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Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

nytimes.com

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Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#491

Post by mrhands556 »

beardedetim wrote: post #56
strombofulous wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why should developers unionize? I love not being in a union. If my company starts dicking me around I'll quit and find another job. Besides, if I do something so bad my boss wants to fire me, fine then I'll go work somewhere where people want me. I don't want to have to bring in my union rep to argue about it since going somewhere else means losing my tenure and taking a 30% pay cut. The only time unions make sense i…

> Why should developers unionize? I love not being in a union. If my company starts dicking me around I'll quit and find another job. Why does the former preclude the latter? > Besides, if I do something so bad my boss wants to fire me, fine then I'll go work somewhere where people want me. What if you didn't do _anything_ and your boss wants to fire you so badly? What if your boss fired you over Zoom randomly withou…

I’m a SWE at a FAANG company and hell no I don’t want a union. I busted my ass to get here and I’m compensated for it. I want my destiny in my control. Not some other large entity that probably doesn’t have my best interests at heart.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#492

Post by majormajor »

ARandomerDude wrote: post #398
rootusrootus wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The idea of the republican working class party has always been more of a clever rhetorical strategy than a reality. I tend to agree, but then again I really don't grok the Trump thing, and I can't claim that I saw it coming or sticking around as long as it has. At this point I would not be terribly shocked to see a bit of role reversal between the two major parties.

I've been a conservative since I had a minimum wage job, for one reason: I want the government out of my life as much as possible. I firmly believe nobody will care about my family as much as I do and I don't want the government's golden handcuffs. Leave me alone, let me work, and I'll happily live with whatever happens. I think this is the fundamental disconnect in left-right (economic) politics. The left, as I see…

Most safety net programs are far more focused on "avoiding a catastrophic outcome" than guaranteeing a good outcome. This is why we don't see a mass migration from tech jobs to welfare...

But for catastrophe prevention... you don't have to think the government will care as much about your family as you do to want there to be a support system in for your family if you die, become unable to work, etc...

And "liberty" alone is so undefined as to be meaningless for these purposes. Is "paying less taxes so that the disabled don't have as much help" an example of liberty? For you? For them?

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#493

Post by imwillofficial »

jorblumesea wrote: post #399
Taikonerd wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Normally this kind of movement would be a strength of the left. But lately the right has become quite populist, so maybe this plays in their direction. I saw an op-ed from a conservative magazine on this exact theme: [1]. The author basically says, "if we're claiming to be the party of the working class, shouldn't we be in favor of this?" 1: https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/republicans...

> "if we're claiming to be the party of the working class, shouldn't we be in favor of this?" But they don't really mean it and have never meant it. The Republican party, at least in modern history, has never been pro working class in any real sense. The opposite in fact, probably far more hostile to working class than Democrats. Much of the "pro working class" rhetoric is largely just conservative values like aborti…

“ But they don't really mean it and have never meant it.” Ah reading millions of minds I see.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#494

Post by vmladenov »

ARandomerDude wrote: post #398
rootusrootus wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The idea of the republican working class party has always been more of a clever rhetorical strategy than a reality. I tend to agree, but then again I really don't grok the Trump thing, and I can't claim that I saw it coming or sticking around as long as it has. At this point I would not be terribly shocked to see a bit of role reversal between the two major parties.

I've been a conservative since I had a minimum wage job, for one reason: I want the government out of my life as much as possible. I firmly believe nobody will care about my family as much as I do and I don't want the government's golden handcuffs. Leave me alone, let me work, and I'll happily live with whatever happens. I think this is the fundamental disconnect in left-right (economic) politics. The left, as I see…

Most Americans aren’t even at liberty to leave their jobs as they risk medical bankruptcy from a hospital trip.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#495

Post by CatsInSinks »

JustLurking2022 wrote: post #294
cs702 wrote: post #103

A single successful effort of unionization at an Amazon facility is more than symbolic: It will encourage -- and serve as a blueprint for -- employees at other Amazon facilities to do the same. Moreover, it will motivate employees at other large companies to try. This has been brewing for a while. It's possible we'll see a generational wave of unionization.

I predict the Staten Island warehouse will soon be closed due to redundancy as part of a strategic rebalancing of their logistics operations due to changing consumer demand. Someone at Amazon is probably already touring all the warehouse sites in Jersey. Doubt they accept this loss.

I was thinking the exact same thing, most likely that'll be the move.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#496

Post by jdmichal »

ARandomerDude wrote: post #398
rootusrootus wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The idea of the republican working class party has always been more of a clever rhetorical strategy than a reality. I tend to agree, but then again I really don't grok the Trump thing, and I can't claim that I saw it coming or sticking around as long as it has. At this point I would not be terribly shocked to see a bit of role reversal between the two major parties.

I've been a conservative since I had a minimum wage job, for one reason: I want the government out of my life as much as possible. I firmly believe nobody will care about my family as much as I do and I don't want the government's golden handcuffs. Leave me alone, let me work, and I'll happily live with whatever happens. I think this is the fundamental disconnect in left-right (economic) politics. The left, as I see…

In my early 20's, I would have agreed 100% with your stance.

But, you know what really gives people freedom and liberty? The freedom to fail without worrying about how they're going to keep a roof over their head and a meal on the table. Without worrying that they're one medical emergency away from losing everything they've worked for.

You want people creating small, lifestyle businesses? Give them a safety net and let them take that step without risking everything.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#497

Post by lliamander »

Retric wrote: post #427
zeruch wrote: post #414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The idea of the republican working class party has always been more of a clever rhetorical strategy than a reality." Always? No. But certainly since the 1970s.

Parties benefit from ideological inertia. I prefer small government that minimizes spending… So based on recent voting patterns, I vote Democrat.

Neither of the two parties represents anything close to a small-government platform.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#498

Post by lambertsimnel »

rdiddly wrote: post #311

The summary says workers voted "by a wide margin" for a union, but it looks like it was 2,654 votes for, 2,131 against, which is 55.5% to 44.5% or a margin of 11%. I wouldn't call that a wide margin, but maybe it could be considered so in these sorry-ass times of perpetual 51-to-49 deadlock.

In light of the fairly small margin of victory, maybe some employees were too undecided to vote. I also wouldn't be surprised if the demands of the job left some without the capacity to engage with the question. I share your disappointment, though.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#499

Post by umvi »

jdmichal wrote: post #496
ARandomerDude wrote: post #398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been a conservative since I had a minimum wage job, for one reason: I want the government out of my life as much as possible. I firmly believe nobody will care about my family as much as I do and I don't want the government's golden handcuffs. Leave me alone, let me work, and I'll happily live with whatever happens. I think this is the fundamental disconnect in left-right (economic) politics. The left, as I see…

In my early 20's, I would have agreed 100% with your stance. But, you know what really gives people freedom and liberty? The freedom to fail without worrying about how they're going to keep a roof over their head and a meal on the table. Without worrying that they're one medical emergency away from losing everything they've worked for. You want people creating small, lifestyle businesses? Give them a safety net and l…

I'm not convinced. There are plenty of countries with social safety nets galore, and all of them seem to have fewer freedoms and fewer small businesses created per capita than the USA.

Re: Amazon workers on Staten Island vote to unionize

#500

Post by Karrot_Kream »

lr4444lr wrote: post #468
Karrot_Kream wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's one of the biggest problems of the US. The population craves a high level of government services like in developed European or Asian countries, but isn't willing to pay for them. So instead the government is stuck playing politics to make the budget work instead of actually taking a cost efficiency mindset. Schools double as daycare because taxpayers don't want to pay for actual daycare. Local road construction…

What are you talking about? We pay way more per capita to educate kids and give people healthcare in this country than in a lot of other well developed countries where these things are more unified by government directive. Dysfunctionally, of course, but we pay a lot for it.

Education spend is in the upper range but still close to other OECD countries [1]. Healthcare is the outlier there [2].

[1]: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator/cmd

[2]: https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/ae3016b9-en/1/3/1/index....

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