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Amazon Is Forcing Its Warehouse Workers into Brutal 'Megacycle' Shifts
- bluedino 6y agoThis is a 4x10, 3rd shift schedule which is pretty normal for factory/warehouse jobs.
- ceilingcorner 6y agoAccording to the article, employees previously not on the 3rd shift schedule were given a week to either agree to it or lose their jobs. I don't know about you, but if my employer said I had to start working 1:20am to 11:50am within a week or lose my job, I'd be pretty angry too. Especially if I was a warehouse worker making a low salary that couldn't afford to find a new job easily.
- mc32 6y agoI think you’re both right. Some people love these schedules _if_ they don’t have other commitments (like a second job or child care, etc). But making it mandatory and not making it elective, usually with some incentive (like 25% premium), is a bit predatory, or at least strong arming workers.
- efsavage 6y agoSounds like that's kind of the point, you impose a policy only a certain type of worker can manage. The fact that this type of worker skews cheaper and more flexible (younger, single, no kids, lower cost of living, etc.) is probably not a coincidence.
- mc32 6y agoWhen I was in my late teens I briefly worked in a warehouse. Work was okay. Pay for what it was was okay. I would _not_ have liked an abrupt no options policy like this imposed. At least make it palatable with a premium per shift as well as make it optional. Ramming it like this will only make people resent it. In a non surveillance world, I’m certain shrinkage would go up from either theft or from intentional mishandling/damage.
- batmaniam 6y agoI don't think the point of the article was to normalize this schedule for 'factory workers'. To me, it's trying to say that this is an unhealthy way of life, and should not be implemented or tolerated in the workplace. Those people need better labor rights From the article: "Megacycle isn't not just bad for lifestyle reasons," a warehouse worker at a delivery station in Queens, New York and a member of the group Amazonians United NYC, told Motherboard. "It's bad for your body. I don't think everyone can handle this."
- KozmoNau7 6y agoBack when I worked on a rotating 8 hour shift schedule in a NOC, we had a very thorough introduction on how to handle such a schedule, plus the health effects and tips on how to deal with the sleep cycle changes and so on. There were regular medical checkups, we got hazard pay and the NOC had a workout room, massage chairs and everything. Even with all of that, it beat the hell out of me, and I was doing glorified office work, no hard physical work at all. The average graveyard shift security guard or warehouse worker will presumably have none of those benefits, and will be so much worse off.
- matz1 6y agoThats the point of the comment, to show counter argument/view.
- _Understated_ 6y agoFrom September 2020 I had to work at an Amazon Warehouse in the UK. Nightshift. Our shifts were 4 x 10.5 with two 30 mins breaks (which you only got paid for one!) It was absolute shite and the toughest job I've ever done but, hey, I kept my roof over my head. It's not nice but unfortunately when you don't have a job and prospects suck then they hold all the cards :(
- sthnblllII 6y agoThats not an accident. Offshoring and immigration have killed the ability of labor to walk when given terrible choices like this.
- yunohn 6y ago> Offshoring and immigration That is a straw man. Instead, corporates need to be forced to follow labor laws and respect human rights.
- ku-man 6y ago"...corporates need to be forced to follow labor laws and respect human rights." You dirty commie, why you don't move to North Korea?
- sthnblllII 6y agoIncreasing supply and reducing demand lowers the price. Thats why everyone who opposes immigration and offshoring is called a racist by corporate media.
- tuxxy 6y agoAre you really coming on HN to try and blame immigrants for this? Do you know the kind of contributions immigrants have had in this industry? Do you know how important open immigration has been to the rise of tech?
- throwaway3699 6y ago
- nickpinkston 6y agoYea, when I ran a factory, our team preferred the 4x10 to 5x8 by a long shot.
- clajiness 6y agoI don't think that's the point being debated.
- kleiba 6y agoThat would be illegal in Germany: your regular work hours must not exceed 8hrs per day.
- yyy888sss 6y agoWhat about the fact it's in the middle of the night? I'd much rather work longer hours during the day than start at 2 am.
- asiando 6y ago8 hours of work already mean about 10 hours dedicated to work, including commute and preparation. It’s 18 hours if you include sleeping and you only have 6 hours left for “recreation,” which must also include personal errands, cooking and cleaning. If you work 10/12 hour shifts you have no life. No wonder people await the weekend like it’s air.
- pochamago 6y agoReally? That is interesting, although I can't say it would be preferable for me. I've had plenty of times when 4x10 was a good fit for my lifestyle. I've got a co-worker who currently does 3x12 and really seems to like it.
- iggldiggl 6y agoThe daily limit is actually 10 h, the 8 h-limit only applies to the average daily working hours measured across the last six months (or a different period of up to a year by agreement). Additionally, the average working hours are calculated based on the official six-day working week, which means that anything up to 48 h/week still remains fully within the legal limit. 3x12 on the other would be illegal on the other hand, unless it includes a significant amount of on-call duty or falls within one of the other permitted exceptions (which probably wouldn't apply to your co-worker, though).
- dominotw 6y agomy current job is 3*10. That won't be allowed in germany ?
- ceilingcorner 6y agoAmerican culture is optimized for consumers. When you're a consumer, it's a great thing: customer service, return policies, payment methods, and the entire process of buying stuff is leaps and bounds above somewhere like the European Union. When you're a worker, though, no one particularly cares about you. If a CEO can squeeze more profit out of his workforce by forcing them to work odd hours at the drop of a hat, he's celebrated for it. We really need to shift this balance in the opposite direction.
- pklausler 6y agoWhere are you getting this great customer service? I'd like to get in on some of that.
- ceilingcorner 6y agoAmerican customer service is leaps and bounds above anything you get in Europe. And I don't mean restaurant service. Europe as a whole is much more worker-first than customer-first.
- danaris 6y agoI guess one might have to do some definition of terms here. Is "customer service" where a customer gets to call/walk in and talk to a human who genuinely tries to help them solve their problems, or where a customer gets to call/walk in and treat someone like absolute shit in order to feel better about their problems? 'Cause "customer service" in the US is all too often used to mean the latter.
- asiando 6y agoService itself is pretty good compared to the EU. Consumer protection for goods however isn’t. Most products in the EU must come with a 2-year consumer warranty for example.
- dimatura 6y agoI sympathize with these workers. But if this can be seen an indictment of American culture, then all in all, maybe things aren't so bad. I worked a construction job for a summer in Chile where we had 12-hour shifts, 5 days a week, and every week we alternated between day (8am-8pm) and night (8pm-8am) shifts. And I had it easy, because I lived close to the site - a lot of the other workers had 1+ hour commutes each way.
- exmadscientist 6y agoSerious question: if these jobs are so awful, and they do sound awful, why are people taking them? I can think of several possible answers, but I haven't the faintest clue which ones are (most) right.
- ceilingcorner 6y ago...because most people don't get to be picky about their jobs. They take whatever they can get. Especially during a pandemic / economic crisis.
- CyanBird 6y agoEven before the pandemic there were lines worth of people entering on these low quality jobs, this is not a consequence of the pandemic itself, it has just further highlighted the issue of service based economies and poorer wages/standard of living for working class people in higher income countries
- ssdspoimdsjvv 6y agoBecause people have bills to pay.
- SkyMarshal 6y agoBecause the American middle class has been eviscerated by globalization, pandemic, etc and these are the best, er least bad, jobs available to many of them. They don’t have any leverage or bargaining power, collective or individual.
- maerF0x0 6y ago+1 I have long been saying that part of why American jobs are so bad is because people keep taking them. Of course, this does ignore the realities of why they keep taking them. Getting people to a place where they can say "No" to a bad deal should be a major goal for progressives and conservatives alike because it fits their model of how the world works -- progressives want people to have the stability of life and "good jobs" and conservatives like it when market forces are reasonably at play (enough workers are saying "no" to bad jobs and "yes" to good jobs)
- troyvit 6y agoJust cancelled my Prime membership a few weeks ago. It's funny how addicted our family was and also how free we feel now.
- random5634 6y agoI actually left an early job because it didn't offer a 4x10. 4x10 is amazing. Your work days are your work days, but the extra day off is amazing. You can actually go do stuff. My own view - everyone should switch to 4x10 or at least have it as an option. Now I'm working crazy hours so all a dream anyways these days. Note 4x10 shifts are not new in warehousing (or even in mfg).
- alteria 6y agoPresumably this was an office job? It might be a little different with a warehouse job that has very productivity targets set from above.
- random5634 6y agoYes. No disagreement there. However, I used to do some other work where I was on longer but thought less. In this other job I'd put headsets on and just listen to podcasts and music while working, and when I was done, I was DONE. Any problems were someone elses to deal with. One problem I have with office work is that it can be hard to leave "at the office" when you are behind. People expect problems to be solved, and if you don't solve them they wait for you the next morning. This has really impacted me badly at times (trouble sleeping etc). My dream scenario - 4x10 and then somehow have no risk of stuff hanging over me to get done the next week!
- mey 6y agoIs that better/worse with manual labor? In software dev, I tend to fluctuate how productive I can be for an extended period, so being useful (instead of just ass in seat) for 10 hours seems rough. Granted some days I go for 12 but that's unhealthy and mostly because I get into a groove I am not interested in breaking.
- oflannabhra 6y agoI’ve worked the following: 4x10 - desk job overnight 3x12 - desk job overnight 5x8 - manual job 4x10 - manual job 5x8 - desk job 4x10 beat 5x8, regardless of workload. I wish I could do it now.
- FrozenVoid 6y agoUS is reverting to early 20th century labor market norms, thanks to 'gig' economy and megacorps subverting unions. https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/22/tech/amazon-nlrb-union-election/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2021/01/22/tech/amazon-nlrb-union-el... Only thing missing is union-busting Pinkerton thugs... https://www.npr.org/2020/11/30/940196997/amazon-reportedly-has-pinkerton-agents-surveil-workers-who-try-to-form-unions https://www.npr.org/2020/11/30/940196997/amazon-reportedly-h...
- dusyshhhdudu 6y agoAs a gig worker I hope it stays, gig work has been a massive quality of life improvement for me. I think if the unions want to compete with us that's fine but the state shouldn't get to pick the winner.
- tomcam 6y agoI would love to hear more from you about this. It’s different from my intuition even though I too work for myself.
- 93po 6y agoThe state is there to look after its people (in theory). If gig work doesn't provide livable wages and drives down wages or job availability for people looking for livable wages then it shouldn't be allowed
- SkyMarshal 6y agoAs a brand new account can you prove you're actually a gig worker, and not some PR firm working for Uber to manage the online conversation about this topic?
- yibg 6y agoWhat are you expecting as proof exactly? Government issued ID and payment from a gig?
- 6y ago
- standardUser 6y agoThis is a great example of how labor laws in the US are weak (deal with this sudden, dramatic change to your schedule or you're fired). It is also an example of how employers take great advantage of those weak labor laws. It is not, however, an example of how big corporations are evil. There's plenty of examples of that out there, this just isn't one. But for some reason is is surprisingly common for people to blame companies for following the law instead of blaming the actual culprit - the (arguably) bad laws made by (arguably) bad lawmakers. You see this everywhere, but for some reason it's especially common on HN.
- ceilingcorner 6y agoI don't do lots of bad things, even though I have the legal right to do so. Is it so much to ask the same of Amazon?
- standardUser 6y agoYes, it is too much to ask a corporation to sacrifice it's own self-interest to be nice. That is why every nation in the world has thousands of laws regulating economic activity.
- vangelis 6y agoRegulations are written in blood. This seems like blaming OSHA for poor safety when an incident they hadn't yet considered happens.
- AlexandrB 6y agoA lot of times employers help write or weaken those labor laws (see proposition 22 in California). I'm not sure they can shrug their shoulders and say: "Aw shucks guys, we're just following the rules!".
- tobmlt 6y agoOne of my first jobs was for a small engineering shop. Paid about 55k a year in 2010 dollars. It did pay overtime, that should have been my first warning. They hired me with the promise of 4x10 work-weeks. What happened in reality is that we came in at 7 am, worked to 6pm (or whenever "the boss" was ready to go home) with a 30 minute lunch, and then on Friday, ..."well we are behind so we need to come in again this week"... almost every week (there were a few exceptions) we worked all day Friday as well. Oh, and how about a half day Saturday many weeks. Once during my short time there, we had a solid week or more (hard to remember due to sleep deprivation and depression fogged recollections of this time) going at 90+ hours per week on a project. It was absolutely insane and I got out as soon as I could, trying to convince as many co-workers as I could (in practice only the young guys) that they were being gaslighted into thinking they had a good job. Luckily I was underemployed for my education level, and single; thus it was easy to get out of this, for there was no way to think sharply, keep proper food in the house, work out enough, etc., at this pace.
- gigatexal 6y agoIf there was ever a case for a humanoid robot it would be for packing packages in a warehouse. Same for agriculture harvesting: the back breaking nature of picking strawberries could be done by a robot with hands that have the same dexterity and nuance as a human.
- danaris 6y agoWhy is either of these a case for a humanoid robot, and not a specialized robot? Humanoid is a pretty awful design for any specific task; it's just that we've evolved and learn to be good at many tasks. In the warehouse, you can adjust the design of the warehouse a relatively small amount to ensure that the robots can easily store and retrieve the packages—which come in a finite number of standard sizes and shapes, which in turn can be adjusted to ensure they pack well while still leaving room for the robot's grasping arm/claw/whatever to grab it. Depending on the specific designs, it may be worthwhile to combine the store-and-retrieve robot with the carry-cart. It's certainly not going to be more effective to have a humanoid robot that has to climb up ladders, rather than some sort of wheeled or tank-treaded robot that can anchor itself to the floor and extend a telescoping part of it up to get or leave the package. For picking strawberries, even if we accept that you want "hands with the same dexterity and nuance as a human", why would those hands do best attached to a human body? Strawberry plants are pretty low to the ground, so why not put them on a little rolling bot that can go between the rows right at berry-level? No; the best case for a humanoid robot is in human-facing positions. We like to interact with people, and a robot (note, not a human-level AI: a robot; human-level AI gets into serious ethical and philosophical quandaries real fast) doesn't care if you yell and scream at it. It'll just keep saying, "Yes, sir. Please give me your account number so I can proceed," for hours on end if need be.
- krapp 6y agoAmazon is testing automation for picking, stowing and palletizing but none of them are humanoid. They still have human workers to do the jobs that require manual dexterity and "wetware AI," which both reduces the cost of the automation and reduces the value of human labor. Win win for Amazon, lose for the employees.
- gigatexal 6y ago
- nobodyandproud 6y agoBestbuy, Target, Costco, and even Walmart are what I try to order from. Waiting a few extra days is a small cost.
- khalilravanna 6y agoFrom the article it sounds like the spirit behind this decision is to better serve the customer by hitting fast delivery times more. Is this really such an important thing for people? I for one would rather wait an extra day if it meant there weren’t countless workers having their schedules destroyed. I’d be interested to see the percentage of people complaining about slow delivery times vs the percentage of people who choose the “slow” shipping option on amazon.
- pavel_lishin 6y ago> Is this really such an important thing for people? I for one would rather wait an extra day if it meant there weren’t countless workers having their schedules destroyed. I'd wager that most of Amazon's customers aren't aware that there's even a trolley problem to solve here.
- sgpl 6y agoUnfortunately customers don't have direct insight into what goes on behind the scenes to make the supply chains more efficient. They are shielded from the exploitation that exists and for the most part don't care after the initial shock of learning about such exploitation. My simple understanding of why this happens is: they move on to other things, convenience trumps everything else, there's so much bad stuff happening in the world that we don't really have the cognitive bandwidth to think about everything, a lot of times we can't really affect change so that doesn't help matters either. Eg: Cloth factories in India/China/Bangladesh; Electronic manufacturing factories such as Foxconn, etc.
- AlexandrB 6y agoWhat makes me laugh about this is that the Amazon customer experience is degrading in so many other, more important (to me) ways. * Reviews are no longer trustworthy - subject to spam, altered product listings, and "discounts" (read bribes) paid to purchasers for positive reviews. * Counterfeits are still rampant. * Products regularly arrive damaged because they're not packaged well (usually tossed in an envelope). * Amazon Prime cancellation process is becoming Kafkaesque. Given the above, even if Amazon could do 1-hour delivery, I don't want to buy anything from them. Maybe they should focus more on some of these other problems instead of running their warehouse staff into the ground.
- jjk166 6y ago> But labor experts say the move to consolidate shifts in the warehouse industry is a tactic long used by employers to cut back on labor costs; hiring and scheduling fewer workers for longer shifts means paying for fewer benefits. It's still 40 hours per person per week, and they run 24/7, so the only way this could reduce the number of benefits they have to pay for is if people on this schedule legitimately work better. While this could very well be the case (doctors and nurses for example typically work long shifts to reduce the risks associated with shift changes), I don't really see that being the case here where it doesn't really matter who is handling a package. Further, the alternative scenario with lots of shorter shifts is a frequent predatory practice which allows employers to hire lots of part time individuals who do not qualify for benefits as well as giving them leverage over their employees by threatening to give them bad shifts and insufficient hours. It would be one thing if day shift workers were being asked to switch back and forth between day and night shifts with short notice, but that's not what's happening here. They are being offered a different position with steady hours to completely replace their current one. It would be silly to say that once you've accepted a day shift position you're ineligible from being offered a night shift position. The article also frames this as exploiting existing workers who will get fired if they don't comply. But would it have been better for either the employees or amazon to just lay off everyone at the closing location and fill the new warehouses with all new hires, thus forcing those who would have been fine with working there into a difficult job market and depriving Amazon of skilled employees? One might make the argument that the current warehouse should not have been closed in the first place, but the factors which caused that decision and its merits are beyond the scope of this discussion. Regardless, giving everyone the voluntary option to remain employed in some capacity when closing a facility is, at least in my opinion, good practice which should not be vilified.
- gavin_gee 6y agoVice.com with the clickbait divisive headlines.
- sys_64738 6y agoUnionize.
- jaybrendansmith 6y agoI really don't understand this either. I worked a wonderful 12 hour shift once, switching between days and nights every 2 weeks. Some weeks I had 5 days off, it was fantastic, and the frequency of day/night allowed for normal weekends.