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Amazon Is Creating Company Towns Across the United States

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Re: Amazon Is Creating Company Towns Across the United States

#61

Post by CryptoPunk »

beckman466 wrote: post #35
aga98mtl wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, I was hoping Amazon was actually making housing for its workers. I think high density housing within walking distance of your job is the realistic solution for lowering co2 emissions.

> I was hoping Amazon was actually making housing for its workers. In the movie 'Sorry To Bother You' by Boots Riley, they have an Amazon-like entity called 'WorryFree' that does exactly this. I'm not sure we actually want this (Amazon or other big employers making housing for laborers they employ), especially since these workers are often not labor aristocrats, and therefore will have little bargaining power.

>>I'm not sure we actually want this (Amazon or others making housing for their workers), especially since these workers are often not labor aristocrats, and therefore will have little bargaining power.

Even in the 19th century, workers had a significant amount of bargaining power, and company towns were in fact an attempt to improve working conditions, in light of workers' sensitivity to high prices.

Without things like company stores and company housing, what was found to happen is that an independent store owner or housing provider would take advantage of their monopoly status, and raise prices, leading to workers quitting. So just like oil rigs have their own company restaurant on-site, isolated 19th century worksites had their own company businesses on-site to ensure their workers had competitively priced goods available to them.

Companies did this at the time because workers in the 19th century were aware of the comparative wages/living-standards on offer, and had enough mobility to leave sites that didn't offer the best available in the market at that time. Compared to the late 19th century, workers today have enormous mobility, and ready internet-based knowledge of market options, so what would happen if company towns emerged today would not be exploitive.

Re: Amazon Is Creating Company Towns Across the United States

#62

Post by aww_dang »

beckman466 wrote: post #53
aww_dang wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if we were to accept class theory, in the 21st century nearly everyone has access to a computer, one of the most productive goods. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27903630

> Even if we were to accept class theory, in the 21st century nearly everyone has access to a computer, one of the most productive goods. You sure that's all that's needed? I am continually surprised when someone claims the internet is some all-mighty resource-rich network. It wasn't the internet that made world class scientists, it was access to privileged firewalled networks: capitalist universities, as well as sta…

I can agree with that sentiment up to a point. We're still better off now than before. Information is more generally available. If you want to publish online or create software, nearly every resource is available. The Internet is its own paradigm of value.

There are still specialized fields guarded by academic gatekeepers. However even there, knowledge is more widely available than before.

Hypothetically speaking, if a researcher progressed to a high level in a traditionally academic field, the term "world class scientist" is a bit loaded. The rank of "world class" would most likely be determined by academic or other large institutions. If he acquired the knowledge without the receipts from an institution, he could easily be excluded. Therefore the gatekeeping to achieve this status is not strictly one of knowledge acquisition. It becomes a bit self-referential.

>That story about the Nepali is not empirical data. It's an anecdotal story that keeps the working class distracted, and stops them from seeing how the system...

I disagree strongly. It is that kind of can't do attitude that stops people from even starting.

"How can I ever succeed, when the deck is stacked against me? The world is unfair, therefore I shouldn't even bother to try. Better to go back to wage based employment. I blame the system!"

If that's the view you take, you'll never manifest success outside of the institutional paradigms you observe. No, the world isn't fair. The world has never been fair. Some will always have an advantage. That doesn't mean that Internet doesn't provide amazing opportunities for those who are willing. If you want different results, it stands to reason that you'll have to do something different. It is possible to escape day to day drudgery if you are willing, motivated and prepared to fail repeatedly.

Re: Amazon Is Creating Company Towns Across the United States

#63

Post by dalbasal »

I suppose we'll see how this play out but... I think there are some serious chasms between 19th century manufacturing's take on mass employment and the tech industries'.

Henry Ford's ideal for manufacturing workers was long term employment, high commitment. The modern tech industry's ideal for logistical work is a fluid, low commitment workforces, with "gig economy" at the extreme end. I don't think amazon want to arrive at a place where the average employee has been working in the warehouse for a decade.

Re: Amazon Is Creating Company Towns Across the United States

#64

Post by unishark »

rswail wrote: post #38
emteycz wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what? The EU and other similar institutions require their branding to be present in classes too. I'd rather have obviously absurd corporate branding than slow but sure political indoctrination (e.g. the EU makes it look like the local government is incapable of doing anything on its own, while the fact is that everything worked pretty well before the EU and even today 90%+ of funding is local - but the EU flag mus…

The issue here is that the school is teaching not general knowledge, but knowledge that is only useful in the Amazon context. It's a "company town" mentality. Amazon needs the workers, so it makes sure that the workers need it. That's completely different to EU/Government funding. That's a debate between two levels of government about who gets the political benefit of the funding. However, by definition, publicly fun…

> The issue here is that the school is teaching not general knowledge, but knowledge that is only useful in the Amazon context.

The public high school in California? They might add some extra stuff to spend that (whopping) $50k from Amazon, but it seems hard to believe that the state will allow a high school to just ditch the education code requirements. Especially a public school.

Re: Amazon Is Creating Company Towns Across the United States

#65

Post by emteycz »

gambiting wrote: post #29
emteycz wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what? The EU and other similar institutions require their branding to be present in classes too. I'd rather have obviously absurd corporate branding than slow but sure political indoctrination (e.g. the EU makes it look like the local government is incapable of doing anything on its own, while the fact is that everything worked pretty well before the EU and even today 90%+ of funding is local - but the EU flag mus…

>>while the fact is that everything worked pretty well before the EU I don't know where you're from, but as a Pole I do not share this sentiment at all. Seeing the EU flag displayed everywhere makes me proud to be an EU citizen and it's a great thing to see.

If I was from Poland, I'd feel the same. Here in Czechia, it is a lie - this country worked well on its own. Membership in EU is great, but acting like there wouldn't be schools and public parks without EU is not.

Re: Amazon Is Creating Company Towns Across the United States

#67

Post by sudosysgen »

aww_dang wrote: post #41
beckman466 wrote: post #20

> the warehouse worker is neither seen nor heard by the customer; at least at Walmart, you go to a store and you see the workers — you know they exist. This made me think of the movie 'The Island' where in one scene, somewhere in the beginning of the movie, they show us the work our protagonists do in their community. There are tubes coming out of the wall on one side of the room and out the other; tubes which have a…

Even if we were to accept class theory, in the 21st century nearly everyone has access to a computer, one of the most productive goods. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27903630

This would normally have been true. Sadly we've invented intellectual property to commoditize knowledge, making computers much less productive unless you have intellectual capital (IP, etc...)

Beyond that, without structural change, it won't help you to become a programmer unless most people can't become a programmer.

Re: Amazon Is Creating Company Towns Across the United States

#69

Post by throw474747 »

emteycz wrote: post #22
eganist wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The article seems to contain nothing that would qualify for the words "Company Town". It appears to boil down "look amazon is big, surely it means that it must be evil!". I guess this is the difference between a literal v. figurative interpretation of the title. The article itself is speaking to Amazon's efforts to sustain its hiring pipeline in the face of colossal churn, describing activities such as sponsoring s…

So what? The EU and other similar institutions require their branding to be present in classes too. I'd rather have obviously absurd corporate branding than slow but sure political indoctrination (e.g. the EU makes it look like the local government is incapable of doing anything on its own, while the fact is that everything worked pretty well before the EU and even today 90%+ of funding is local - but the EU flag mus…

Having been in multiple educational institutions in different EU countries I have never seen this anywhere.

Did you perhaps confuse this with the common signs indicating that the EU funded that particular project/institution?

Re: Amazon Is Creating Company Towns Across the United States

#70

Post by tester756 »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #54
vortico wrote: post #27

>$15 an hour, Amazon’s starting wage, is below the average for the warehousing industry Where are they getting this information? The average wage in the US is lower, like $13-14. https://www.indeed.com/career/warehouse-worker/salaries https://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Warehouse_Worker/Ho...

I have a long-time friend who tried to get an Amazon Warehouse job after relocating to a new city for his SO’s career. Given all of the negative press he assumed they’d be desperate for employees and he could walk right into the job. It turns out those jobs are highly competitive in the area because they paid relatively well and had good benefits. The hourly rate alone doesn’t tell the full story. Many more typical w…

who would've thought that vocal minority on twitter does not reflect reality for all, cuz at the end of the day Amazon hires above milion ppl

So, just to add another opinion

I've seen only positive comments (sample size around 3) about working in Amazon's warehouse in Poland

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