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U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

reuters.com

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Re: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

#131

Post by greggman2 »

olliej wrote: post #119
breakerbox wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon gets all the attention because it's Amazon. Work a retail job anywhere and you will discover that MILLIONS of retail workers must do similar checks.

Well, Amazon also employs more people than entire industries, and has a long track record of grotesque Labour abuses, so this is just an additional data point for when people ask why amazon is awful

It's still less then a 1/3 as many employees as Walmart

Looks like they had similar issues?

https://www.plbsh.com/jury-awards-walmart-employees-6-millio...

Re: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

#132

Post by Buge »

mikelyons wrote: post #111
Buge wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how it's that similar. Employees getting a new job is often very difficult, so would create a lot of difficulty for a lot of people. Whereas Amazon raising their prices by a few cents shouldn't be much work.

It's not about the difficulty of raising prices, it's about the impact to the bottom line profit to shareholders when a few cents is extrapolated over a billion transactions.

The percent impact would be negligible, I expect lower than daily fluctuation. Anyway, the law isn't just designed to protect shareholders, it's designed to protect everyone.

If someone can make money by fraud, that money is not justification to allow fraud. The US economy relies on dependable contacts.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

#133

Post by subsaharancoder »

ceejayoz wrote: post #57
breakerbox wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon gets all the attention because it's Amazon. Work a retail job anywhere and you will discover that MILLIONS of retail workers must do similar checks.

1. They should get paid for that time, too. 2. The article says "the screening takes around 25 minutes to complete", which is not typical in retail.

Grossly inaccurate is the best way of describing the screening time, I've done the amazon fulfillment center tour and seen employees check in for different shifts, it does not take 25 minutes to go through the screening process. There's no way Amazon with its efficiency mantra would let this happen knowing how it eventually impacts the bottom line.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

#134

Post by simonh »

fiter wrote: post #106
simonh wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Employees generally choose where they live and which jobs they apply for and where, so this is not a reasonable comparison. They have no choice about these checks.

Early in your reply you say employees have a choice where they apply for jobs, then you say they have no choice on whether to apply for jobs with security measures.

They didn’t, because apparently the time requirement off the clock isn’t clearly communicated up front when they are hired. You can’t make an informed choice if you don’t have the information. This is why employment legislation is so important - otherwise employers can spring extra costs and demands on employees with impunity.

And no, it’s not acceptable to expect them to simply resign. Changing jobs can also incur significant costs on people, which can allow employers to exploit their position of power over employees.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

#135

Post by skywhopper »

breakerbox wrote: post #50
FPGAhacker wrote: post #5

It seems eminently reasonable and obvious that workers should be compensated for performing the Duties of their job while at work or in premises. Clearly submitting to a security check before being allowed to leave work is an obligation they incur as an employee. They should not be able to “clock out” until after such security checks.

Amazon gets all the attention because it's Amazon. Work a retail job anywhere and you will discover that MILLIONS of retail workers must do similar checks.

Sure, but the court case is only going to involve one company. In this case Amazon, which is not surprising, since their policies impact far more workers than almost any other corporation. But the result of the case impacts all the rest.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

#136

Post by jonfw »

mikelyons wrote: post #110
DangitBobby wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damn, yeah, I guess these guys should really be asking their new employer if they'll be subject to wage theft before they get hired.

Or just a̶s̶s̶u̶m̶e̶ be vigilant about it, corporations are amoral profit machines and have no incentive to care about replaceable workers.

I have no incentive to care about the grocery store I frequent, but it is still illegal for me to steal from them and I can expect to be held accountable by the government in the event that I do steal from them.

I'm very libertarian- but at the end of the day I will always support the government authority to punish theft. And a failure to pay employees the agreed upon rate is theft.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

#137

Post by avar »

I'm surprised this hasn't come up before, isn't the US full of e.g. military installations where employees work by the hour and clock in/out, and where there's some gate check going in & out of the installation that might take a non-trivial amount of time? E.g. the CIA & NSA have such gates, and presumably the same goes for a bunch of military and security contractors.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

#138

Post by s1artibartfast »

mfer wrote: post #87
FPGAhacker wrote: post #5

It seems eminently reasonable and obvious that workers should be compensated for performing the Duties of their job while at work or in premises. Clearly submitting to a security check before being allowed to leave work is an obligation they incur as an employee. They should not be able to “clock out” until after such security checks.

Changing this is up to the legislature rather than the courts. In other news, about 18% of Americans approve of congress job while about 81% disapprove of it [1]. [1] https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/congressional... !

Most American approve of THEIR congressmen by wide margins (50%+ for, 35% against, 15% no opinion)

(Scroll down) https://news.gallup.com/poll/1600/congress-public.aspx

Re: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

#139

Post by greggman2 »

So according to this, as of April 2019, Walmart got in trouble in California for security screening in the sense that it was manditory and they were not paying for it. California requires breaks for workers and Walmart was effectively making workers use part of their break time to go through security screening.

https://www.plbsh.com/jury-awards-walmart-employees-6-millio...

I suppose that's not exactly the same since it only covers security time eating into break time not, after work time.

Re: U.S. Supreme Court rejects Amazon warehouse worker wage appeal

#140

Post by fiter »

simonh wrote: post #134
fiter wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Early in your reply you say employees have a choice where they apply for jobs, then you say they have no choice on whether to apply for jobs with security measures.

They didn’t, because apparently the time requirement off the clock isn’t clearly communicated up front when they are hired. You can’t make an informed choice if you don’t have the information. This is why employment legislation is so important - otherwise employers can spring extra costs and demands on employees with impunity. And no, it’s not acceptable to expect them to simply resign. Changing jobs can also incur s…

So the law we are looking for is disclosure. I can agree with that. Do you know if such a law already exists?
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