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Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

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Re: Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

#261

Post by edmundsauto »

moate wrote: post #241
lawnchair_larry wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you ever talked to a single Republican? You’re way off base, especially with the race baiting.

What do you view the Republican platform as being? What specifically is he wrong about?

OP is wrong about unrestricted access to all weapons. And not all Republicans are anti-abortion, although that is a big part of their platform due to the control it gives over evangelicals. (That is to say, I think if there is a schism, the more centric version of the party would not be anti-abortion.)

Also, white nationalism is only embraced by a small percentage of the party. It's not really part of their platform, it's just what the loudest shouters in the party want.

(Disclaimer: I do not identify as repbulican, but if this is your best faith effort to define their platform, you lack empathy for them which means you'll never understand even their lucid ideas. Granted, many of their ideas are vague and not lucid.)

Re: Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

#262

Post by Aunche »

dragonwriter wrote: post #201
Aunche wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any negotiated increase in salary or pensions should require a vote unless if there is a budget surplus. Municipalities are incurring way too much debt without taxpayer knowledge, let alone approval. Government workers already have a lot of job security, so I don't think unions should be allowed to affect that. I do think that public servants have a right to negotiate safety and other technical issues without public…

> Any negotiated increase in salary or pensions should require a vote unless if there is a budget surplus. Generally, they do require a vote of the appropriate governing body, with all the associated public information and opportunity for input that goes along with that. > Municipalities are incurring way too much debt without taxpayer knowledge If true, its because taxpayers don’t actually care. Because if they did,…

> If true, its because taxpayers don’t actually care.

They do care when they're forced to pay extra taxes to cover interest. Your average voter doesn't have time to audit their city's finances. Both the unions and public officials knew that public would not agree to tax hikes, so they decided to go with unfunded pensions instead. Even though it's technically transparent, they're still abusing an information asymmetry, much like pyramid schemes.

Re: Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

#263

Post by edmundsauto »

maxerickson wrote: post #67
oarabbus_ wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're right, but they have ways to do it. They'd simply shut down the plant in it's entirety, and open another warehouse far away. They can dress it up as "operational inefficiencies" or "poor location for shipping" etc. The fact the workers were going to unionize? Oh, just a coincidence! We were already planning to shut down our Alabama location anyway.

I would expect that tactic to still require that they give the workers at the facility shutting down similar opportunities to what they have given other employees in the past in similar situations.

It's a pretty easy loophole: offer workers their jobs at a different location with no relocation benefits. Most warehouse workers aren't going to take them up on it.

Re: Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

#264

Post by edmundsauto »

Sodman wrote: post #214
stefan_ wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well that's a convoluted mess. Here is the game plan on the other side of the bargaining table: - Conspire with others to not pay top talent market rate and not poach employees - The end.

This particular scandal involved FANG companies... While obviously bad for employees, I don't think "we don't get paid enough" is a primary complaint amongst the FANG workers currently trying to unionize. Outside of FANG, poaching and competing on salary are common, at least in the startup space.

After the lawsuit, within FAANG, they poach and compete on salary. Take a look at levels.fyi and compare to startup salary bands.

Re: Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

#265

Post by yourapostasy »

asdff wrote: post #150
pmoriarty wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is when anecdotes about isolated abuses are used to reject unions outright rather than looking at whether unions as a whole would benefit society. You could argue from personal experience that you went to a bad school therefore all schools are bad, or you had a bad experience with therefore all people of that sort are bad. It's just not very convincing.

For every anecdote of an isolated case of union abuse, there are probably hundreds of unheard cases of corporations abusing their workers. But that doesn't matter for most people, simplistic logic says therefore all unions are bad and capable of corruption, and ignoring that most of the time, the status quo is far, far more exploitative for the average worker. Once again, perfect becomes the enemy of good, and condit…

It is a matter of incentives.

To substantiate and engage PR over abuse of workers by a corporation, the livelihood of individual workers who give witness to the allegations are at stake.

To substantiate and engage PR over abuse of the public weal, customers or the corporation by a union, usually no one's livelihood is threatened by giving witness.

It isn't surprising abuses by unions are easier to publicize and and more commonly substantiated. This dynamic will not change until workers have the equivalent of FU money. Or like in one sci-fi story I read, a genetic mutation causes everyone to fix chlorophyll in their pigmentation and get all their minimum bodily energy requirements by standing around in the sun for a few hours each day, and have to be convinced to work. I suspect a more near-term, practical direction is some solution along the lines of an intentional community co-op.

Re: Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

#266

Post by coffeemaniac »

stretchcat wrote: post #230
quandrum wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wage theft is the most common crime in the US, is estimated to occur to ~20% of all employees and equal tens of billions a year, and no one talks about it. How many union members do you think experience wage theft?

The US Department of Labor takes wage theft very seriously. If you report it to them, at no cost to yourself, they will investigate it and almost certainly scare your boss shitless so he'll never try it again. Probably they could do a better job of advertising this to workers. Many workers experiencing wage theft probably are not aware of their options, and that's a problem. But when used, it works. I've seen it work…

I've seen this go both ways, it's certainly effective when it does work, but it's sluggish and often won't provide the relief needed by workers in any acceptable time frame.

Re: Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

#267

Post by [deleted] »

asdff wrote: post #162
slg wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't surprising once you reframe the issue. These unions are successfully suppressed for the exact same reason that people are inclined to form them. The labor class in the US simply doesn't have (or perhaps more accurately doesn't yield) the political power that the labor class does in many other countries. The forming of unions will help them get more power, but the act of creating a union already requires a ce…

That is by design, really. The working poor in this country have been ideologically divided by moral wedges such as abortion for decades now. Few poor republicans and poor democrats would like to admit that they are in the same economic boat, and as a result typically the former votes against their own economic interest on the grounds of their moral principles. For the wealthy in this country, the political footballi…

[deleted]

Re: Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

#268

Post by joshe »

maximente wrote: post #239
joshe wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

American unions are quite different from European unions. European unions spend a lot of time running apprenticeship programs and doing things like advocating for more productivity. Like trying to figure out how to make the shop floor more efficient. American unions spend time preventing bad employees from being fired (like the NY teacher's rubber rooms and police unions fighting the firing of cops with 5 excessive f…

i mean, yeah, is it really a surprise? most of the purpose (in terms of "the purpose of a thing is what it does" thinking) of organized labor in the US is basically countering ridiculous labor conditions: child labor, not having weekends, etc. when that didn't work, in came the police and the pinkertons (read: violence by the state on behalf of capital, or just violence via capital itself). so it's no surprise that t…

1965 was 56 years ago. Unions need to be relevant for 2021.

Re: Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

#269

Post by LatteLazy »

txsoftwaredev wrote: post #200
LatteLazy wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Obamacare got a lot of workers at places like amazon warehouses healthcare. Cancelling student debt will help a shit tonne more workers. He has a section on his campaign website addressing Union specifics: https://joebiden.com/empowerworkers/ Well see what he can actually does, but with the senate in democrat hands, the sky is the limit.

"Cancelling student debt will help a shit tonne more workers." I will feel terrible if that ever happens for folks that were smart with money and didn't incur tons of debt. It's gonna be a real bummer when you learn that you paid off your educational debt or never had any and that now you get to pay off debt of others that made bad decisions.

You're describing me.

I agree emotionally. But that's life, if you actually believe in education you can only really pay if forwards...

Re: Amazon Warehouse Workers to Decide Whether to Form Company's First U.S. Union

#270

Post by [deleted] »

willcipriano wrote: post #99
rjstreur wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a long history here. The American labor movement secured a lot of those protections in the early and mid-20th century, and they were strong for several decades. It was a hard, violent fight. People died at strikes for those protections. As we entered the 80's and 90's with the rise of Reaganism and then neoliberalism, however, US businesses as well as the federal and state governments started chipping away at…

> It was a hard, violent fight. People died at strikes for those protections. Just a personal anecdote, my biological grandfathers trunk was firebombed by the Philly Roofers Union (UURWAW) due to a dispute with them. The K&A gang in that area is well known to be tied into the union[0] and was known to fairly regularly engage in violence like that to prevent "scabs". My point being, the violence was omni-directional a…

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