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The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

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Re: The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

#31

Post by icelancer »

Amadou wrote: post #20
cynicalkane wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The power of labor unions for low-paid workers is not as strong as you think. Where I went to school (U Chicago), there was a very active mostly student-organized university workers' labor union, but workplace violations were still routine. The power to strike is no help when you depend on your paycheck to survive, and the union's legal clout was no help when the laws were hard to enforce and deep-pocketed employers…

The power to strike is no help when you depend on your paycheck to survive Well managed unions maintain a strike fund so that their members can survive the economic hardship of a strike. After googling a little I think you are talking about Graduate Students United - their dues are only $5/year, which means they aren't even in the same league as the serious blue collar labor unions. http://uchicagogsu.org/faq/

>Well managed unions maintain a strike fund so that their members can survive the economic hardship of a strike.

Recent grocery store workers voted to strike and the pay was going to be $100/week for picketing 15-20 hours a week. Great.

Re: The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

#32

Post by quadrangle »

rjohnk wrote: post #13

Every year the same article. No one is forced to work at a temp agency or retail. If it sucks so much, find a different job. Yes, yes, I know, it's not that easy. But it actually is.

HAHAHAHA. Laugh rather than cry, right? This is simple economics: there's a certain population of people, a certain amount of basic wealth and resources. If an individual figures out how to get a good job and not temp or warehouse work, all they've done is figure out how to be the one who gets that other job. Yes, the overall system can be flexible, but it is IMPOSSIBLE for every warehouse worker to all get good jobs at once. This is a social problem, not an individual problem.

Re: The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

#33

Post by quadrangle »

knowitall wrote: post #21

Perhaps Amazon could add a checkbox to the shopping cart: [] pay 10% more that will go directly into the pockets of the packers. I wouldn't even mind a picture gallery of everybody who handled my package.

If some business did this and it was reliable, I guess we'd need third-party certification that this was real…

As someone else mentioned, the real solution is a Basic Income Guarantee. Otherwise, these ideas start becoming bizarro bureaucratic regulatory wasteful things, even though it sounds nice.

Re: The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

#34

Post by selmnoo »

nsxwolf wrote: post #11
rayiner wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're going to be replaced by robots either way. That doesn't mean they shouldn't be treated decently in the meantime.

So we can give them a living wage, which will accelerate the development of a robotic replacement, so that they can earn a bit more in the meantime, before their inevitable unemployment?

The earlier mass unemployment comes the better. Only that will necessitate some major rethinking of classical employment and welfare ideas, and very likely, finally have us implement basic income.

Re: The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

#35

Post by EliRivers »

rjohnk wrote: post #13

Every year the same article. No one is forced to work at a temp agency or retail. If it sucks so much, find a different job. Yes, yes, I know, it's not that easy. But it actually is.

But it actually is.

Hell yeah. Get off your lazy ass, and go spend tens of thousands of dollars getting an education that makes you employable (just put aside for the moment the fact that your years of compulsory education left you good for nothing better than packing boxes). It's that easy, everyone. Economy down? Well maybe you should invest massively in industry and spark a boom so there are more jobs. If you aren't doing that, you're just not trying.

Re: The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

#36

Post by powertower »

If you think Capitalism is bad, just try Socialism. Instead of making X amount of people miserable, it makes almost everyone miserable.

The world is not perfect, there is no utopia, and whatever you might think, Capitalism is about as good of product/market fit (human-nature/society-type fit) as you can get in a world that's not based on small hunter/gatherer groups.

It's also keeps us in a state of competition, which is the driving force for innovation and progress like nothing else is.

But don't believe me, just check how all the previous Marxsist and Socialist societies in history turned out.

Re: The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

#37

Post by abduhl »

EliRivers wrote: post #35
rjohnk wrote: post #13

Every year the same article. No one is forced to work at a temp agency or retail. If it sucks so much, find a different job. Yes, yes, I know, it's not that easy. But it actually is.

But it actually is. Hell yeah. Get off your lazy ass, and go spend tens of thousands of dollars getting an education that makes you employable (just put aside for the moment the fact that your years of compulsory education left you good for nothing better than packing boxes). It's that easy, everyone. Economy down? Well maybe you should invest massively in industry and spark a boom so there are more jobs. If you aren…

Why don't they just move into the tech industry, an industry filled with those that proclaim the worthlessness of a degree and a low barrier to entry?

Or are they not fit for tech? Is there something that sets them apart and makes them lesser than your typical dot commer?

Re: The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

#38

Post by tashi »

rjohnk wrote: post #13

Every year the same article. No one is forced to work at a temp agency or retail. If it sucks so much, find a different job. Yes, yes, I know, it's not that easy. But it actually is.

I'm one of the people who would say it's not that easy, and I'm a little confused by using "but it actually is" as an apparent counterargument. Could you please elaborate?

Re: The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

#39

Post by w1ntermute »

knowitall wrote: post #21

Perhaps Amazon could add a checkbox to the shopping cart: [] pay 10% more that will go directly into the pockets of the packers. I wouldn't even mind a picture gallery of everybody who handled my package.

They already have this: http://smile.amazon.com/

Re: The Workers Who Bring You Black Friday

#40

Post by w1ntermute »

meritt wrote: post #17
nsxwolf wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or be replaced by robots. All I could think of reading that is why they haven't figured out how to fold and tape a cardboard box with a robot yet. They should get on that, and then those people won't have to be subjected to those conditions anymore.

They have. It's called Kiva Systems and Amazon acquired them in 2012.

According to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KRjuuEVEZs, you still need people to do the boxing/packing even with a Kiva system.
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