What Amazon Does to Poor Cities • Hacker News Board

Re: What Amazon Does to Poor Cities

#41

Post by tzs » Fri, Feb 02, 2018, 5:21 PM UTC

About another company's warehouse:

> Wages start at $26 an hour, but many workers make a lot more than that because Stater Brothers operates an incentive program in which people who grab orders—doing similar tasks to workers at Amazon—are rewarded if they go faster than the average speed.

I wonder if it would be possible for a group of workers to pay another group of workers to slow down, thus lowering the average speed so that the first group ends up in the rewards group without having to raise their speed?

Re: What Amazon Does to Poor Cities

#42

Post by crpatino » Fri, Feb 02, 2018, 5:21 PM UTC

AlexandrB wrote: post #11

It frequently seems to be the case that when tech companies interact with unskilled labor, the unskilled labor gets a worse deal than they would before the tech economy. See Uber, Amazon, Blue Apron, and many others. In me this inspires a high-level of cynicism. Now when I hear a startup wanting to "change the world" I'm always curious whose underpaid labor is going to subsidize that change. Underneath all the Silico…

Right. When we set out to "change the world", we rarely stop and think whose world we'd be changing.

Re: What Amazon Does to Poor Cities

#43

Post by InclinedPlane » Fri, Feb 02, 2018, 5:21 PM UTC

garybro wrote: post #23

A common theme I see with these articles is how "grueling" the work is. People need some perspective on what grueling work is. I worked at a UPS hub during college, where I'd load, unload, and sort the contents of trailers. What they do seems pretty easy compared to what I did at UPS. Picking and packing orders is a lot less grueling than unloading trailers full of 60 pound paper boxes, or loading hundreds of package…

I don't think it's the physical labor that is most complained about, it's the tyranny of the system. It seems like you're treated like a cog. The fact that many people quit after not very long is a strong indication of the poor work conditions.

Re: What Amazon Does to Poor Cities

#44

Post by dj-wonk » Fri, Feb 02, 2018, 5:22 PM UTC

lotsofpulp wrote: post #5

refurb wrote: post #4

Sure, Amazon fulfillment center jobs might not be high-paying, middle class jobs, but what's the alternative for these areas? High unemployment and stagnation?

I almost consider it clickbait. The writer even states that there's no other option than Amazon in these regions, and obviously the lack of other employers offering more simply means that the real problem is lack of demand for the types of work that the people in these communities can demand a living wage for.

A serious issue lacking a clear solution does not clickbait make. (There are plenty of other pieces of content that deserve the clickbait title.)

Re: What Amazon Does to Poor Cities

#45

Post by crdoconnor » Fri, Feb 02, 2018, 5:23 PM UTC

_rpd wrote: post #33

dj-wonk wrote: post #7

Yes, intensively competitive companies like Amazon sometimes press workers hard. Without endorsing nor assigning blame to the company (which faces pressures from globalization and shareholders), there are many potential approaches to the problems: 1. Amazon could build a brand around treating workers better (UPS has at times had this reputation) and thus differentiate themselves and justify the cost of better pay and…

Amazon is already working to fully automate these warehouses. Actions that increase the cost of labor will simply accelerate this process.

Actions that increase the cost of labor will take big chunks out of their profit margins.

Amazon will respond to this threat by telling agitated investors to calm down because they have a plan to automate every human out of existence by the year 2025.

Unsophisticated investors are appeased by the tasty kool aid.

Sometimes the general public will drink it too and react with downvotes thrown at the people hinting that the emperor might not be wearing any clothes.

Re: What Amazon Does to Poor Cities

#46

Post by amarkov » Fri, Feb 02, 2018, 5:24 PM UTC

AlexandrB wrote: post #11

It frequently seems to be the case that when tech companies interact with unskilled labor, the unskilled labor gets a worse deal than they would before the tech economy. See Uber, Amazon, Blue Apron, and many others. In me this inspires a high-level of cynicism. Now when I hear a startup wanting to "change the world" I'm always curious whose underpaid labor is going to subsidize that change. Underneath all the Silico…

Does Amazon offer a significantly worse deal to its warehouse staff than Walmart? My impression is that it doesn't, so I don't think this is a problem with tech companies specifically.

Re: What Amazon Does to Poor Cities

#47

Post by lerie82 » Fri, Feb 02, 2018, 5:25 PM UTC

San Bernadino is not a poor city.

Re: What Amazon Does to Poor Cities

#48

Post by dv_dt » Fri, Feb 02, 2018, 5:25 PM UTC

garybro wrote: post #23

A common theme I see with these articles is how "grueling" the work is. People need some perspective on what grueling work is. I worked at a UPS hub during college, where I'd load, unload, and sort the contents of trailers. What they do seems pretty easy compared to what I did at UPS. Picking and packing orders is a lot less grueling than unloading trailers full of 60 pound paper boxes, or loading hundreds of package…

> But it's better than no job at all.

I think questioning this idea is the whole point of the article. It's a job, but does the job pay enough to improve the lot of the individual worker? Maybe that isn't fully obvious to the worker because they're worried about no job at all, but if the city of the business and residence of the workers isn't collectively benefiting, then maybe that's a hint that low-skill jobs don't pay enough. (Or are on a questionable edge).

Finally, if a business sets up with a portion of its employees earning subsistence wage, it's competition to other businesses which are more willing to pay better wages. These conditions are a potential drag on the progress of civilization if that's the case.

Re: What Amazon Does to Poor Cities

#49

Post by _rpd » Fri, Feb 02, 2018, 5:25 PM UTC

wehadfun wrote: post #21

I think the best people for jobs like this are those that just want supplemental income. Teenagers, College Kids, Part-time or temp workers.

I think it is pretty clear that we should automate box packing as soon as possible. It is a waste of human talent to have people doing this.

Re: What Amazon Does to Poor Cities

#50

Post by deadmetheny » Fri, Feb 02, 2018, 5:26 PM UTC

AlexandrB wrote: post #11

It frequently seems to be the case that when tech companies interact with unskilled labor, the unskilled labor gets a worse deal than they would before the tech economy. See Uber, Amazon, Blue Apron, and many others. In me this inspires a high-level of cynicism. Now when I hear a startup wanting to "change the world" I'm always curious whose underpaid labor is going to subsidize that change. Underneath all the Silico…

This is exactly why the technocratti are not to be trusted with what have traditionally been 'bootstrapped businesses' (aka a normal small business). It's not an unreasonable thing to burn some random VC's cash with a team of coders working on apps, but stretching that money when you actually have to hire people to do real work that your product depends on is harder, and then once you've settled on hiring people for peanuts, why would you change it? Shareholders won't stand for it, after all.