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Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

#21

Post by camus2 »

radical_blogger wrote: post #11

at least the british press still cares enough about the average british worker to write an article like this. The american press would only write an article like this if such conditions disparately impacted minority race workers. Pretty soon the british press will do the same. It just gets worse and worse. I see no light at the end of the tunnel. The citizens of america do not even ask the right questions.

Low Wage workers need to fight for their rights and working conditions. Nobody is going to do that for them. That's class warfare, and it has never been more important than today.

Re: Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

#22

Post by emilga »

waps wrote: post #14
arethuza wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Why are humans still doing this work?" Given that Amazon is no stranger to technology I suspect the answer is that it simply doesn't make financial sense. I suspect the capex on a standard Amazon shipping center is probably pretty low (lease a warehouse, put in computer systems, hire a crowd of temp workers).

Take it from someone who's tried making it work : grasping is too fucking hard. It looks so simple, a baby could do it. A hand grasping objects. Many things that many people believe robots can do are in this category. The absolute state of the art is balancing (not walking) on 2 legs (which does allow you to move, but ...), and walking on 4 legs (it's not really walking like for example a cat does, but it's better th…

On the problem of grasping, can you please comment on this video [1]? Instead of making a robot "hand", they have filled a balloon with ground coffee beans. "Grasping" and "ungrasping" then simply becomes sucking air out of, and pushing air into the balloon.

Is there some downside to this that I'm not seeing?

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKOI_lVDPpw

Re: Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

#23

Post by yummyfajitas »

csmuk wrote: post #16
ck2 wrote: post #9

Average people get all upset about unions when they see them applied to jobs that don't seem too too demanding. But places like Walmart and Amazon are exactly why unions should exist, to counterbalance the inhumane over-optimization and maltreatment of people. Amazon could probably make work less toxic by hiring 10% more people, but that would make things cost a few cents more.

Yes and no. This subject somewhat angers me. Yes people like Walmart and Amazon workers need protection form maltreatment. Definitely. This should be built into the law though, not into unions. And no because the existing unions don't really protect people. If you look at RMT, Unison and NUT they regularly pop up just to cause trouble. From a perspective of people having to consume services offered by their staff reg…

This is happening a lot in the UK a the moment as the Job Centre has been pushing for people to do this by threatening to cut their benefits if they don't do it. The result is people being forced to work for no compensation and having to pay for travel expenses out of their own (literally destitute) pocket.

From the perspective of the employee/trainee, the only difference I see between this situation and actual employment is that the name on the check is different from the name of the employer. So what's the big deal?

Re: Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

#24

Post by Nursie »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #23
csmuk wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes and no. This subject somewhat angers me. Yes people like Walmart and Amazon workers need protection form maltreatment. Definitely. This should be built into the law though, not into unions. And no because the existing unions don't really protect people. If you look at RMT, Unison and NUT they regularly pop up just to cause trouble. From a perspective of people having to consume services offered by their staff reg…

This is happening a lot in the UK a the moment as the Job Centre has been pushing for people to do this by threatening to cut their benefits if they don't do it. The result is people being forced to work for no compensation and having to pay for travel expenses out of their own (literally destitute) pocket. From the perspective of the employee/trainee, the only difference I see between this situation and actual emplo…

They have to pay their own travel expenses, if you do the calculations then they get less than minimum wage and they are threatened with having even that withdrawn.

And the taxpayer foots the bill instead of the business, which as a societal meme can just go f*ck itself.

Re: Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

#25

Post by arethuza »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #23
csmuk wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes and no. This subject somewhat angers me. Yes people like Walmart and Amazon workers need protection form maltreatment. Definitely. This should be built into the law though, not into unions. And no because the existing unions don't really protect people. If you look at RMT, Unison and NUT they regularly pop up just to cause trouble. From a perspective of people having to consume services offered by their staff reg…

This is happening a lot in the UK a the moment as the Job Centre has been pushing for people to do this by threatening to cut their benefits if they don't do it. The result is people being forced to work for no compensation and having to pay for travel expenses out of their own (literally destitute) pocket. From the perspective of the employee/trainee, the only difference I see between this situation and actual emplo…

Exactly, far better off to have the unemployed doing something rather than sitting round watching daytime TV.

[Note that I say that as someone who actually has signed on for a bit when I was a daft kid and done some pretty ghastly manual laboring jobs in agriculture and fishing].

Mind you I think having to pay their own travelling expenses is a bit harsh (mind you the first employment I had was for 12-15 hour shifts and I had to cycle 45 minutes to get there and back.)

Re: Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

#26

Post by csmuk »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #23
csmuk wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes and no. This subject somewhat angers me. Yes people like Walmart and Amazon workers need protection form maltreatment. Definitely. This should be built into the law though, not into unions. And no because the existing unions don't really protect people. If you look at RMT, Unison and NUT they regularly pop up just to cause trouble. From a perspective of people having to consume services offered by their staff reg…

This is happening a lot in the UK a the moment as the Job Centre has been pushing for people to do this by threatening to cut their benefits if they don't do it. The result is people being forced to work for no compensation and having to pay for travel expenses out of their own (literally destitute) pocket. From the perspective of the employee/trainee, the only difference I see between this situation and actual emplo…

That's the sort of ignorance that is promoted.

The big deal is that JSA which is the only paid amount is £56.80 a week. For a 40 hour standard week that is £1.42 an hour.

The national minimum wage is £6.31 an hour.

Not only that, the jobs in question can be literally 20-30 miles from your residential address so travelling is not even possible.

Also, we end up paying the JSA for the business. The business sees this as another expense avoided rather than an investment in the business. This should not be promoted!!

Re: Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

#27

Post by csmuk »

arethuza wrote: post #25
yummyfajitas wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is happening a lot in the UK a the moment as the Job Centre has been pushing for people to do this by threatening to cut their benefits if they don't do it. The result is people being forced to work for no compensation and having to pay for travel expenses out of their own (literally destitute) pocket. From the perspective of the employee/trainee, the only difference I see between this situation and actual emplo…

Exactly, far better off to have the unemployed doing something rather than sitting round watching daytime TV. [Note that I say that as someone who actually has signed on for a bit when I was a daft kid and done some pretty ghastly manual laboring jobs in agriculture and fishing]. Mind you I think having to pay their own travelling expenses is a bit harsh (mind you the first employment I had was for 12-15 hour shifts…

Disagree:

1. The business should foot the wage.

2. The wage should be fair.

Doing something isn't actually necessarily possible. We've automated a big chunk of people's jobs away. There isn't necessarily a place for everyone to work now. Not only that, we're living longer. Provisions need to be made for these facts.

Re: Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

#28

Post by pirateking »

moocowduckquack wrote: post #15
pirateking wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Salvation is always just around the corner, but we are walking around a rotating platform struggling to even just keep the corner in sight.

Alongside the platform is a railway tunnel. If you walk down it to the left you will find a bundle of disconnected wiring and a sign reading; "We are sorry to announce that due to unforseen circumstances and the state of the economy, the light at the end of the tunnel has now been switched off" . If you were to walk in the other direction however there is brilliant illumination, but that is just the lights of an onco…

You take the left path.

Your inventory contains: flashlight with unknown amount of battery power, shovel, binoculars, old brass ring, matchbox, notebook, pencil.

1. Inspect the wiring.

2. Continue in the dark.

3. Turn back.

Re: Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

#29

Post by arethuza »

csmuk wrote: post #27
arethuza wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, far better off to have the unemployed doing something rather than sitting round watching daytime TV. [Note that I say that as someone who actually has signed on for a bit when I was a daft kid and done some pretty ghastly manual laboring jobs in agriculture and fishing]. Mind you I think having to pay their own travelling expenses is a bit harsh (mind you the first employment I had was for 12-15 hour shifts…

Disagree: 1. The business should foot the wage. 2. The wage should be fair. Doing something isn't actually necessarily possible. We've automated a big chunk of people's jobs away. There isn't necessarily a place for everyone to work now. Not only that, we're living longer. Provisions need to be made for these facts.

You could argue as the loaded cost of employing anyone is a good bit more than their salary that any employer is making a contribution. (Usual rule of thumb is ~50% of salary for fully loaded costs - and that's without any thing fancy).

Re: Amazon workers face 'increased risk of mental illness'

#30

Post by Nursie »

arethuza wrote: post #29
csmuk wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree: 1. The business should foot the wage. 2. The wage should be fair. Doing something isn't actually necessarily possible. We've automated a big chunk of people's jobs away. There isn't necessarily a place for everyone to work now. Not only that, we're living longer. Provisions need to be made for these facts.

You could argue as the loaded cost of employing anyone is a good bit more than their salary that any employer is making a contribution. (Usual rule of thumb is ~50% of salary for fully loaded costs - and that's without any thing fancy).

You could, but it would be disingenuous.

Some of the cost of employment in the UK is employers national insurance (effectively a kind o tax that gets paid by the company before the employee even sees the pay check). This is not present here. Neither is there any question of employee rights, or employer responsibilities because there's no employment.

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