremely hard. And often, jobs that are very very hard pay hardly anything. There is a two-way transaction happening here, tho…

> As long as people are willing to do this job for this amount of money, it will probably not get better unfortunately.

There is an inherent falsehood to this statement: it reads as if there is no alternative to a laissez faire market. Regulation serves to prevent exactly these situations. Universal limits to how many hours you can force someone to work; regulated standards to how much rest you need to give your workers; rules for how much you must pay them.

Unfortunately regulation has failed to do these things. Pieces like this are helpful to remind us of this and to push our governments to do better.

I don't think if you ask anyone that they like that their products are all made, packed, and shipped using wage slavery. Don't you want a world where we all have a little less thanks to efficiency losses but know that everyone is being treated with a minimum level of decency?

Re: Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

#73

Post by CamelCaseName »

colechristensen wrote: post #51
token_throwaway wrote: post #42

This job sounds shitty but have you ever spoken to someone in a domestic role? A postal employee? A trucker? A janitor at your office building? Kitchen staff at a restaurant who do not even have time to take a piss without dropping the ball, let alone timed pee breaks? Lots of jobs are hard. Extremely hard. And often, jobs that are very very hard pay hardly anything. There is a two-way transaction happening here, tho…

This kind of logic lets you justify any behavior as long as there's a market involved somehow. You're trying to give free agency to people who are very likely choosing between the only job they can find and starvation. That's not a free market, it's wage slavery. Low end employers can do anything they want as long as the alternative for enough of their candidates is starvation.

If the government were to offer PTO for employees below a certain income threshold to learn new work-related skills, would that help lift people out of these situations?

Or would such a system be 1. too invasive and 2. abused, either by companies or the employees.

Re: Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

#74

Post by holydude »

This is on countries like the US and the EU to set a world standard on how the employees should be treated. Everyone competes with everyone and make no mistake the wester europe is not some wonderland paradise where even your average joe is treated well. Western Europe makes hefty profits out of abusing Eastern European labour and markets.

Re: Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

#75

Post by holydude »

fpisfun wrote: post #49

When an Amazon warehouse opened in my area relatively recently it seemed that many people were scrambling like crazy to try to get a job there. These seemed to be people who are poorly educated and low skilled but clearly the Amazon job represented a step up for them. I'm not saying that there aren't issues but clearly working for Amazon is still a better alternative than their other options. I personally know of som…

I am against excessive taxation or overregulation but companies like Amazon ...no really any company...should be responsible for treating the society fair. Amazon is a behemoth that grew because of its ruthless behavior towards its competitors. I am sure there is more to life than constant race to the bottom when your average american has to compete with someone from china or africa.

Re: Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

#76

Post by mattacular »

innagadadavida wrote: post #65
zemo wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this is extremely, extremely tone-deaf. > As long as people are willing to do this job for this amount of money, it will probably not get better unfortunately. child labor didn't stop because parents stopped being willing to sentence their kids to labor, it stopped because of laws. The free market does nothing to guarantee that working conditions are livable or humane. Any suggestion to the contrary is at best naive,…

> child labor didn't stop because parents stopped being willing to sentence their kids to labor... No it did not, it just moved overseas. It is hard to beat the free market -- it just finds the most economical way to get things done, it does not care about human plight.

Since you say "child labor moved overseas [once the US adopted child labor laws]" are you prepared to show some data indicating that there was a corresponding increase in child labor outside of the US since that time?

Without that your comment is just hollow market worship.

Re: Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

#77

Post by sneak »

holydude wrote: post #75
fpisfun wrote: post #49

When an Amazon warehouse opened in my area relatively recently it seemed that many people were scrambling like crazy to try to get a job there. These seemed to be people who are poorly educated and low skilled but clearly the Amazon job represented a step up for them. I'm not saying that there aren't issues but clearly working for Amazon is still a better alternative than their other options. I personally know of som…

I am against excessive taxation or overregulation but companies like Amazon ...no really any company...should be responsible for treating the society fair. Amazon is a behemoth that grew because of its ruthless behavior towards its competitors. I am sure there is more to life than constant race to the bottom when your average american has to compete with someone from china or africa.

How can you treat someone unfairly when they are not compelled to interact with you at all?

Every single person who has a job with Amazon is there because they choose to be.

Re: Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

#78

Post by colechristensen »

CamelCaseName wrote: post #73
colechristensen wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of logic lets you justify any behavior as long as there's a market involved somehow. You're trying to give free agency to people who are very likely choosing between the only job they can find and starvation. That's not a free market, it's wage slavery. Low end employers can do anything they want as long as the alternative for enough of their candidates is starvation.

If the government were to offer PTO for employees below a certain income threshold to learn new work-related skills, would that help lift people out of these situations? Or would such a system be 1. too invasive and 2. abused, either by companies or the employees.

That's a weird way to do it, and would tend to subsidize employers for questionable benefits. Tax incentives for employer tuition reimbursement makes more sense.

Instead there should be programs to pay people minimum wage + tuition to attend community college for in-demand-career related degrees.

Re: Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

#79

Post by vorpalhex »

colechristensen wrote: post #51
token_throwaway wrote: post #42

This job sounds shitty but have you ever spoken to someone in a domestic role? A postal employee? A trucker? A janitor at your office building? Kitchen staff at a restaurant who do not even have time to take a piss without dropping the ball, let alone timed pee breaks? Lots of jobs are hard. Extremely hard. And often, jobs that are very very hard pay hardly anything. There is a two-way transaction happening here, tho…

This kind of logic lets you justify any behavior as long as there's a market involved somehow. You're trying to give free agency to people who are very likely choosing between the only job they can find and starvation. That's not a free market, it's wage slavery. Low end employers can do anything they want as long as the alternative for enough of their candidates is starvation.

Should we go back to the days of mandated government work programs? What is your actual recommendation here?

At some point we have to accept that people should be able to make free choices, and will typically make sub-optimal choices. We can increase the burden on employers but then that means less overall jobs - which then leads to that starvation outcome you mention.

Re: Brutal life working in Amazon warehouse

#80

Post by pkaler »

Brutal? Sounds like a regular blue collar job.

I worked as a sparkwatch at a plywood plant in high school. Basically, a welder’s assistant. This is what regular blue collar jobs look like. You work 12 hour shifts. The machinery is hot. There is constant dust in the air. You are on your feet the entire time. It’s 30ºC in the summer. It’s -20ºC in the winter.

People in Sillicon Valley and especially the press are just completely out of touch with how the rest of the world works and live.

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