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Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

npr.org

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Re: Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

#81

Post by kayodelycaon »

dalbasal wrote: post #55
patwolfe wrote: post #18

Really disappointing to see the "Well, what did you expect?" comments already. Just because companies have been trying to prevent organization of their labor for over a century doesn't mean it isn't still messed up now. It's easy to say that it's just the way the world works from your desk, the people who are forced to work in Amazon's warehouses with terrible working conditions don't have that luxury.

For those who identify strongly with unions, union-busting stuff like this is triggering... like "bringing up the war" in a war traumatised nation. I get that. But... 2020 isn't 1920 or even 1980. Fresh eyes might see more clearly. To the advantage of union organisers, mass communication and organisation is a lot easier today. Surveillance is easier too. IDK. Yes, Bezos does not want an amazon union and won't just le…

> Yes, Bezos does not want an amazon union and won't just let it happen without a fight. Same as always.

Which is, if I recalled correctly, illegal.

Re: Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

#82

Post by fennecfoxen »

rmrfrmrf wrote: post #60
kayson wrote: post #19

I'm all for the Amazon hate train but this is pretty weak. The journalist first says Pinkerton was hired in Poland to investigate irregularities in their application process. Amazon says they only hire Pinkerton to "secure shipments". The "acquired document" says that Amazon tracks social media information about labor organization and strokes. It's all over the place, and even assuming all parties report the truth, n…

From the article: > We need to note that Amazon is an NPR funder. The original Motherboard article [0] is extensive. The NPR version is deliberately incoherent. [0] https://www.vice.com/en/article/5dp3yn/amazon-leaked-reports...

Who needs to be coherent or honest when you can thrill your listeners by smearing some company you both already hate? Things like honesty and integrity are wicked when they fail to serve the cause; this is a time for deliberate obfuscation!

— npr, probably

Geez, guys. There's so many good reasons to go after Amazon; you'd think one of them would be enough, but nooooo.

Re: Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

#83

Post by josefx »

Grimm1 wrote: post #11

"Pinkerton operatives were inserted into an Amazon warehouse in Wroclaw, Poland, to investigate an allegation that warehouse workers were circumventing sort of the application process for applying to warehouse jobs" How does this match the title of the piece. Then, "So I imagine that in the U.S., they're tracking labor organizing activity but not union members yet." So they have no proof and this is all speculation.…

> How does this match the title of the piece.

Read again:

> > It involves collecting data, it seems, from Facebook groups, from social media. In some cases in the case of the Pinkertons, there is a line in one of the documents that we've obtained that says that Pinkerton operatives were inserted into a warehouse in Wroclaw, Poland, to gather intelligence on what their warehouse workers were up to.

The Pinkerton case seems to be one case out of several mentioned in the papers and while the stated reason is to sniff out the application process even that is in direct conflict with official statements by Amazon.

> So they have no proof and this is all speculation.

They list a few points they know about right before the line you quoted.

> Another Amazon hit piece, real quality journalism here.

Still a lot better than the copy pasted Amazon press releases after it lost the lawsuit in France. Those were pure fiction with Bezos in the role of the poor abused Emperor Palpatine.

Re: Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

#84

Post by eplanit »

calvinmorrison wrote: post #77
wozer wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In most Western countries, workers have a right to form unions. So yes, companies have to accept it.

Do companies have a right to circulate anti-union material, to have anti-union speakers come to work, etc?

Yes, they do.

Re: Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

#85

Post by HarryHirsch »

neaden wrote: post #71
HarryHirsch wrote: post #6

Why would you expect anything else? Amazon is a logistics company like UPS; if Bezos didn't squeeze every last drop of profit from their employees it wouldn't be world-dominating.

Jeff Bezos has made 90 billion dollars during the pandemic. He does not need to squeeze every drop of profit.

Thing is, he does. Else his wealth would quickly evaporate, and he'd be like the CEOs of Fedex, UPS & suchlike. The fact that most of his wealth is in stocks doesn't help.

Re: Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

#86

Post by Florin_Andrei »

mikestew wrote: post #3

"Pinkerton: for over one-hundred years, the ones to call when you've got a union problem." I mean, that has to be their schtick, right, even if it's unspoken? Because that pretty much sums up what I know about Pinkerton, so I would assume they are happy with that. As for the topic at hand, yeah well, that's what companies do...for over one-hundred years as well.

I honestly thought "Pinkerton agents" was a metaphor. :) Like the way you say "xerox that paper".

Re: Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

#87

Post by hnlmorg »

TheRealSteel wrote: post #39
Angostura wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not even the way that capitalism works. It's the way that unproperly regulated capitalism works

The way that capitalism works is to prevent proper regulation.

[flagged]

Re: Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

#88

Post by CamTin »

dnissley wrote: post #57
patwolfe wrote: post #18

Really disappointing to see the "Well, what did you expect?" comments already. Just because companies have been trying to prevent organization of their labor for over a century doesn't mean it isn't still messed up now. It's easy to say that it's just the way the world works from your desk, the people who are forced to work in Amazon's warehouses with terrible working conditions don't have that luxury.

Where do we draw the line? What tactics are ok for a company to use to combat unions if it doesn't want them? Or should companies just accept and work with any union that forms?

> What tactics are ok for a company to use to combat unions if it doesn't want them?

They don't have a right to combat them at all. Union organizing is literally a human right. Of course ownership doesn't want them -- the feelings of ownership are (supposed to be) irrelevant.

Re: Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

#89

Post by dcgudeman »

patwolfe wrote: post #18

Really disappointing to see the "Well, what did you expect?" comments already. Just because companies have been trying to prevent organization of their labor for over a century doesn't mean it isn't still messed up now. It's easy to say that it's just the way the world works from your desk, the people who are forced to work in Amazon's warehouses with terrible working conditions don't have that luxury.

I have not seen any convincing evidence that Amazon’s warehouses have “terrible working conditions”, do you have a source that might change my opinion?

Re: Amazon reportedly has Pinkerton agents surveil workers who try to form unions

#90

Post by iso1631 »

hpoe wrote: post #76
arichard123 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People are getting payed $16 that is incredible for an unskilled labor position. That's one view, but it's only informed by "the way things are". Another view is based on the way things should be, that no one should have to work for less than the wage it takes to live a reasonable life. https://livingwage.mit.edu/ offers values for this. I don't see why someone should work full time and still end up poor.

And I disagree that everyone should get paid a loving wage. Let's take 2 identical twins Juan and Jamal (because if you've seen Juan you've seen Jamal). In school Jamal works hard, studies, and puts his efforts first. Juan on the other hand decides football is the way to go and along with that partying, drinking and at one point gets a gal pregnant. They graduate Jamal gets several scholarships and goes to school whi…

Nobody is saying that Jamal should not be paid more, they're just saying the floor should be enough to live.
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