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Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

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Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#211

Post by geodel »

Consultant32452 wrote: post #144
hueving wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's whataboutism. There are people in terrible conditions all over the world that US citizens can do little about. When it happens in the country where we can vote on laws and candidates, we can do something about it. So it's important to focus on those cases and set an example.

Sounds like your answer is nationalism. We could just as easily be talking about laws and candidates who want to improve our trade agreements such that workers in China, Mexico, etc. get better working conditions. I don't particularly like the conditions at Amazon either, but I see it as the obvious result of globalism. When 70% of the world lives on less than $10 per day, what we call decent conditions is really a f…

> When 70% of the world lives on less than $10 per day,

This too looks like optimistic number to me. More than half of Indians are living on <2 dollar a day. And this number is before automation takes away better paying labor jobs which are about 300-400 dollars a month.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#212

Post by wenc »

It seems that everyone is assuming that the allegations in the article are true, and are commenting based on that assumption.

But are they true? Can someone corroborate?

p.s. the reason I ask is because things are often more complex than a simple narrative would have you believe, and it's worthwhile thinking about what's actually going on rather than just taking in a narrative without questioning it.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#213

Post by aylmao »

80386 wrote: post #151
toomuchtodo wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't grow your business to be a monstrosity without treating your employees like slaves, your business should not exist.

I work at an Amazon warehouse. I'd rather be able to do that and write code on the side than be unemployed and have to live with my parents in the middle of nowhere. My parents don't even have an internet connection.

That's the problem with the current labour market. A job sounds almost like a favor, because it's better than nothing, but workers (should) have rights too.

There will always be someone who has less and is therefore satisfied with less, and companies will capitalize on that to offer the bare minimum to get the job done. Ultimately the person who'd do the job for more gets no job, the person doing the job for less doesn't get a fair compensation, and the only party benefiting is the company.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#214

Post by bluedino »

notheguyouthink wrote: post #2

Are Amazon's margins razor thin? I'm trying to understand what compels them to be so toxic in their work environment. Especially compared to the people I know who work at Costco, I struggle to understand why Costco treats employees so well, and Amazon treats their employees so poorly. It's really sad, regardless.

Same as Walmart.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#215

Post by basseq »

decebalus1 wrote: post #179
losteric wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW: I think Amazon's stock vesting schedule for ICs is reasonable considering the sizable hiring bonus (iirc ~$20k for new graduates). Stock grants are intended to reflect an employee's ownership in the company, and rapidly increase with tenure. That said... Amazon is definitely not human-oriented. Leadership within established business units is brutally efficient, with far too much faith in their metric goals. Ask…

> I think Amazon's stock vesting schedule for ICs is reasonable considering the sizable hiring bonus (iirc ~$20k for new graduates) One can get this bonus basically everywhere else in the area with similar sized companies. Hell, I got way more than that 8 years ago. The vesting schedule is diabolical: > 5% 1st yr, 15% 2nd yr, then 20% every 6 months coupled with the turnover rate: http://www.slate.com/content/dam/sla…

My company's vesting schedule used to have a 3-year cliff: 0% first year, 0% 2nd year, 75% third year, 25% fourth year.

It's a much more reasonable quarterly vest with a 1-year cliff now.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#216

Post by eloff »

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #47

My fear is that the future of work for most people is not unemployment, but shitty jobs like this. My feeling is that in order to avoid this and prosper, the people need to own the robots that do all the work (Marxism heyy). If robots provide huge productivity gains, then they will provide those gains for their owners. If it’s the big corporations that own them, they will see the gains. But as long as people are trea…

From the point of view of creating a society with least inequality all must own an equal share of production. This is straight up Marxism, and anywhere anything like it has been attempted, it made everyone equally poor.

The problem is capital owns production, and capital is not distributed equally. And if you forcefully try to change that too much, capital leaves for greener pastures or is no longer put to work.

I don't think equality is a good goal. I think a good standard of living for all citizens should be the goal. After that's been achieved, I don't care how rich the 1% are.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#217

Post by Spooky23 »

menacingly wrote: post #196

I tend to personally view things from the owner's point of view. I also know that once the popular narrative has bitten down on the story of a successful company running slave factories, they won't let go. Whether these are exaggerated or isolated cases doesn't matter, there will be story after story until Amazon makes some show of changing practices. However, I know there's another side. At some point, a company the…

A big part of this problem is that the warehouse operations people de-risk the impact and accountability for these problems to the bodyshops that fulfill these roles. Companies like Amazon love temporary workforces because they have big capital investments in fulfillment centers that they cannot walk away from, and an employee workforce would attract union mobilization.

IMO, the way to attack this is to increase the cost of temporary employment by taking away tax and other privileges. There should be a cost borne by the employer for the flexibility of temporary workforces. That would discourage the practice at companies like Amazon and have a lesser impact on SMB.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#218

Post by gadders »

louisswiss wrote: post #108
atrexler wrote: post #23

Long-haul truckers have been doing this for decades for the same reason-- they don't have time to pull over and use the restroom-- and no one is upset about that. I'm sure there are many industries, white and blue collar, where similar norms are expressed. Edit to add: I'm not endorsing the practice in any industry at all, just pointing out that its not a unique problem to Amazon. My comment would have been better ph…

Are there no legally-mandated 'rest stops' for truckers in the US? In Europe there are (quite strictly enforced) regulations in place to ensure truckers/HGV-drivers take a 30min break every few hours.

They still pee in bottles though. Check the sides of the motorways for coke bottles full of a yellow liquid.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#219

Post by progval »

atrexler wrote: post #23

Long-haul truckers have been doing this for decades for the same reason-- they don't have time to pull over and use the restroom-- and no one is upset about that. I'm sure there are many industries, white and blue collar, where similar norms are expressed. Edit to add: I'm not endorsing the practice in any industry at all, just pointing out that its not a unique problem to Amazon. My comment would have been better ph…

> why aren't more people upset about that?

I guess they just don't realize it.

To be honest I didn't either before reading your comment, but I am not surprised it is a thing.

Re: Amazon warehouse workers 'peed in bottles' fearing punishment for taking breaks

#220

Post by [deleted] »

gourou wrote: post #12
kelukelugames wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bezos. Jeff Bezos is the reason why Amazon treats workers they way they do. Compared to other tech giants, Amazon is incredibly anti-employee. Look at how their stocks vest. I worked at Microsoft during Balmer's reign. The founder/CEO's attitude dictates the work culture. And causes harm if it's bad. I live in Seattle and often hear this joke: Being an Amazon customer is the best. An investor is great. An employee no…

> Amazon is incredibly anti-employee They prefer calling it 'customer-centric' > Amazon, Earth’s Most Customer-Centric Company

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