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Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

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Re: Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

#31

I'm going to assume a lot of these warehouse workers would rather have more money in there pay packet now then a share or two which need years to vest with an unknown value.

The cash bonuses were monthly. I used to work in those warehouses. They definitely helped. Amazon and Bezos could definitely afford to keep all those programs and still give those employees a raise they deserve. The working conditions there are terrible.

Re: Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

#32

This is the problem with media. It starts with the media focusing on how many Amazon workers aren't making enough money. Political pressure mounts and Amazon increases everyone's salary to minimum $15/hr. The media then changes focus to those that feel slighted by their loss in bonus. They stop focusing on the people who are now happy and keep focusing on the small percentage of people who are unhappy, and seem to re…

This is a problem with Amazon PR misrepresenting a salary increase that isn't actually what they protrayed it as originally.

Re: Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

#33

This is the problem with media. It starts with the media focusing on how many Amazon workers aren't making enough money. Political pressure mounts and Amazon increases everyone's salary to minimum $15/hr. The media then changes focus to those that feel slighted by their loss in bonus. They stop focusing on the people who are now happy and keep focusing on the small percentage of people who are unhappy, and seem to re…

What part of this is 'fake'?

Why should the media be cutting Amazon slack?

Re: Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

#34

This is the problem with media. It starts with the media focusing on how many Amazon workers aren't making enough money. Political pressure mounts and Amazon increases everyone's salary to minimum $15/hr. The media then changes focus to those that feel slighted by their loss in bonus. They stop focusing on the people who are now happy and keep focusing on the small percentage of people who are unhappy, and seem to re…

Sigh.

Amazon's move probably represents the needs of a highly competitive labor market in the face of important holiday business, not "political pressure" or the media.

Fake news indeed.

Re: Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

#35

This is the problem with media. It starts with the media focusing on how many Amazon workers aren't making enough money. Political pressure mounts and Amazon increases everyone's salary to minimum $15/hr. The media then changes focus to those that feel slighted by their loss in bonus. They stop focusing on the people who are now happy and keep focusing on the small percentage of people who are unhappy, and seem to re…

The outrage machine climbing ever higher toward peak nuttery. We already seem to be a point where the majority of the media output is focused on spurring outrage in a given story, talking about something we're all supposed to be outraged about, or trying to spark outrage where there shouldn't be any. Then it hands off to social media, where the consumers compete to see who can be the most outraged, for social tribe points.

Re: Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

#36
post #28

This sort of hand wringing seems like a distraction from the likelihood that Amazon has moved up the date* in which these jobs will be eliminated. Whether employees are netting out the same or not is going to be moot. If it's similar though then that really doesn't seem like a good deal longer term. *Robots will be able to do the jobs for $15 hour sooner than they'll be able to for $7 an hour. The math will accelerat…

I don't buy this argument. The problem usually isn't that robots are too expensive to do the human jobs, it's that robots can't do the human jobs, period. If something can be done by machine, it is done by machine, and that's been true since the beginning of the industrial era. Entire job classifications get wiped out by new automation, all the time. At this point, the jobs that are still done by humans are jobs that…

Exactly, and Amazon is still growing so even as some jobs are gradually replaced by machines the total number of workers is still increasing.

Re: Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

#37
post #28

This sort of hand wringing seems like a distraction from the likelihood that Amazon has moved up the date* in which these jobs will be eliminated. Whether employees are netting out the same or not is going to be moot. If it's similar though then that really doesn't seem like a good deal longer term. *Robots will be able to do the jobs for $15 hour sooner than they'll be able to for $7 an hour. The math will accelerat…

I don't buy this argument. The problem usually isn't that robots are too expensive to do the human jobs, it's that robots can't do the human jobs, period. If something can be done by machine, it is done by machine, and that's been true since the beginning of the industrial era. Entire job classifications get wiped out by new automation, all the time. At this point, the jobs that are still done by humans are jobs that…

The Amazon of China, Jingdong, has a fulfillment center that handles hundreds of thousands of packages a day and employs just five people: https://youtu.be/RFV8IkY52iY

Amazon used humans because the investment to build full automation was too expensive and take too long to build out compared to spinning up human labor. However now the logistics of the fulfillment center are well understood and they can be rebuilt with full automation.

It was clearly a matter of time and money, not “these jobs are impractical hard to do with automation”

Re: Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

#38

This is the problem with media. It starts with the media focusing on how many Amazon workers aren't making enough money. Political pressure mounts and Amazon increases everyone's salary to minimum $15/hr. The media then changes focus to those that feel slighted by their loss in bonus. They stop focusing on the people who are now happy and keep focusing on the small percentage of people who are unhappy, and seem to re…

> the small percentage of people who are unhappy

Citation needed.

Re: Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

#39
Amazon is correct. Equity is an inherently risky asset and is something better suited for those who can accept the risk.

If you're making $12/hr, adding Amazon stock on top is a feast or famine situation and would almost certainly cause issues in the next few years. We're on the end of a 10 year bull market, and the most likely situation is trending down.

As the saying goes, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.

Re: Amazon says wage hike ‘more than compensates’ for loss of bonuses

#40
post #28

This sort of hand wringing seems like a distraction from the likelihood that Amazon has moved up the date* in which these jobs will be eliminated. Whether employees are netting out the same or not is going to be moot. If it's similar though then that really doesn't seem like a good deal longer term. *Robots will be able to do the jobs for $15 hour sooner than they'll be able to for $7 an hour. The math will accelerat…

I don't buy this argument. The problem usually isn't that robots are too expensive to do the human jobs, it's that robots can't do the human jobs, period. If something can be done by machine, it is done by machine, and that's been true since the beginning of the industrial era. Entire job classifications get wiped out by new automation, all the time. At this point, the jobs that are still done by humans are jobs that…

iPhones are assembled by hand and Amazon uses human pickers over automated warehouses which have been around for 30+ years.

Human labor is both cheap and dependable where automation takes capital and introduces risks. Just look at Tesla who cut back on automation at their factory.

The trend is for companies to do things by hand as they scale, and only automate when it's either required to stay competitive or the business enters a near steady state.

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