Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers • Hacker News Board

Re: Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers

#211

Post by fy20 » Sat, Sep 04, 2021, 3:04 AM UTC

eurasiantiger wrote: post #88

phh wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you have it upside-down. It's tobacco and alcohol that have special treatment, not pot. My main guess for that special treatment is merely that tobacco and alcohol were global when we started taking care about global health issues, so we left them, but banned any newcomer

There are plenty of psychoactive substances on the shelves of any major supermarket and most of the stuff is completely unregulated. How is coffee different from tobacco? How is nutmeg or saffron different from drugs? How about artificial flavonoid—xanthine concoctions such as Red Bull?

> How about artificial flavonoid—xanthine concoctions such as Red Bull?

In my country, 'energy drinks' cannot be sold to anyone under 20 (same as alcohol and tobacco) for exactly this reason.

Re: Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers

#212

Post by ffggvv » Sat, Sep 04, 2021, 3:04 AM UTC

voz_ wrote: post #209

ffggvv wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

well see how much of a shortage there is now that it’s september and they don’t get more to sit at home and smoke weed than to work

Your response smacks of implication that the labor price is fair, and that the minimum living handouts people were getting are somehow wrong?

they may or may not have been appropriate 18 months ago, far before the vaccine was even a thought.. but they definitely lasted too long and artificially raised the price of labor..

Re: Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers

#213

Post by ghoward » Sat, Sep 04, 2021, 3:04 AM UTC

the_only_law wrote: post #72

Shadonototro wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

yeap, that is why they specifically say: > Ibuprofen can cause blurred vision, drowsiness, and dizziness. Do not drive or operate heavy machinery until you know how ibuprofen affects you

Sounds like we need to start piss testing workers to make sure we aren’t hiring any ibuprofen junkies then.

I trained as a school bus driver, and when we got drug tested, a lot of over the counter stuff could show up. We were also not allowed to drive under the influence of any drugs that had not been cleared, even prescription. And clearing a drug was on a case-by-case basis, though it mostly operated on the honor system.

Re: Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers

#214

Post by meowster » Sat, Sep 04, 2021, 3:05 AM UTC

ghoward wrote: post #205

antattack wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

School bus drivers should be making double of what they are actually making just for increased liability alone.

I've learned how to drive school buses, and I absolutely agree with your opinion. My first day on the job was my last (well, I drove a bit the next day before refusing to drive in a situation I was not comfortable in); it was just way too stressful thinking about those kids and how any mistake I make could hurt them. Edit: clarified my actual quit story.

How does staffing for school bus drivers work? I imagine they have to have a pretty exact number of drivers? They can't really have too many or too few, how close to the exact number do they have to get, or how do they handle underages/overages?

Re: Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers

#215

Post by gavinhoward » Sat, Sep 04, 2021, 3:12 AM UTC

meowster wrote: post #214

ghoward wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've learned how to drive school buses, and I absolutely agree with your opinion. My first day on the job was my last (well, I drove a bit the next day before refusing to drive in a situation I was not comfortable in); it was just way too stressful thinking about those kids and how any mistake I make could hurt them. Edit: clarified my actual quit story.

How does staffing for school bus drivers work? I imagine they have to have a pretty exact number of drivers? They can't really have too many or too few, how close to the exact number do they have to get, or how do they handle underages/overages?

Those are all great questions.

There is almost never an "overage" because there is a driver assigned per route, but they also have a bunch of sub drivers who get paid to show up, wait, and maybe take a route whose driver didn't show up, but if not, they go home after getting paid for an hour of waiting.

That's the gist, but it's a bit more complicated than that; in the school district where I live, bus drivers who were assigned routes actually had two or three per day: one for an elementary school, one for a middle school, and one for a high school. Yes, they are that short-staffed. In fact, all of the buses are advertising paid training because they need drivers that bad.

When I quit on my second day because of the stress about being pushed to get kids to school on time rather than safely, and also feeling like I needed more training to be safe, the head of the transportation department desperately tried to get me to stay.

tl;dr: they have bus drivers on standby who get paid to wait in case routes need to be filled. And they are so understaffed that overages never happen and drivers handle 2 or 3 routes.

Re: Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers

#216

Post by gruez » Sat, Sep 04, 2021, 3:34 AM UTC

pope_meat wrote: post #201

gruez wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This is an extension of prison labor. You lost me with that hyperbole. I fail to see how you can equate voluntarily working for a company earning at least minimum wage and other benefits, as "prison labor".

It's amazing we have so many volunteers for some of the worst jobs around. Happy volunteers, voluntarily working. You can see it on their faces, at 8:37pm pulling packages out of a van and running to a door, happy little contractors, happily volunteering.

Alright, let's flip the question: what doesn't constitute an "extension of prison labor"? If you think everything is an "extension of prison labor" that's not really an interesting statement. Is being a prehistoric hunter-gatherer also an "extension of prison labor"? It seems to check your boxes. Risking your life to hunt for woolly mammoths definitely seems more risky than delivering packages at 8:37pm, so I doubt those hunters were "happy volunteers, voluntarily working".

Re: Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers

#217

Post by userbinator » Sat, Sep 04, 2021, 4:02 AM UTC

honksillet wrote: post #137

One underappreciated aspect of this. They will ignore marijuana at time of hire. But they will absolutely test you if there is ever an accident or if you are injured at work (even if you just strain your back picking up a heavy object) before you see an occupational health doctor. If you come back positive in the course of injury, they won't cover your workers compensation bills. They'll fire you (for being intoxicat…

The article seems to allude to that:

“If a delivery associate is impaired at work and tests positive post-accident or due to reasonable suspicion, that person would no longer be permitted to perform services for Amazon,” she said.

Re: Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers

#218

Post by programmarchy » Sat, Sep 04, 2021, 4:12 AM UTC

For warehouse workers, this would not be a problem. Although I imagine that could impact Amazon's bottom line.

For delivery drivers, it's a terrible idea. Driving large vehicles around people's neighborhoods while high is dangerous. It's a negative externality Amazon is recklessly putting onto the public.

Cue mental gymnastics of potheads claiming they actually drive better while stoned.

Re: Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers

#219

Post by bpodgursky » Sat, Sep 04, 2021, 4:13 AM UTC

ghoward wrote: post #205

antattack wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

School bus drivers should be making double of what they are actually making just for increased liability alone.

I've learned how to drive school buses, and I absolutely agree with your opinion. My first day on the job was my last (well, I drove a bit the next day before refusing to drive in a situation I was not comfortable in); it was just way too stressful thinking about those kids and how any mistake I make could hurt them. Edit: clarified my actual quit story.

Luckily it's actually pretty hard to hurt kids in a school bus. They are built incredibly heavy and sturdy for exactly this reason -- if you collide with any car other than a loaded semi trailer, the bus will win.

Busses even roll every so often and while the kids are banged up a bit, fatalities are incredibly rare.

Re: Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers

#220

Post by ghoward » Sat, Sep 04, 2021, 4:14 AM UTC

bpodgursky wrote: post #219

ghoward wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've learned how to drive school buses, and I absolutely agree with your opinion. My first day on the job was my last (well, I drove a bit the next day before refusing to drive in a situation I was not comfortable in); it was just way too stressful thinking about those kids and how any mistake I make could hurt them. Edit: clarified my actual quit story.

Luckily it's actually pretty hard to hurt kids in a school bus. They are built incredibly heavy and sturdy for exactly this reason -- if you collide with any car other than a loaded semi trailer, the bus will win. Busses even roll every so often and while the kids are banged up a bit, fatalities are incredibly rare.

Yeah, we were told that, and I do know that.

But...the irrational part of me still had anxiety about it.

And we were trained about how to evacuate the kids, which we were supposed to do only in two cases: stuck on railroad tracks and fire. And only those two cases because...being on the bus was safer, just as you said.