Live data from Hacker News

Amazon reaches agreement with trade unions in Italy

reuters.com

21–30 of 55 posts

Re: Amazon reaches agreement with trade unions in Italy

#21

Italian here. Don't get your hopes up, Italy is a very peculiar place, there are 11.5 million workers that are members of one of the tree major trade unions, not counting smaller ones, it's half of the total work force. Nothing moves in Italy without an agreement with trade unions when a company the size of Amazon starts hiring en masse. That's both good and bad, but generally more good than bad.

Italian as well.

I'm generally pro-union and I see nothing wrong with this deal. Our particular implementation of unions though is dreadful and disgusting. Full of politicians or wannabe politicians, they'll gladly defend the indefensible to raise their membership numbers. They are for all practical purposes political parties, not unions, and they regularly come out with nonsensical takes about everything.

It's good most of the workforce is unionized, but I have nothing but contempt for how they're run.

Re: Amazon reaches agreement with trade unions in Italy

#22
post #18
post #13

In Germany they are in full throttle marketing campaign how cool it is to work for them. The anti-Union attemps over here made no friends. It is all over the place, TV ads, subway, bus stops...

We've had a similar media blitz in the UK, luckily we dealt with most our unions in the 80s. Despite getting an email from Amazon about twice a week i could never see myself working there.

why luckily?

Re: Amazon reaches agreement with trade unions in Italy

#24

Italian here. Don't get your hopes up, Italy is a very peculiar place, there are 11.5 million workers that are members of one of the tree major trade unions, not counting smaller ones, it's half of the total work force. Nothing moves in Italy without an agreement with trade unions when a company the size of Amazon starts hiring en masse. That's both good and bad, but generally more good than bad.

11,5 million people are members of the major trade unions, but roughly half of them are not workers anymore, they are retired

Re: Amazon reaches agreement with trade unions in Italy

#26
Surprized to see the Amazon flag fluttering beside the EU and Italy flags in the photo. Many countries require the National Flag to be given special respect, and must be flown above other flags.

I'm surprised to see the Amazon flag in the first place. Gives a corporate-state vibe, rather than an "e-commerce warehouse" vibe.

Re: Amazon reaches agreement with trade unions in Italy

#27

Surprized to see the Amazon flag fluttering beside the EU and Italy flags in the photo. Many countries require the National Flag to be given special respect, and must be flown above other flags. I'm surprised to see the Amazon flag in the first place. Gives a corporate-state vibe, rather than an "e-commerce warehouse" vibe.

It matches the official Italian protocol for flag display. Nothing wrong.

When both the Italian and EU flags are displayed, the protocol requires them to be flown at the same height, "as equals". Many places also fly a third flag, representing city colors, regional flag, university emblem, etc.

For example: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/26/Palazzo_...

(the yellow/red flag in the corner is the flag of the city of Rome)

Re: Amazon reaches agreement with trade unions in Italy

#28

Surprized to see the Amazon flag fluttering beside the EU and Italy flags in the photo. Many countries require the National Flag to be given special respect, and must be flown above other flags. I'm surprised to see the Amazon flag in the first place. Gives a corporate-state vibe, rather than an "e-commerce warehouse" vibe.

Many countries require other flags to be at the same height and size as the national flag, some specifying placement of the national flag in relation to others.

Re: Amazon reaches agreement with trade unions in Italy

#29
post #18
post #13

In Germany they are in full throttle marketing campaign how cool it is to work for them. The anti-Union attemps over here made no friends. It is all over the place, TV ads, subway, bus stops...

We've had a similar media blitz in the UK, luckily we dealt with most our unions in the 80s. Despite getting an email from Amazon about twice a week i could never see myself working there.

Agreed. I don't want any union to represent my interests or interfere with my relation with businesses.

Trade unions constrain employment and add inefficient procedures in the workplace.

I will always avoid any industry/country dominated by unions. And that's how I moved from Spain to UK.

Post reply on HN