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SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

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231–240 of 277 posts

Re: SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

#231

Amazon does the same thing by using third party delivery companies and geographic dislocation with their support staff. The proletariat can be taught to take their class problems out on the customers. I assume that the third party delivery companies' leadership even encourage their drivers to take out their class frustrations on customers that complain about problems.

Many companies even use third-party support staff, per ProPublica. It's outsourcing and penny-pinching all the way down, and the people getting screwed are the customers and the employees.

https://www.propublica.org/article/meet-the-customer-service...

Re: SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

#232
post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> people steal stuff so freely because they don't get prosecuted or punished. > and they do it in the first place because they can sell the stuff and buy meth. they 100% aren't worried about gentrification issues or the local economy, etc. People also steal stuff increasingly because they need it and cannot afford it. In the past few years thefts of things like groceries and diapers have shot up. It's depressing, rea…

Theft of diapers (and laundry detergent) is because these are items that are consumed, fairly high value, needed somewhere in the area, and able to be sold for cash. People don't often steal diapers because they need them. https://consumerist.com/2012/10/26/diapers-are-apparently-th... https://www.king5.com/article/news/local/retail-crime-ring-s... https://www.wearegreenbay.com/news/local-news/two-arrested-i...

True — though even if the people directly responsible for the theft aren't savory individuals, the people they sell to might be struggling to buy diapers all the same. There's apparently an entire black market around this stuff.

> The black market for diapers and other baby products thrives because so many people can’t afford over-the-counter prices for them. Diapers and wipes cannot be purchased with food stamps or other welfare benefits, and the expense is a grinding source of stress for families in poverty. During the pandemic, the number of families who couldn’t pay for diapers shot up across the country.

https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-local-correspondents/the-...

Re: SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

#233

It’s the same with the tipping that seems almost everywhere these days. Instead of the workers being paid properly by the company the customer gets guilt tripped to tip and when you don’t tip the worker is angry at the customer, not the company.

As a customer, I support workers unionizing to improve their wage bargaining power. Besides tipping, I can’t do much to help them do that. They’ve gotta organize to do it, and call on the NLRB when there’s (always inevitably) Corporate Fuckery [1]. Luckily, the NLRB received a $25M funding bump in the latest Omnibus spending bill signed into law. [1] https://www.nlrb.gov/cases-decisions/decisions/administrativ...

1.7 trillion spent and 25 million for NLRB. Truly the current regime looks after the little guy.

Re: SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

#234
post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a customer, I support workers unionizing to improve their wage bargaining power. Besides tipping, I can’t do much to help them do that. They’ve gotta organize to do it, and call on the NLRB when there’s (always inevitably) Corporate Fuckery [1]. Luckily, the NLRB received a $25M funding bump in the latest Omnibus spending bill signed into law. [1] https://www.nlrb.gov/cases-decisions/decisions/administrativ...

1.7 trillion spent and 25 million for NLRB. Truly the current regime looks after the little guy.

2023 budget is $300M. "the NLRB received a $25M funding bump in the latest Omnibus spending bill signed into law."

https://www.nlrb.gov/news-outreach/news-story/statement-on-n...

Re: SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

#235

The article complains about automation replacing workers. This complaint goes back to the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, but automation has enabled us to sit in warm houses and watch Netflix all day rather than spending every day picking bugs off of our crops. The other thing it complains about is cutting costs. Well, Southwest has the cheapest air fares. You don't get top flight customer service when you bu…

My family has been flying SW almost exclusively for 10 years and this Christmas was the first problem we’ve encountered.

Something definitely changed with the new CEO because the usually happy workers were much less so. For instance, they used to have somewhat unique and entertaining scripts for the flight education before takeoff, but for the past few years they stick to the boring version the other airlines deliver.

Maybe there’s something else going on, and my observation is wrong, and it’s all a combination of shitty managers and outdated software

Re: SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

#236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you think the executives care about your letter? Stop going to the place that treats you badly, and if possible write an honest critical review of them. This is not perfect, but it has more hope of getting attention than a letter to an executive who almost certainly won't even see it. For better or worse, people vote with their wallets. There are lots of low cost versions of things I would never even consider (and…

I do think that some do. A well written, polite, short letter expressing a issue and how it is detrimental to an organization and how it impacts customers would be welcome by any competent executive or manager. If they don't want that knowledge, then I am sure that is common, but it is not ubiquitous.

Oh please

Re: SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

#237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do think that some do. A well written, polite, short letter expressing a issue and how it is detrimental to an organization and how it impacts customers would be welcome by any competent executive or manager. If they don't want that knowledge, then I am sure that is common, but it is not ubiquitous.

Oh please

Instead of dismissing things off-hand because they don't fit your assumptions, you may find it useful to spend a few minutes coming up with a thoughtful and critical response. Doing so might not only contribute meaningfully to discussion but it might let you work through how some of those assumptions may not hold up to real scrutiny.

Re: SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

#238
If you provide a unique service or talent to a corporation, it is incentivized to use technology to empower you. This lifts your worth, and your financial situation.

If you provide a replicable service or talent to a corporation, it is incentivized to use technology to make you generic. This makes you easily replaceable, lowers your economic value i.e. your wages, and reduces management complexity.

In both cases, the corporation is incentivized to use technology to reduce the number of people it needs.

It is like a vertically oriented barbell, but with the bar getting longer, the balls at the end getting smaller. The people at the top are fewer but wealthier. Those at the bottom are more in number, but also often getting fewer, and definitely getting poorer (relatively).

The bar is automation. The implicit goal is for the two balls to shrink to the point that there is only the bar, only automation.

--

This isn't due to politics, or morals, or even greed. It is just an extension of natural selection.

Social solutions need to take into account more than just capitalism - which after all, is only part of the ecosystem of life - while still keeping the benefits of capitalism.

--

For instance, if untapped natural resources were considered a joint inheritance of all humans, then everyone would inherit at least a minimal base level income, providing a base line level of financial security and leverage. Resource extractors would bid to use resources, with the result of their bidding shared by all.

Charity is an alternative, but it doesn't present a clear structure for operating, and is notoriously difficult to rationalize consistently with capitalism. Charity is hard to scale and maintain without conflict, corruption and gaps in coverage where it is needed.

Whereas, equal shares of the inheritance of the resources, that the universe bequeathed to all of us, is a stronger, more orderly, non-coercive, structure for sharing wealth.

--

Taxing real estate based on the land, not the structure, recognizes that land is a limited availability common resource and treats land ownership more like renting, with the proceeds shared by all.

Since structures are not taxed, development of land is not disincentived with greater taxes, making it cheaper to increase land's productivity (i.e. adding and improving structures for businesses, more homes, etc.). And since unused land is taxed as heavily as used land, it becomes unattractive as a financial hedge (no longer useful like gold, or perhaps bitcoin), lowering non-productive financial-instrument demand for land.

Thus making land both more productive AND affordable.

The road ahead is going to be rocky, but there are ways it can be made smoother.

Re: SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

#239
post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

False. So many comments in this thread seem like they’re written by people who have never worked jobs with tipping. When I worked as a server, tips were far preferable to salary. We’d get $10/hr plus tips, which could work out to $30/hr on average. We had people who came from other server jobs paying $20/hr with no tips who felt they were getting screwed.

> We’d get $10/hr plus tips, which could work out to $30/hr on average. in which city? I would never describe making $62k a year in NYC as being paid well.

Think large Mid-west city where you can rent a 1 bed for under $1k.

There is a reason why so many people work jobs that pay tips when apparently HN thinks a flat hourly rate is better.

In NYC I've heard it's not unusual to get $80-100k at a higher-end place under a tips model.

Re: SouthwestAirlines' Meltdown Shows How Corporations Pit Consumers Against Workers

#240
post #109

This is kind of a bizarre article that tries to view the world through some sort of class struggle. Airlines make choices about how to run their business. Consumers make choices about which business to give their money to. If businesses screw up, then consumers leave. It’s really that simple.

> This is kind of a bizarre article that tries to view the world through some sort of class struggle. What exactly is bizarre about it? The world is a class struggle.

Only if you view the world as a first year poly sci major with a penchant for Marx.

The world is way more complex than just "class".

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