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I didn't hear anything about improving working conditions. The employees in Seattle making $15/hr already are still being treated like shit.

drawkbox 8y ago
That isn't an Amazon specific thing though, it is an American workplace thing that is more like a dictatorship/feudal empire than anything with rights. In the US, we live in 'freedom' but then go work on a feudal/sharecropper mini states that act like fiefdoms for corporate overlords. Labor rights are not even along for the ride anymore, they got left at the station somewhere in the early 80s. Look at how companies even see raising wages when they know that is a critical part of growth and as American as apple pie, however wage increases have been efficiently metric optimized and worked out of the system. SCOTUS just recently agreed that forced arbitration is legal [1]. > In a 5 to 4 decision, the Supreme Court’s more conservative justices ruled that companies can use arbitration clauses to block employees from banding together in class action suits. Corporate overlords, who serve the next quarter earnings only, might even get non-competes to be valid with the way things are going, not looking good for labor. Amazon employees might be able to change conditions if they were weren't locked into forced arbitration. Raises are very American and needed in a consumer economy that requires growth and new demand, those are almost gone. Competition is very market friendly and American, non-competes are everywhere and are the most anti-American, anti-business and anti-competitive thing that currently exist, they only favor established and large corporations over investors, entrepreneurs and small/medium companies coming up. If arbitrators are allowed to determine non-competes validity, competition, entrepreneurship and innovation is over. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/21/business/supreme-court-upholds-workplace-arbitration-contracts.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/21/business/supreme-court-up...
- prolikewh0a 8y ago
  I agree with all of your points. Noam Chomsky recently points out that when you walk into work in USA now, you're really walking into something akin to a communist dictatorship [1]. Private Governments. [1] https://taibbi.substack.com/p/preface-an-interview-with-noam-chomsky-the-fairway https://taibbi.substack.com/p/preface-an-interview-with-noam...

drawkbox 8y ago

That isn't an Amazon specific thing though, it is an American workplace thing that is more like a dictatorship/feudal empire than anything with rights. In the US, we live in 'freedom' but then go work on a feudal/sharecropper mini states that act like fiefdoms for corporate overlords. Labor rights are not even along for the ride anymore, they got left at the station somewhere in the early 80s. Look at how companies even see raising wages when they know that is a critical part of growth and as American as apple pie, however wage increases have been efficiently metric optimized and worked out of the system. SCOTUS just recently agreed that forced arbitration is legal [1]. > In a 5 to 4 decision, the Supreme Court’s more conservative justices ruled that companies can use arbitration clauses to block employees from banding together in class action suits. Corporate overlords, who serve the next quarter earnings only, might even get non-competes to be valid with the way things are going, not looking good for labor. Amazon employees might be able to change conditions if they were weren't locked into forced arbitration. Raises are very American and needed in a consumer economy that requires growth and new demand, those are almost gone. Competition is very market friendly and American, non-competes are everywhere and are the most anti-American, anti-business and anti-competitive thing that currently exist, they only favor established and large corporations over investors, entrepreneurs and small/medium companies coming up. If arbitrators are allowed to determine non-competes validity, competition, entrepreneurship and innovation is over. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/21/business/supreme-court-upholds-workplace-arbitration-contracts.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/21/business/supreme-court-up...

prolikewh0a 8y ago
I agree with all of your points. Noam Chomsky recently points out that when you walk into work in USA now, you're really walking into something akin to a communist dictatorship [1]. Private Governments. [1] https://taibbi.substack.com/p/preface-an-interview-with-noam-chomsky-the-fairway https://taibbi.substack.com/p/preface-an-interview-with-noam...