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Leaked Amazon memo warns the company is running out of people to hire

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Re: Leaked Amazon memo warns the company is running out of people to hire

#31

There's no shortage of workers, there's a shortage of workers wanting to work for Amazon.

It's kind of interesting because Amazon has built a reputation for being absolutely ruthless to their workers (not just delivery or warehouse).

You have the notorious NYT article from 2015 (the article mentions this):

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/technology/inside-amazon-...

The online perception is that it has only gotten worse. It doesn't take much to find stories on teamblind, twitter, reddit, or even hackernews about hire to fire, stack ranking/pip, and even just general mental abuse.

I mean just read this excerpt from the article about a working needing to go see a dentist about an infected tooth:

> The problem, he said, was that he only had seven hours of unpaid time off but ended up missing 20 hours of work; he had enough paid vacation time to cover the absence, but he said the company did not pull from that separate bank of days because Pagan would have had to apply for vacation time in advance. Pagan said he also had a doctor’s note but was told the company did not need to accept it as an excuse, even though he had been excused from work with a doctor’s note previously. He said he worked for another full week without issue, until he showed up one night for his overnight shift and his badge no longer worked. He was eventually told he had been terminated.

At what point do we simply ask if Amazon leaders have no sense of decency? [1]

[1] https://www.senate.gov/about/powers-procedures/investigation...

Re: Leaked Amazon memo warns the company is running out of people to hire

#32

There's no shortage of workers, there's a shortage of workers wanting to work for Amazon.

Working at an Amazon warehouse sounds terrible in every way, but… did you see those spiral package slides in the background? Might give up my sweet tech job just to ride on those.

Re: Leaked Amazon memo warns the company is running out of people to hire

#33

This is specifically in reference to warehouse workers, not the tech side of things. Though I've heard from many recently ex-Amazon engineers that they're having real trouble recruiting engineers now too

Probably depends on region/country/situation. Applied for an engineer position in Europe a few weeks ago, got to the last round of interviews, was rejected (probably because I'm horrible trying to explain things with that STAR method, I think the rest was ok).

I don't think they have a lack of candidates to be honest.

Re: Leaked Amazon memo warns the company is running out of people to hire

#35
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one reason why these types of megacorps support mass immigration, it provides a steady stream of desperate people they can exploit. Those from other countries also might lack the collective cultural knowledge to stay away.

I hadn't really thought before about how left-wing folks typically want higher wages as well as more mass immigration which inherently suppresses wages. In their defense, they want raises waged by law rather than by market (an elevated minimum wage would raise wages irrespective of immigration), but considering how unlikely a minimum federal wage hike is, it seems like they're pursuing two contradictory goals. EDIT:…

Likewise, I’ve always found it amusing that right wing business guys pay lip service to being against illegal immigration, yet they move their meat packing plants to nowhere-ville.

Re: Leaked Amazon memo warns the company is running out of people to hire

#36

This is specifically in reference to warehouse workers, not the tech side of things. Though I've heard from many recently ex-Amazon engineers that they're having real trouble recruiting engineers now too

It turns out when you treat your employees as disposable resources to be exploited, instead of human beings, people don't want to work there. I have several friends that worked for Amazon as engineers and from their stories, I don't think I'll ever consider working for Amazon. They probably have some good teams in there somewhere. And let's not forget their "hire to fire" practices to meet their turnover quotas.

Re: Leaked Amazon memo warns the company is running out of people to hire

#37
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hadn't really thought before about how left-wing folks typically want higher wages as well as more mass immigration which inherently suppresses wages. In their defense, they want raises waged by law rather than by market (an elevated minimum wage would raise wages irrespective of immigration), but considering how unlikely a minimum federal wage hike is, it seems like they're pursuing two contradictory goals. EDIT:…

>as well as more mass immigration I really haven't seen this with "left wing folks". That sounds more like some folks talking points they want you to buy into. I think you might be mistaken. Any immigration /= "more mass immigration".

I'm not trying to malign anyone here. I'm pretty sure more mass immigration is a left-wing opinion, and I thought that much was uncontroversial. I don't understand the distinction you're making between "any immigration" and "mass immigration". The US already allows a lot of immigration.

Re: Leaked Amazon memo warns the company is running out of people to hire

#38
post #28

This is specifically in reference to warehouse workers, not the tech side of things. Though I've heard from many recently ex-Amazon engineers that they're having real trouble recruiting engineers now too

From the tech side, I'd say Amazon and Facebook are by far the most frequent to reach out on LinkedIn asking if I want a job compared to other big tech companies.

Same. I’m not on Facebook’s radar, but I get Amazon recruiter spam to my inbox every 2-3 months. This is a far higher rate than any other company.

Re: Leaked Amazon memo warns the company is running out of people to hire

#39
post #23
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a surplus of management eager to exploit workers.

> There's a surplus of management eager to exploit workers. Can also be written "There's a surplus of customer eager to pay the lowest possible price even if that means exploiting workers." As shown by the success of Chinese super low cost brands wether we are talking electronics, fashion etc.

Have you considered that those customers and workers are mostly the same people?

There is no ethical consumption under capitalism. See: https://www.workers.org/2021/12/60560/

Re: Leaked Amazon memo warns the company is running out of people to hire

#40

Amazon has 1.6 MILLION employees based on its last financial report, with 1.1 million in the US. Basically 1% of the US labor force currently works for Amazon.

That's getting into too-big-to-fail territory. I'd expect some big fat checks for free money from us taxpayers to Amazon in the future.
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