12 ms·

Amazon’s business model meets Sweden’s labor unions

162 points by ptr 6y ago

dmitriid 6y ago
The most relevant quote: > If they can operate in Germany, they can operate in Sweden.
- wasmitnetzen 6y ago
  As a German living in Sweden, I wouldn't be so sure about that. Granted, compared to the US, both are on a similar level, but if you look at them individually, unions are a lot stronger in Sweden.
docdeek 6y ago
> Initially, Swedish and Nordic clients will be mainly served from German warehouses — known as fulfillment centers in Amazon-speak — with trucks driving up to Sweden through Denmark, and a fulfillment center operated by local partner Kuehne + Nagel in the Swedish town of Eskilstuna, near Stockholm. During the lockdown here in France Amazon was forced to close some warehouses and filfillment centers under pressure from unions (among other pressures, of course). It was big news for a week or so, and deliveries seemed to pause briefly before being picked up from German warehouses, too. After a week or so we started getting our deliveries again, usually with an extra day of delay because it was being fulfilled from Germany. I suspect they will eventually do a deal with the Swedish unions but that, in the meantime, trucking things in from Germany will allow them to become established.
- bkor 6y ago
  > After a week or so we started getting our deliveries again, usually with an extra day of delay because it was being fulfilled from Germany. In some other industries (shipping) you have to be really careful to do that. There's various laws against breaking up (the effectiveness of) a strike. That's currently often only applied within one country. If Amazon does something similar more often enough they'll probably get hit with an EU-wide law instead. It's always weird that internet based companies aren't treated like any other company. Unfair competition IMO.
  - docdeek 6y ago
    This was less a strike than a forced government shutdown due to COVID-19. amazon couldn’t satisfy the French government that the French warehouses and fulfillment centers were going to be safe for workers, so they were shutdown. I assume that the German ones satisfied the German government to German standards, and so were kept open.
    - josefx 6y ago
      > so they were shutdown They weren't shut down, that was Amazons decision. The court only told them to reduce operations to specific categories of its store site - the idea was to somehow reduce operations to a safe amount as Amazon had repeatedly failed to so by itself. Amazon then made up the nebulous "essential products" category and made sure to complain loudly about the supposed nonsense the court required while it shut down french warehouses completely.
      - UK-Al05 6y ago
        French goverment was trying to apply rules which had a lot of grey area. Amazon decided it was too risky so shut down.
        josefx 6y ago
        The court provided a list of Amazon(TM) categories from the Amazon (TM) website and told Amazon to restrict its operations to those. You wont find any of the "essential products" nonsense outside of Amazons own court documents and press releases.
        UK-Al05 6y ago
        I don't understand. The goverment created an a product list of items to sell, which amazon then tried to create an essential product list which contained these items? I don't understand whats the problem with that? According to Amazon they found it difficult to workout what was and wasn't an essential item according to the rules. I would imagine with a catalog as big amazon that's probably true. They decided to shutdown instead which is perfectly rational given the amount fines placed upon them if they did accidentally ship an item. The goverment got what they requested, no non essential items shipped. I would imagine amazon would have preferred to keep operating, so I believe them.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- wdb 6y ago
  I wish Amazon UK would send from the continent when items are not in stock. I had to wait three months to get a Spacegrey Magic Trackpad from them while it was in stock all the time in Amazon DE, NL, FT.
MattGaiser 6y ago
Amazon is the kind of company to instead build high speed hovercraft and base them in Poland or park a large warehouse offshore.
- robin_reala 6y ago
  Amazon Bornholm.
  - dybber 6y ago
    We have the same tradition of strong unions in Denmark.
    - encom 6y ago
      We do, but it has been eroded somewhat, especially by the "yellow" unions, that aren't unions at all.
      - Jolter 6y ago
        Has any "yellow" union been formed yet, though? Link?
        encom 6y ago
        Yes, there are plenty of them. Just off the top of my head there are Krifa, Det Faglige Hus, Frie Funktionærer and some others that I've forgotten. They are bloodsucking leeches, benefiting from the work done by real proper unions, and their members are rightfully shunned in some workplaces.
        Jolter 6y ago
        Ok I meant in Sweden, sorry for not being clearer. I misunderstood the GP comment.
- negamax 6y ago
LatteLazy 6y ago
It will be interesting to see what happens. But right now, nothing has happened...
matsemann 6y ago
Good luck with Sweden's one hour lunch break. And the fika breaks every hour as well. Sorry Jeff, no forcing workers to pee in bottles among the shelves[1] in Sweden to drive up the stock price. I hope the Nordic countries wont bow down to Amazon's exploits. [1]: https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/16/17243026/amazon-warehouse-jobs-worker-conditions-bathroom-breaks https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/16/17243026/amazon-warehouse...
- progre 6y ago
  Well the lunch break is not work time in Sweden so if you have a 1 hour lunch you just work longer in the afternoon. 30 minutes lunch (scheduled to fit the shifts) has been the norm when I have done blue collar work. I don't know anyone who has fika every hour. 15 minutes breakfast break and 15 minutes in the afternoon (on the clock) is normal.
  - aucontraire 6y ago
    You are entitled to 5 minutes (paid) break per hour worked in a shift, which the employer has the right to consolidate in various (but not endless) ways. This is on top the right to a lunch break which has separate rules. I think that both of these are is in the labour law and not allowed to substantially re-negotiated. (Many things across the various labour laws are explicitly allowed to be overridden by CBA).
bkor 6y ago
What a weird article. Loads of international companies operate in countries with wildly different laws, standards of living, disposable income, etc. Why compare Sweden with a Polish warehouse workers and not investigate how e.g. Amazon.fr operates? That country at least goes on strike significantly more often (probably more so than the rest of the EU combined). Meaning, one year I noticed them on strike every other week to protest some intended government plan, even though the company had nothing to do with that, plus they only went on strike during the night. > Initially, Swedish and Nordic clients will be mainly served from German warehouses — known as fulfillment centers in Amazon-speak — with trucks driving up to Sweden through Denmark, and a fulfillment center operated by local partner Kuehne + Nagel in the Swedish town of Eskilstuna, near Stockholm. So partly they question if they'll operate a warehouse, but at the same time, there's going to be a warehouses. Only difference is that someone else does the logistics for them. What usually happens with different standards of living is that the companies raise their prices a bit. Not sure why the article does not go into that. EU is planning some changes in the trucking cabotage laws, see e.g. https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/society/20200630STO82385/better-working-conditions-for-truck-drivers-across-the-eu https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/society/202.... This might (according to articles) make it more difficult to only use truckers from certain countries (e.g. whomever has the lowest standard of living / wage). Might also benefit the environment by ensuring companies might reduce the amount of trucking.
- Jolter 6y ago
  I don't know if you've quite understood how Swedish labor law differs from the French. Sweden is a little unique in that we have fewer strikes than most European countries. The reason is the "fredsplikt": as long as there is a collective bargaining agreement in place, if a worker goes on strike they can be legally laid off for shirking work. So, strikes will only happen at most every two-three years when the current agreement expires. And while then there may be a threat of strike, it seldom comes to that. In contrast, in most contries (notably France), unions may do "political strikes" to express opinions. Amazon won't be worried about their Swedish employees unpredictably going on strike for better terms. They will be worrying about having to agree to the same collective agreement as competing businesses. They will not get to push salaries lower than others, or squeeze slightly more hours or shorter breaks. So, they will have to look forward to their profits coming from economy of scale and not mistreatment of their warehouse workers. They will not be able to keep prices 10% lower than competitors while keeping the same profit margin, the way they do in the U.S. Until they sign an agreement, workers at other companies will likely put them under blockade, which means truckers from suppliers will refuse to ship to Amazon's Swedish warehouse; Postal workers will not pick up shipments to consumers; Caterers and conference centres won't service management meetings; Electricians will not service their warehouse; Garbage will not get picked up, etc. They can do some of this themselves, instead, but that's a very high threshold to cross on day 1.
waihtis 6y ago
Nordic politicians will cave in like everyone else. Generally it's funny how this region (Nordics) is reported in the media as some kinds of rationalist demi-gods, when in reality most politics here are just your regular smokescreen mixed with wishful thinking and a lack of understanding the real world. In conclusion, politicians will do as politicians do nowerdays - drive their own career over the 'public good'.
- Jolter 6y ago
  You seem to be misguided about the influence of politics on labor negotiations in Sweden. There is no mandate for a politician to interfere, it is entirely a thing between the two bargaining parties. That is, unless you can gather a political majority behind a major upheaval of the current law, which would have to happen after the next election because no such majority exists today.
  - waihtis 6y ago
    Potentially true, my reflection point is Finland instead of Sweden. Unions over here are however thinly masked extensions of political parties, yes they operate somewhat independently but each political party has a 'favourite' union who they influence through unofficial channels.
    - menybuvico 6y ago
      Sweden and Finland are pretty alike, but Sweden's system has a bit less political interference compared to how it's here in Finland. The ruling Social Democratic Party has strong ties with the unions though.
      - progre 6y ago
        They have traditional strong ties to one subset of the unions, the LO ones. But it's complex: LO is often openly critical of the (ruling) Social Democratic Party. At the same time a large chunk of the actual union members are voting for a different party, often one in opposition to the Social Democrats.
navidfarhadi 6y ago
I'm very interested to see how Amazon's entry into the Swedish market plays out. I used to shop a lot on Amazon back when I lived in the SF Bay Area and thought I would miss it when I moved to Stockholm but honestly that has not been the case. I get 1-2 day shipping from other online retailers in Sweden anyway (like CDON and Webhallen) and there is quite fierce competition between a few of the bigger names in the game which keeps prices low. The only thing I miss about Amazon was their very generous return policy and same-day shipping on some items, but I think the latter is limited to larger markets.
- redgc 6y ago
  I always attempt to shop from Amazon Germany because (a) larger variety of items, and (b) I feel I can trust the reviews there. Have you found Swedish e-commerce sites to have enough reliable reviews to buy anything with confidence, or do you tend to buy products that you can find reviews of elsewhere? I joke to my wife, "If 500 Germans say it's good, I'm sold"
  - luckylion 6y ago
    As a German, don't trust the reviews, they're heavily manipulated. I guess at some point (e.g. top seller with thousands of reviews) manipulation doesn't move the needle as much, but for plenty of products with < 100 reviews, there's often dozens that are likely fakes (even without counting the paid Vine reviews).
  - toyg 6y ago
    > I feel I can trust the reviews [on Amazon Germany] I... wouldn't do that.
    - me_me_me 6y ago
      Read 3/4 star reviews, they are usually good indicator of quality. There are few type of those, and you are looking for someone who knows what they are talking about and talk about shortcomings of a given product. They are usually pro's that have some experience with given category of a product. So they know what they want. If you find one like that its ease to judge what features you need vs features pros need. Usually, 1 stars are by entitled complainers (unless product is cheap knockoff) and 5 stars are by people that don't know what they are talking about or brought reviews.
dsign 6y ago
Let's see how that goes. Everybody in Sweden right now has an uneasy feeling about Amazon, and I have the impression that if people could have a referendum on the matter, Amazon wouldn't be allowed in.
- thecopy 6y ago
  >Everybody in Sweden right now has an uneasy feeling about Amazon Everybody? I dont. Im in Sweden. So your statement is false.
- Krisando 6y ago
  > Everybody in Sweden right now has an uneasy feeling about Amazon The few Swedish friends I showed this article to were actually happy to hear that they might have a local Amazon coming soon?
- Yetanfou 6y ago
  Everybody in Sweden is ~10.150.000 people. They all have their own ideas about many things, including whether Amazon should be allowed to set up shop here. I thing they should be allowed, that does not mean I want them to take over the market. Since my opinion represents that of 0.00001% of the population I'm not going to speak for the rest of the country.
redgc 6y ago
I live in Stockholm, and order regularly from Amazon Germany already. It's free shipping if you order 39 euro or above, which usually delivers things in around a week. Fast shipping of two working days costs 9 euro per shipment. Based on what I've read and this article, it doesn't sound like that much will change once it officially "launches" a Swedish site, although maybe Amazon will lower the minimum amount for free shipping or speed up regular shipping time. Re: this article, I can see them being willing to hold off for quite some time. Also to note: During the Covid-19 peak in Sweden, Amazon provided to-the-door delivery using Postnord, which I figured was somewhat of an experiment for when the Swedish site launched. It's pretty rare here in e-commerce to get door deliveries - most online shopping is sent to local convenience stores and you need to go and pick up.
- redgc 6y ago
  Something I forgot to add: Sweden does have some great gig worker to-the-door delivery companies that have sprung up, particularly around small items like from online pharmacies. When you fulfill an order using those companies they typically have a great monitoring app to track where your delivery is, to input your building door code if necessary, inform you when it's been left outside your door, etc. I always find it a great contrast to compare to premium shipping companies like DHL and FedEx, whenever I'm unlucky enough to get a delivery from them from overseas. They're still stuck in a world of "we'll deliver between 9am and 6pm, be ready" and they also make little attempt to ask for door codes if you live in the inner city, so most first attempts end up with "premises was not accessible" with no convenient way to give them the four digit code they need. I spent 1+ hour on hold last week with DHL and FedEx for this exact purpose. It will be interesting to see how "modern" of an approach Amazon takes.
  - distances 6y ago
    Germany has interesting approach for this: if you can't be reached, the delivery will be left to whichever neighbour or coffee shop happens to accept it. You'll get notified where it was left, and then just go knocking. It's quite weird at first but in my experience works surprisingly well. Very rarely one has to go queue in the post office to collect the parcel.
guerrilla 6y ago
Assuming that local production reduces costs, the question seems to become whether they can leverage demand to break the unions or not. This comes from the two further assumptions that they don't have any other leverage to do so (outside of corruption) and even though the benefit of satsifying the market presumably outststrips the cost, they will do everything they can to reduce costs anyway. Am I missing anything? I'll continue supporting the local competition (for books and media) in any case.
- jeltz 6y ago
  How would they be able to leverage demand? I can't see our politicians wanting to get involved in this fight, especially not on Amazon's side. Why would they want to support Amazon against both unions and againast Swedish companies? I think they will just remove themselves from the conflict and let it play out. I can't see a scenario where Amazon does not have to agree to collective bargaining.
  - guerrilla 6y ago
    Swedish naiveté always amazes me.
    - Jolter 6y ago
      Feel free to explain a plausible scenario where Amazon wins an all-out fight with the unions, then.
      - Yetanfou 6y ago
        Very simple, they'll just stage most operations outside of Sweden but inside the EU and run deliveries to Sweden that way. More or less like things are now, really.
        Jolter 6y ago
        I don’t see how they will win the marketplace then. Delivery will be slower than their local competitors, presumably.
eckesicle 6y ago
I think the union rep from Handels is correct. They'll get Amazon to cave. Amazon is the quintessential hill to die on for the unions and the labour laws are incredibly strong in Sweden. Here's how I think it might play out if Amazon refuses to sign: - Handels requests collective bargaining - Amazon declines but are sued in court and loses (you are required to bargain) - Negotiations fail and Amazon refuses to sign - The union realises that this is their David v Goliath and blockades the company - Amazon refuses to cave - The union declares widespread "sympathetic strikes". - in the end garbage collectors will refuse to pick up garbage at their warehouse. Electricians will refuse to service their warehouse. Plumbers will not plumb. Workers, builders, postmen etc will all simply stop servicing Amazon. Companies that deal with Amazon can also be put in a blockade. - Amazon will also receive zero support for from politicians for two reasons, first it's not a political matter. Second even the right wing opposition party will know better than to go against the electorate on this matter. It's simply not possible to operate a large scale business in Sweden without support of the labour unions (or by having workers conditions that exceed the perceived minimum). If a large scale business wants to operate in the country they _must_ sign a collective bargaining agreement.
- Cederfjard 6y ago
  For a case study, look up Toys R Us' entry into Sweden.
  - spindle 6y ago
    Could you suggest something specific to read please? Thank you.
    - bildung 6y ago
      https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/03/18/sweden-retail-unions_n_6888328.html https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/03/18/sweden-retail-union... TL;DR: refusal to sign a collective agreement escalated into an all-out boycott of the company. In the end, the workers won. "Toys “R” Us was both an exception to the rule —even McDonald's was forced to sign a collective agreement — and a warning for other corporations that they must adapt to the Swedish model or fail"
mikkelam 6y ago
I order quite a bit from amazon.de to Denmark, hoping this will be a better experience. I do feel quite bad knowing how the german workers are treated at the warehouse/fulfillment centers, I am definitely hoping Swedens labor unions can make a dent here while still keeping the price low enough.
TazeTSchnitzel 6y ago
If the quality of item descriptions is anything like Amazon.DE's right now, maybe other Swedish online retailers don't need to worry too much. It's already possible for me to buy from Amazon in Sweden (Amazon.DE ships to Sweden, using PostNord no less), but the listings are poor quality and you can't trust it. I only use it as a last resort. (Mind you, I also avoid Amazon because I don't like their business practices.) It should also be mentioned that e-commerce is easier in Sweden than in some other countries. The ubiquity of electronic ID, the national address database and rapid bank transfers mean that even if you do not use PayPal, creating an account and ordering with a new website is very quick and requires entering almost no personal details yourself. Many websites even let you pay by invoice.
legulere 6y ago
Let’s hope it work out like toysˋrˋus: https://apnews.com/6d245065b3faaadc70e6eb77e3e5c20f https://apnews.com/6d245065b3faaadc70e6eb77e3e5c20f
alkonaut 6y ago
Agree that Amazon won't upend the Swedish labor market model. But do they really need to do that to operate with a healthy profit? And if they think they need to revolutionize the labor market to be profitable (enough), would they really establish a presence in Sweden then? My feeling is they'll establish a business like everyone else and not even try to pull a Toys'R'Us.
- nabla9 6y ago
  They don't because the Swedish and European union organization is not as confrontational in company level as US style enterprise bargaining is. Sweden has mostly sectoral bargaining. Many/most things are negotiated between the unions and trade associations, not between union and individual enterprise. When Amazon sits to talk with unions (70% of workers belong to union), they discover that many things have been settled in a bigger table.
gohbgl 6y ago
Thanks to strong unions and labor laws Sweden is the worker's paradise and everybody has a great job. If Amazon wants to entice people to work for them then they must make a better offer than all* existing employers. What is there for the unions to negotiate? Please don't bash me for the cynicism. I am trying to figure out the logic behind all of this. * edit: What meant say is that Amazon must offer a job that's better than the jobs that people currently have for them to switch.
- CuriousSkeptic 6y ago
  “The Swedish model” is to put laws like this in place mostly to level the negotiation positions of the parties. What rules to actually apply is expected to be negotiated between the unions and the employers on top of that. (As a side note the current government is actually just about to abolish one of the corner stones of those laws (“LAS”, the law of employment protection). Due to a deal they cut with the opposition parties in order to be allowed to form government)
  - oxymoron 6y ago
    I’m not sure it’s really a corner stone. Saltsjöbadsavtalen and the Swedish model of collective bargaining came much earlier. Amuingly, LAS was introduced by a liberal goverment against the protests of the social democrats who felt that it infringed on the bargaining power of the unions.
    - CuriousSkeptic 6y ago
      Ok, I guess that makes more sense then. I was really surprised to see S (LO) agree to that deal.
- xorcist 6y ago
  Sweden hasn't got as many labor laws as you would imagine. There are no minimum wages, for instance. It's all "voluntary" agreements with the unions. Pretty standard things though, limits on wages, work hours and such. These agreements are not so much voluntary of course, since without an agreement in place it's hard to do any business in the country at all. Some try out of stubbornness but it's just an expensive way to accomplish nothing. The alternative would be meddling politicians and nobody wants that. Unions are expected to have a bit more domain knowledge, and these agreements are re-negotiated every few years to get rid of obsolete rules and introduce new ones. It helps that the labor unions are centralized, professionalized, and has vested interests in the long term survival of the companies they regulate, because of the trust required to make it work. If it is a good system I do not know, but it does provide for a stable labor market with almost no strikes, for which an agreement is a small price to pay.

162 points by ptr 6y ago

dmitriid 6y ago

The most relevant quote: > If they can operate in Germany, they can operate in Sweden.

wasmitnetzen 6y ago
As a German living in Sweden, I wouldn't be so sure about that. Granted, compared to the US, both are on a similar level, but if you look at them individually, unions are a lot stronger in Sweden.

docdeek 6y ago

> Initially, Swedish and Nordic clients will be mainly served from German warehouses — known as fulfillment centers in Amazon-speak — with trucks driving up to Sweden through Denmark, and a fulfillment center operated by local partner Kuehne + Nagel in the Swedish town of Eskilstuna, near Stockholm. During the lockdown here in France Amazon was forced to close some warehouses and filfillment centers under pressure from unions (among other pressures, of course). It was big news for a week or so, and deliveries seemed to pause briefly before being picked up from German warehouses, too. After a week or so we started getting our deliveries again, usually with an extra day of delay because it was being fulfilled from Germany. I suspect they will eventually do a deal with the Swedish unions but that, in the meantime, trucking things in from Germany will allow them to become established.

bkor 6y ago
> After a week or so we started getting our deliveries again, usually with an extra day of delay because it was being fulfilled from Germany. In some other industries (shipping) you have to be really careful to do that. There's various laws against breaking up (the effectiveness of) a strike. That's currently often only applied within one country. If Amazon does something similar more often enough they'll probably get hit with an EU-wide law instead. It's always weird that internet based companies aren't treated like any other company. Unfair competition IMO.
- docdeek 6y ago
  This was less a strike than a forced government shutdown due to COVID-19. amazon couldn’t satisfy the French government that the French warehouses and fulfillment centers were going to be safe for workers, so they were shutdown. I assume that the German ones satisfied the German government to German standards, and so were kept open.
  - josefx 6y ago
    > so they were shutdown They weren't shut down, that was Amazons decision. The court only told them to reduce operations to specific categories of its store site - the idea was to somehow reduce operations to a safe amount as Amazon had repeatedly failed to so by itself. Amazon then made up the nebulous "essential products" category and made sure to complain loudly about the supposed nonsense the court required while it shut down french warehouses completely.
    - UK-Al05 6y ago
      French goverment was trying to apply rules which had a lot of grey area. Amazon decided it was too risky so shut down.
      - josefx 6y ago
        The court provided a list of Amazon(TM) categories from the Amazon (TM) website and told Amazon to restrict its operations to those. You wont find any of the "essential products" nonsense outside of Amazons own court documents and press releases.
        UK-Al05 6y ago
        I don't understand. The goverment created an a product list of items to sell, which amazon then tried to create an essential product list which contained these items? I don't understand whats the problem with that? According to Amazon they found it difficult to workout what was and wasn't an essential item according to the rules. I would imagine with a catalog as big amazon that's probably true. They decided to shutdown instead which is perfectly rational given the amount fines placed upon them if they did accidentally ship an item. The goverment got what they requested, no non essential items shipped. I would imagine amazon would have preferred to keep operating, so I believe them.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
wdb 6y ago
I wish Amazon UK would send from the continent when items are not in stock. I had to wait three months to get a Spacegrey Magic Trackpad from them while it was in stock all the time in Amazon DE, NL, FT.

MattGaiser 6y ago

Amazon is the kind of company to instead build high speed hovercraft and base them in Poland or park a large warehouse offshore.

robin_reala 6y ago
Amazon Bornholm.
- dybber 6y ago
  We have the same tradition of strong unions in Denmark.
  - encom 6y ago
    We do, but it has been eroded somewhat, especially by the "yellow" unions, that aren't unions at all.
    - Jolter 6y ago
      Has any "yellow" union been formed yet, though? Link?
      - encom 6y ago
        Yes, there are plenty of them. Just off the top of my head there are Krifa, Det Faglige Hus, Frie Funktionærer and some others that I've forgotten. They are bloodsucking leeches, benefiting from the work done by real proper unions, and their members are rightfully shunned in some workplaces.
        Jolter 6y ago
        Ok I meant in Sweden, sorry for not being clearer. I misunderstood the GP comment.
negamax 6y ago

LatteLazy 6y ago

It will be interesting to see what happens. But right now, nothing has happened...

matsemann 6y ago

Good luck with Sweden's one hour lunch break. And the fika breaks every hour as well. Sorry Jeff, no forcing workers to pee in bottles among the shelves[1] in Sweden to drive up the stock price. I hope the Nordic countries wont bow down to Amazon's exploits. [1]: https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/16/17243026/amazon-warehouse-jobs-worker-conditions-bathroom-breaks https://www.theverge.com/2018/4/16/17243026/amazon-warehouse...

progre 6y ago
Well the lunch break is not work time in Sweden so if you have a 1 hour lunch you just work longer in the afternoon. 30 minutes lunch (scheduled to fit the shifts) has been the norm when I have done blue collar work. I don't know anyone who has fika every hour. 15 minutes breakfast break and 15 minutes in the afternoon (on the clock) is normal.
- aucontraire 6y ago
  You are entitled to 5 minutes (paid) break per hour worked in a shift, which the employer has the right to consolidate in various (but not endless) ways. This is on top the right to a lunch break which has separate rules. I think that both of these are is in the labour law and not allowed to substantially re-negotiated. (Many things across the various labour laws are explicitly allowed to be overridden by CBA).

bkor 6y ago

What a weird article. Loads of international companies operate in countries with wildly different laws, standards of living, disposable income, etc. Why compare Sweden with a Polish warehouse workers and not investigate how e.g. Amazon.fr operates? That country at least goes on strike significantly more often (probably more so than the rest of the EU combined). Meaning, one year I noticed them on strike every other week to protest some intended government plan, even though the company had nothing to do with that, plus they only went on strike during the night. > Initially, Swedish and Nordic clients will be mainly served from German warehouses — known as fulfillment centers in Amazon-speak — with trucks driving up to Sweden through Denmark, and a fulfillment center operated by local partner Kuehne + Nagel in the Swedish town of Eskilstuna, near Stockholm. So partly they question if they'll operate a warehouse, but at the same time, there's going to be a warehouses. Only difference is that someone else does the logistics for them. What usually happens with different standards of living is that the companies raise their prices a bit. Not sure why the article does not go into that. EU is planning some changes in the trucking cabotage laws, see e.g. https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/society/20200630STO82385/better-working-conditions-for-truck-drivers-across-the-eu https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/headlines/society/202.... This might (according to articles) make it more difficult to only use truckers from certain countries (e.g. whomever has the lowest standard of living / wage). Might also benefit the environment by ensuring companies might reduce the amount of trucking.

Jolter 6y ago
I don't know if you've quite understood how Swedish labor law differs from the French. Sweden is a little unique in that we have fewer strikes than most European countries. The reason is the "fredsplikt": as long as there is a collective bargaining agreement in place, if a worker goes on strike they can be legally laid off for shirking work. So, strikes will only happen at most every two-three years when the current agreement expires. And while then there may be a threat of strike, it seldom comes to that. In contrast, in most contries (notably France), unions may do "political strikes" to express opinions. Amazon won't be worried about their Swedish employees unpredictably going on strike for better terms. They will be worrying about having to agree to the same collective agreement as competing businesses. They will not get to push salaries lower than others, or squeeze slightly more hours or shorter breaks. So, they will have to look forward to their profits coming from economy of scale and not mistreatment of their warehouse workers. They will not be able to keep prices 10% lower than competitors while keeping the same profit margin, the way they do in the U.S. Until they sign an agreement, workers at other companies will likely put them under blockade, which means truckers from suppliers will refuse to ship to Amazon's Swedish warehouse; Postal workers will not pick up shipments to consumers; Caterers and conference centres won't service management meetings; Electricians will not service their warehouse; Garbage will not get picked up, etc. They can do some of this themselves, instead, but that's a very high threshold to cross on day 1.

waihtis 6y ago

Nordic politicians will cave in like everyone else. Generally it's funny how this region (Nordics) is reported in the media as some kinds of rationalist demi-gods, when in reality most politics here are just your regular smokescreen mixed with wishful thinking and a lack of understanding the real world. In conclusion, politicians will do as politicians do nowerdays - drive their own career over the 'public good'.

Jolter 6y ago
You seem to be misguided about the influence of politics on labor negotiations in Sweden. There is no mandate for a politician to interfere, it is entirely a thing between the two bargaining parties. That is, unless you can gather a political majority behind a major upheaval of the current law, which would have to happen after the next election because no such majority exists today.
- waihtis 6y ago
  Potentially true, my reflection point is Finland instead of Sweden. Unions over here are however thinly masked extensions of political parties, yes they operate somewhat independently but each political party has a 'favourite' union who they influence through unofficial channels.
  - menybuvico 6y ago
    Sweden and Finland are pretty alike, but Sweden's system has a bit less political interference compared to how it's here in Finland. The ruling Social Democratic Party has strong ties with the unions though.
    - progre 6y ago
      They have traditional strong ties to one subset of the unions, the LO ones. But it's complex: LO is often openly critical of the (ruling) Social Democratic Party. At the same time a large chunk of the actual union members are voting for a different party, often one in opposition to the Social Democrats.

navidfarhadi 6y ago

I'm very interested to see how Amazon's entry into the Swedish market plays out. I used to shop a lot on Amazon back when I lived in the SF Bay Area and thought I would miss it when I moved to Stockholm but honestly that has not been the case. I get 1-2 day shipping from other online retailers in Sweden anyway (like CDON and Webhallen) and there is quite fierce competition between a few of the bigger names in the game which keeps prices low. The only thing I miss about Amazon was their very generous return policy and same-day shipping on some items, but I think the latter is limited to larger markets.

redgc 6y ago
I always attempt to shop from Amazon Germany because (a) larger variety of items, and (b) I feel I can trust the reviews there. Have you found Swedish e-commerce sites to have enough reliable reviews to buy anything with confidence, or do you tend to buy products that you can find reviews of elsewhere? I joke to my wife, "If 500 Germans say it's good, I'm sold"
- luckylion 6y ago
  As a German, don't trust the reviews, they're heavily manipulated. I guess at some point (e.g. top seller with thousands of reviews) manipulation doesn't move the needle as much, but for plenty of products with < 100 reviews, there's often dozens that are likely fakes (even without counting the paid Vine reviews).
- toyg 6y ago
  > I feel I can trust the reviews [on Amazon Germany] I... wouldn't do that.
  - me_me_me 6y ago
    Read 3/4 star reviews, they are usually good indicator of quality. There are few type of those, and you are looking for someone who knows what they are talking about and talk about shortcomings of a given product. They are usually pro's that have some experience with given category of a product. So they know what they want. If you find one like that its ease to judge what features you need vs features pros need. Usually, 1 stars are by entitled complainers (unless product is cheap knockoff) and 5 stars are by people that don't know what they are talking about or brought reviews.

dsign 6y ago

Let's see how that goes. Everybody in Sweden right now has an uneasy feeling about Amazon, and I have the impression that if people could have a referendum on the matter, Amazon wouldn't be allowed in.

thecopy 6y ago
>Everybody in Sweden right now has an uneasy feeling about Amazon Everybody? I dont. Im in Sweden. So your statement is false.
Krisando 6y ago
> Everybody in Sweden right now has an uneasy feeling about Amazon The few Swedish friends I showed this article to were actually happy to hear that they might have a local Amazon coming soon?
Yetanfou 6y ago
Everybody in Sweden is ~10.150.000 people. They all have their own ideas about many things, including whether Amazon should be allowed to set up shop here. I thing they should be allowed, that does not mean I want them to take over the market. Since my opinion represents that of 0.00001% of the population I'm not going to speak for the rest of the country.

redgc 6y ago

I live in Stockholm, and order regularly from Amazon Germany already. It's free shipping if you order 39 euro or above, which usually delivers things in around a week. Fast shipping of two working days costs 9 euro per shipment. Based on what I've read and this article, it doesn't sound like that much will change once it officially "launches" a Swedish site, although maybe Amazon will lower the minimum amount for free shipping or speed up regular shipping time. Re: this article, I can see them being willing to hold off for quite some time. Also to note: During the Covid-19 peak in Sweden, Amazon provided to-the-door delivery using Postnord, which I figured was somewhat of an experiment for when the Swedish site launched. It's pretty rare here in e-commerce to get door deliveries - most online shopping is sent to local convenience stores and you need to go and pick up.

redgc 6y ago
Something I forgot to add: Sweden does have some great gig worker to-the-door delivery companies that have sprung up, particularly around small items like from online pharmacies. When you fulfill an order using those companies they typically have a great monitoring app to track where your delivery is, to input your building door code if necessary, inform you when it's been left outside your door, etc. I always find it a great contrast to compare to premium shipping companies like DHL and FedEx, whenever I'm unlucky enough to get a delivery from them from overseas. They're still stuck in a world of "we'll deliver between 9am and 6pm, be ready" and they also make little attempt to ask for door codes if you live in the inner city, so most first attempts end up with "premises was not accessible" with no convenient way to give them the four digit code they need. I spent 1+ hour on hold last week with DHL and FedEx for this exact purpose. It will be interesting to see how "modern" of an approach Amazon takes.
- distances 6y ago
  Germany has interesting approach for this: if you can't be reached, the delivery will be left to whichever neighbour or coffee shop happens to accept it. You'll get notified where it was left, and then just go knocking. It's quite weird at first but in my experience works surprisingly well. Very rarely one has to go queue in the post office to collect the parcel.

guerrilla 6y ago

Assuming that local production reduces costs, the question seems to become whether they can leverage demand to break the unions or not. This comes from the two further assumptions that they don't have any other leverage to do so (outside of corruption) and even though the benefit of satsifying the market presumably outststrips the cost, they will do everything they can to reduce costs anyway. Am I missing anything? I'll continue supporting the local competition (for books and media) in any case.

jeltz 6y ago
How would they be able to leverage demand? I can't see our politicians wanting to get involved in this fight, especially not on Amazon's side. Why would they want to support Amazon against both unions and againast Swedish companies? I think they will just remove themselves from the conflict and let it play out. I can't see a scenario where Amazon does not have to agree to collective bargaining.
- guerrilla 6y ago
  Swedish naiveté always amazes me.
  - Jolter 6y ago
    Feel free to explain a plausible scenario where Amazon wins an all-out fight with the unions, then.
    - Yetanfou 6y ago
      Very simple, they'll just stage most operations outside of Sweden but inside the EU and run deliveries to Sweden that way. More or less like things are now, really.
      - Jolter 6y ago
        I don’t see how they will win the marketplace then. Delivery will be slower than their local competitors, presumably.

eckesicle 6y ago

I think the union rep from Handels is correct. They'll get Amazon to cave. Amazon is the quintessential hill to die on for the unions and the labour laws are incredibly strong in Sweden. Here's how I think it might play out if Amazon refuses to sign: - Handels requests collective bargaining - Amazon declines but are sued in court and loses (you are required to bargain) - Negotiations fail and Amazon refuses to sign - The union realises that this is their David v Goliath and blockades the company - Amazon refuses to cave - The union declares widespread "sympathetic strikes". - in the end garbage collectors will refuse to pick up garbage at their warehouse. Electricians will refuse to service their warehouse. Plumbers will not plumb. Workers, builders, postmen etc will all simply stop servicing Amazon. Companies that deal with Amazon can also be put in a blockade. - Amazon will also receive zero support for from politicians for two reasons, first it's not a political matter. Second even the right wing opposition party will know better than to go against the electorate on this matter. It's simply not possible to operate a large scale business in Sweden without support of the labour unions (or by having workers conditions that exceed the perceived minimum). If a large scale business wants to operate in the country they _must_ sign a collective bargaining agreement.

Cederfjard 6y ago
For a case study, look up Toys R Us' entry into Sweden.
- spindle 6y ago
  Could you suggest something specific to read please? Thank you.
  - bildung 6y ago
    https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/03/18/sweden-retail-unions_n_6888328.html https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/03/18/sweden-retail-union... TL;DR: refusal to sign a collective agreement escalated into an all-out boycott of the company. In the end, the workers won. "Toys “R” Us was both an exception to the rule —even McDonald's was forced to sign a collective agreement — and a warning for other corporations that they must adapt to the Swedish model or fail"

mikkelam 6y ago

I order quite a bit from amazon.de to Denmark, hoping this will be a better experience. I do feel quite bad knowing how the german workers are treated at the warehouse/fulfillment centers, I am definitely hoping Swedens labor unions can make a dent here while still keeping the price low enough.

TazeTSchnitzel 6y ago

If the quality of item descriptions is anything like Amazon.DE's right now, maybe other Swedish online retailers don't need to worry too much. It's already possible for me to buy from Amazon in Sweden (Amazon.DE ships to Sweden, using PostNord no less), but the listings are poor quality and you can't trust it. I only use it as a last resort. (Mind you, I also avoid Amazon because I don't like their business practices.) It should also be mentioned that e-commerce is easier in Sweden than in some other countries. The ubiquity of electronic ID, the national address database and rapid bank transfers mean that even if you do not use PayPal, creating an account and ordering with a new website is very quick and requires entering almost no personal details yourself. Many websites even let you pay by invoice.

legulere 6y ago

Let’s hope it work out like toysˋrˋus: https://apnews.com/6d245065b3faaadc70e6eb77e3e5c20f https://apnews.com/6d245065b3faaadc70e6eb77e3e5c20f

alkonaut 6y ago

Agree that Amazon won't upend the Swedish labor market model. But do they really need to do that to operate with a healthy profit? And if they think they need to revolutionize the labor market to be profitable (enough), would they really establish a presence in Sweden then? My feeling is they'll establish a business like everyone else and not even try to pull a Toys'R'Us.

nabla9 6y ago
They don't because the Swedish and European union organization is not as confrontational in company level as US style enterprise bargaining is. Sweden has mostly sectoral bargaining. Many/most things are negotiated between the unions and trade associations, not between union and individual enterprise. When Amazon sits to talk with unions (70% of workers belong to union), they discover that many things have been settled in a bigger table.

gohbgl 6y ago

Thanks to strong unions and labor laws Sweden is the worker's paradise and everybody has a great job. If Amazon wants to entice people to work for them then they must make a better offer than all* existing employers. What is there for the unions to negotiate? Please don't bash me for the cynicism. I am trying to figure out the logic behind all of this. * edit: What meant say is that Amazon must offer a job that's better than the jobs that people currently have for them to switch.

CuriousSkeptic 6y ago
“The Swedish model” is to put laws like this in place mostly to level the negotiation positions of the parties. What rules to actually apply is expected to be negotiated between the unions and the employers on top of that. (As a side note the current government is actually just about to abolish one of the corner stones of those laws (“LAS”, the law of employment protection). Due to a deal they cut with the opposition parties in order to be allowed to form government)
- oxymoron 6y ago
  I’m not sure it’s really a corner stone. Saltsjöbadsavtalen and the Swedish model of collective bargaining came much earlier. Amuingly, LAS was introduced by a liberal goverment against the protests of the social democrats who felt that it infringed on the bargaining power of the unions.
  - CuriousSkeptic 6y ago
    Ok, I guess that makes more sense then. I was really surprised to see S (LO) agree to that deal.
xorcist 6y ago
Sweden hasn't got as many labor laws as you would imagine. There are no minimum wages, for instance. It's all "voluntary" agreements with the unions. Pretty standard things though, limits on wages, work hours and such. These agreements are not so much voluntary of course, since without an agreement in place it's hard to do any business in the country at all. Some try out of stubbornness but it's just an expensive way to accomplish nothing. The alternative would be meddling politicians and nobody wants that. Unions are expected to have a bit more domain knowledge, and these agreements are re-negotiated every few years to get rid of obsolete rules and introduce new ones. It helps that the labor unions are centralized, professionalized, and has vested interests in the long term survival of the companies they regulate, because of the trust required to make it work. If it is a good system I do not know, but it does provide for a stable labor market with almost no strikes, for which an agreement is a small price to pay.