Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks • Hacker News Board

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#281

Post by epicureanideal » Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:21 PM UTC

RockyMcNuts wrote: post #277

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #47

My fear is that the future of work for most people is not unemployment, but shitty jobs like this. My feeling is that in order to avoid this and prosper, the people need to own the robots that do all the work (Marxism heyy). If robots provide huge productivity gains, then they will provide those gains for their owners. If it’s the big corporations that own them, they will see the gains. But as long as people are trea…

Subsistence farming and coal mining were shitty jobs too. Most jobs have always been shitty, this is less shitty than most and pays somewhat better (I believe Amazon is harder work than Walmart but pays more). And you can't find Americans to work in the fields, mines, slaughterhouses anymore. If it was really shitty the US would get foreigners to do it. So much of the stuff Amazon ships is made overseas we almost mig…

Automatic default reply whenever I see "can't find Americans to work..."...

...at the rate of pay offered.

Speaking as a software engineer, if you offered me double my salary and secure employment for a couple years to work in a field or mine, I'd do it. Test me. Make me an offer. Slaughterhouses I don't know if I could do, but I'll bet plenty of people would for my current salary or less.

About a decade and a half ago I probably would've done the same for maybe $50/hr.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#282

Post by kajumix » Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:22 PM UTC

kelukelugames wrote: post #7

notheguyouthink wrote: post #2

Are Amazon's margins razor thin? I'm trying to understand what compels them to be so toxic in their work environment. Especially compared to the people I know who work at Costco, I struggle to understand why Costco treats employees so well, and Amazon treats their employees so poorly. It's really sad, regardless.

Bezos. Jeff Bezos is the reason why Amazon treats workers they way they do. Compared to other tech giants, Amazon is incredibly anti-employee. Look at how their stocks vest. I worked at Microsoft during Balmer's reign. The founder/CEO's attitude dictates the work culture. And causes harm if it's bad. I live in Seattle and often hear this joke: Being an Amazon customer is the best. An investor is great. An employee no…

Judging from some of the comments here, software engineers working in Amazon must either be stupid or irrational to continue working there, given the market for software engineers. Amazon is a highly successful company with significant anticipate growth still to come. All that success doesn't come without talent. So maybe not stupid, maybe just irrational? Tech companies in general, and Amazon in particular, are highly data driven and people are constantly challenged to make design choices and decisions based on data--they are being constantly asked for hard evidence on why a certain choice is better than another. In a way they are optimizing for rational people in their recruitment. Could it be that they are more rational than average? Could it be that they are qualified to look at their work experience and weigh it against the compensation, and make the choice to instead go work for Microsoft, or one of the many tech companies around the Seattle area? Maybe they are all just masochists?

(Disclosure: I am a software engineer in AWS, and I love my job. Sorry, can't speak for non-tech jobs. Opinions are my own.)

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#283

Post by balls187 » Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:22 PM UTC

amyjess wrote: post #193

I have a friend who used to work at a fulfillment center. In December, she took a week of medical leave. Last month, they retroactively denied her leave and then fired her for having a negative UPT balance. She'd worked there for years. It's an awful, abusive company, and even though Trump's reasons for going after Amazon are the wrong reasons, I hope he successfully gets them shut down anyway.

She wasn't covered by FMLA?

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#284

Post by sol_remmy » Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:22 PM UTC

dv_dt wrote: post #112

sremani wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Retail in general is thin-margin. That is why you see Amazon try out all sorts of things from cloud to videos, because their core is so thin margin, that any non-core looks more like an opportunity rather than spreading out resources, say in contrast to a Google or Facebook, who have solid cores high margins.

But their pricing hasn't been best-possible for a while now. I've been more and more frequently finding better prices through other venues.

That's because big box retailers are shipping at a loss: i ordered something from Home Depot that was $10 and got free shipping, 3-4 days too. For the same cost as the in-store item. No way is that profitable for them

They're all okay losing money in the short temp to capture online consumers

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#285

Post by knieveltech » Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:23 PM UTC

GuB-42 wrote: post #271

temp-dude-87844 wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, Marx and Engels did accurately identify that a large reserve of under-employed workers, or people who didn't previously participate in the labor force, is what enables the most exploitative jobs. All necessities in life cost money: food, housing, childcare, healthcare; and those in the most precarious social positions are the people most willing to accept abusive employment for reasons directly tied to their su…

I don't think it is completely true. In shitty countries, most people have a "job" working for the local dictator. They are exploited by force. It works because most work is just manual labor, they don't need highly skilled, well educated workers. It is not the case in developed countries. For example, we don't increase food production by just adding more farmers with hand tools. We have mechanical engineers making m…

Please explain this "need" for exploitative jobs. Edit: No, I'm serious, I want someone to supply an internally consistent rationale that explains why corporations or society in general requires someone getting fucked over to function.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#286

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:23 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #180

piracykills wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think so, reading real statistics on this kind of thing instead of alarmist and politically slanted headlines paints a very different picture of how the world is doing. https://ourworldindata.org/extreme-poverty

As global average quality of life trends upward, the American lower and middle class are dying quietly in the streets. https://www.drugabuse.gov/related-topics/trends-statistics/o... https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/12/21/5720803...

[deleted]

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#287

Post by pascalxus » Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:23 PM UTC

baby wrote: post #105

noonespecial wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But I do already own some of the robots. I have Amazon stock in my 401k. That's what "the people owning the robots" looks like. What you're getting at is that there are many people right now who are too poor (and are going to be too poor) to ever own any part of the robots. This century's great debate is forming up to be whether or not we should give them some anyway even though they can't "earn" it for whatever movi…

In a few centuries students in history classes will look back and try to understand why we let our people die in the streets.

SF spends 240 million dollars every year to help the homeless. That's more than most city's entire budget. The reason that money doesn't help anyone is because it won't go very far in a city where housing costs 2000$ per square foot. And it really doesn't need to be like this at all. It's an entirely man made disaster of colossal proportions.

There's plenty of blame to go around. You can thank all the NIMBYs and countless housing regulations that prevent cost effective shelter from being created.

It's within our technological power to create housing for a tiny fraction of what it costs today in SF: just look at the tiny house movement. Just imagine how much cheaper it would be if something like that was built but stackable. Housing, A potentially multi-trillion dollar industry, completely unassailable, very few companies or investors are investing in this, all thanks to: Regulation.

Regulations and land use policy hamstring developers, increasing costs endlessly. Instead of working against them, we should be working with them to streamline and reduce their costs and finding ways to create more competition between them, to ensure that people get the very lowest prices. It can be done. Places like Dallas are growing every bit as quickly as SF/bay area and can still create housing for 100$/sq foot. I suspect even lower prices are possible with the removal of regulation: which would finally allow humanity to innovate in this area, rather than creating yet more cat video apps.

This harmful idea that real estate is something that should go up and up forever is wrong: morally and economically. In a world that is progressing, things should be getting cheaper, even real-estate.

Right now, your options in SF are a 200$ tent under a bridge or a 2 million dollar condo. There, really ought to be more options between those two extremes.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#288

Post by laythea » Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:25 PM UTC

Hang on a second. Isn't the magical quality about life, is its ability to adapt?

If the world is becoming full of this kind of job, we need as individuals to reject it, and adapt to other forms of income. Off course, if you let the corporations treat us like this, they will.

And they are not at fault. It is us at fault for accepting it. We must not accept these forms of income. Easier said than done, I know. But, who said it was easy? Its like being in an abusive relationship. If you accept it, it will continue!

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#289

Post by CJefferson » Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:25 PM UTC

gimmeDatCheddar wrote: post #249

ihm wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Around 80% of stock is owned by the top 10% wealthiest individuals[1]. More recent work[2] puts the percentage even higher. You might own some of the robots but most people don't. [1]: https://appam.confex.com/appam/2012/webprogram/ExtendedAbstr... [2]: http://time.com/money/5054009/stock-ownership-10-percent-ric...

But you know what most people DO own? Unnecessary consumer debt that stunts their ability to save and invest. When the average car payment in America is around $500 a month, it's clear evidence that people have a spending problem rather than an income problem. Here's an idea: Teach people not to finance $500 worth of car each month (plus gas, plus insurance, plus maintenance, plus healthcare costs) and suddenly peopl…

You've replied to multiple posts about these poor people with $500 month car financing. Prove it. And show what they should be doing instead.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#290

Post by philwelch » Mon, Apr 16, 2018, 5:25 PM UTC

eeZah7Ux wrote: post #261

philwelch wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to think it was some sort of nationalism, but I think it's mostly because making sure all Americans are treated well is a much more tractable problem than worrying about the welfare of literally everyone in the world. It is conceivably possible for every American to have adequate food, housing, and medical care, to work in safe and humane conditions, and so forth. Even that seems crazy and utopian to some, but…

> It is conceivably possible for every American to have adequate food, housing, and medical care, to work in safe and humane conditions, and so forth. It is conceivably possible for every human - given the current available resources.

But a much larger project, especially if you’re constrained by the standard liberal sensibilities of the 21st century.