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Amazon's anti-union site for its Alabama warehouse

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Re: Amazon's anti-union site for its Alabama warehouse

#71

Post by tacitusarc »

CryptoPunk wrote: post #27
Simulacra wrote: post #20

Amazon warehouses are one of the few reasons, I think we can all agree, that a union has a place. There is the argument to be made that if someone doesn't like the job, go elsewhere, it's the free market. True, but I see a lot of these fulfillment centers in small towns. They become a major employer, sometimes eclipsing even the local Walmart. It's a place where jobs are hard to come by, so maybe Amazon offers someth…

>>. It's a place where jobs are hard to come by, so maybe Amazon offers something the desperate, the poor, and the struggling something they can't get elsewhere. If you make it illegal to provide bad jobs, those jobs will not be substituted one-for-one for good jobs. That's not how an economy works. You're only hurting low-skilled workers by mandating higher minimum work standards. Responding to below: Yes, every so-…

This is a very tidy theoretical argument, but in practice you don't build a warehouse in a rural area along a shipping route then just abandon it when the community unionizes. Companies stick around for as long as they can possibly make a return on that investment, even if it means paying the people at the top less or decreasing margin to comply with union demands. And yeah, unions can go too far, but Amazon warehouses seem like a great place for them. Also, as long as the state is right to work so union participation is voluntary, what's the problem with it?

Re: Amazon's anti-union site for its Alabama warehouse

#72

Post by Meph504 »

steve_adams_86 wrote: post #51

That very first * is the first major point for unions. Many unions protect part time workers, or protect workers from being excluded from a fair share of benefits based on their inputs. The reason for this is that there’s no incentive to push hours down until no one gets benefits. Which is not uncommon, unfortunately. Many companies tout incredible benefits with a significant portion of their workforce having no enti…

Are you in the U.S.?

You say you don't get paid leave as a software developer, are you a contractor?

Re: Amazon's anti-union site for its Alabama warehouse

#73

Post by drak0n1c »

captainzidgel wrote: post #41

> IF YOU’RE PAYING DUES… it will be RESTRICTIVE meaning it won’t be easy to be as helpful and social with each other. So be a DOER, stay friendly and get things done versus paying dues What is this line even supposed to mean? Probably the most incomprehensible union busting talking point I've ever heard.

My wife worked in the event planning industry - the few unionized venues she had to deal with were a huge pain loaded with restrictions. As a client you couldn't even move a table by yourself on the spot - a union employee had to do it as part of an assigned task. Perhaps it's warning of similar red tape that gets in the way of doing work directly.

Re: Amazon's anti-union site for its Alabama warehouse

#74

Post by [deleted] »

lend000 wrote: post #50

I wonder how many people commenting have actually been part of a union. I have. My take is that if it's voluntary: great. If the union has negotiated that a company cannot hire you without being a part of the union: not great. Perhaps that should even be illegal. Forcing people making minimum wage to pay union dues is as far from helping people at the bottom as you can get. Unions are typically about benefitting peop…

[deleted]

Re: Amazon's anti-union site for its Alabama warehouse

#75

Post by danShumway »

CryptoPunk wrote: post #27
Simulacra wrote: post #20

Amazon warehouses are one of the few reasons, I think we can all agree, that a union has a place. There is the argument to be made that if someone doesn't like the job, go elsewhere, it's the free market. True, but I see a lot of these fulfillment centers in small towns. They become a major employer, sometimes eclipsing even the local Walmart. It's a place where jobs are hard to come by, so maybe Amazon offers someth…

>>. It's a place where jobs are hard to come by, so maybe Amazon offers something the desperate, the poor, and the struggling something they can't get elsewhere. If you make it illegal to provide bad jobs, those jobs will not be substituted one-for-one for good jobs. That's not how an economy works. You're only hurting low-skilled workers by mandating higher minimum work standards. Responding to below: Yes, every so-…

> If you make it illegal to provide bad jobs, those jobs will not be substituted one-for-one for good jobs. That's not how an economy works.

I think this betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of how markets work. If you are a smart business, you don't charge what's "fair", you don't start by saying "I'm going to pay $X to my workers, so let's see how many I can hire with that money." Those are bad ways to run a business. You hire the number of workers you need to run your business at the price the market will bear.

This is something that gets drilled into you if you take any entrepreneurship classes: things cost what the market will bear, there is no concept of "fairness" that entrepreneurs should be thinking about. You pay as little as you can to make something, and you charge as much as you can for it, and those are largely independent variables from each other.

The idea that Amazon is going to stop hiring workers if they get more pee breaks... that's just not how markets work. If Amazon could afford to let those workers go, it would have done it already. If it doesn't need those workers and it's hiring them anyway, then it's just a badly managed company.

Similarly, if you get rid of labor laws and reduce the minimum wage for Amazon's workers, it's not going to hire twice as many people just because it has the money. It'll increase its profit margins, because it's a business being run by smart people who understand how supply/demand works. You're talking about the market like supply and demand form a constant ratio with each other. They don't.

It's not just wrong because reality is more complicated and in practice the simplistic models don't always bare out (although reality is more complicated and these simplistic models rarely capture how everything will work out), it's also wrong because it's fundamentally bad market theory on a simple level. Nobody starts a business deciding that they're going to pay a constant amount of money that gets divided equally among all of their workers. At least, they don't think that way if they want to stay in business for very long.

Re: Amazon's anti-union site for its Alabama warehouse

#76

Post by chordalkeyboard »

steve_adams_86 wrote: post #51

That very first * is the first major point for unions. Many unions protect part time workers, or protect workers from being excluded from a fair share of benefits based on their inputs. The reason for this is that there’s no incentive to push hours down until no one gets benefits. Which is not uncommon, unfortunately. Many companies tout incredible benefits with a significant portion of their workforce having no enti…

> Many unions protect part time workers, or protect workers from being excluded from a fair share of benefits based on their inputs.

I can understand why this would be highly preferable for part time workers. Can you understand how a company might be able to afford to provide a $30,000/yr benefits package to workers who work 40 hours a week, but not be able to afford to provide a $30,000/yr benefits package to workers who work 20 hours a week? Can you see how increasing the cost of part time employment might make a lot of those part time jobs go away?

> The reason for this is that there’s no incentive to push hours down until no one gets benefits. Which is not uncommon, unfortunately. Many companies tout incredible benefits with a significant portion of their workforce having no entitlement to it because of arbitrary suppression of their shifts.

I understand that it seems unfair for a company to replace one 40 hour worker with two 20 hour workers. Especially when the 40 hour worker has benefits and the 20 hour workers do not. The issue here is that requiring an employer to provide benefits for full time employees creates the situation where an employer may not be able to afford benefits for their full time employees. So in order to keep the business going, they do what they can. Making it more expensive for them to do this is just going to result in fewer businesses anyway.

> Collective bargaining is no joke.

Collective bargaining flattens worker salaries, the lower performing workers make more than they should and the higher performing workers make less. Its not a given that everyone wants this, or should want it. People should be able to negotiate as individuals.

> She has life insurance that would cost me an arm and a leg, a great pension plan, incredible leave options, very generous extended health/vision/dental benefits... It’s a long list.

Not everyone wants all these things. More importantly, not everyone wants to pay for all of them. Some people could use the money elsewhere (perhaps they are covered under a spouse).

> I could say my money is better but it’s nowhere near as secure and dependable, and although it looks so much better paper, I’d be spending a huge amount to get the same benefits privately.

I like a world where both of these things are available for people who choose them.

> I think she gets something like 6 weeks of leave per year, too. If I don’t work, I don’t get paid, period.

I personally would prefer to get paid more and manage my own finances and vacations. You don’t get interest on vacation days (although they do include health insurance).

Re: Amazon's anti-union site for its Alabama warehouse

#77

Post by refurb »

steve_adams_86 wrote: post #51

That very first * is the first major point for unions. Many unions protect part time workers, or protect workers from being excluded from a fair share of benefits based on their inputs. The reason for this is that there’s no incentive to push hours down until no one gets benefits. Which is not uncommon, unfortunately. Many companies tout incredible benefits with a significant portion of their workforce having no enti…

The part-time/full-time issue is very union dependent. I was a member of the Teamster's union many moons ago and got zero benefits as a part-time worker.

Re: Amazon's anti-union site for its Alabama warehouse

#78

Post by chordalkeyboard »

flower-giraffe wrote: post #63
chordalkeyboard wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Q: Will NOT having a union provide better wages and benefits? A: Yes, it could. Unions introduce parasitic loss and collective bargaining. Collective bargaining allows a large part of the workforce to negotiate as one unit and consequently higher performing workers are unable to negotiate a salary commensurate with their performance. In order to retain higher performing workers, corporations end up paying average per…

> higher performing workers Do you mean the ones that sit at their keyboards earning a multiple of the salaries of those who do the actual physical work necessary to serve customers. I often remind my colleagues that we are very lucky to have such easy and well paid jobs by asking the simple question, “how many bags of sand did you carry yesterday?”

> Do you mean the ones that sit at their keyboards earning a multiple of the salaries of those who do the actual physical work necessary to serve customers.

I mean “higher performing” according to the people who pay them.

> I often remind my colleagues that we are very lucky to have such easy and well paid jobs by asking the simple question, “how many bags of sand did you carry yesterday?”

I’ve been a welder/fabricator, machine operator, and forklift driver. Programming and web development isn’t easy although it isn’t physically arduous. Whats more relevant to our discussion is that a high performer is not as easily replaced. Physical work is honorable and demanding. Its also something a lot of people can do.

Re: Amazon's anti-union site for its Alabama warehouse

#80

Post by colinmhayes »

readflaggedcomm wrote: post #5
WrtCdEvrydy wrote: post #2

I love the *Applies to full time employees... The most basic of caste systems.

Are they born into part-time employment?

I don't know about Amazon, but many employers don't let most employees work full time. If that's the case these workers sort of are born into part-time employment since the socioeconomic class you grow up in is the biggest factor of success.
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