9 ms·

Amazon is offering competitive wages (especially for Albama's cost of living), and benefits from day one. Maybe a majority of the workers there prefer the stat

by dannyw 6y ago

Amazon is offering competitive wages (especially for Albama's cost of living), and benefits from day one. Maybe a majority of the workers there prefer the status quo?

sammorrowdrums 6y ago
I would be willing to listen to that line of argument, but having seen the Amazon manager training videos, the doitwithoutdues.com site, the countless other articles, evidence and anecdotes about Amazon's particularly aggressive forms of trying to prevent unionisation, the twitter ambassadors tweeting the official talking points etc. I don't think we can rule out the possibility we don't actually know what the employees truly think because they're in the middle of an all out propaganda war. And I certainly don't think Amazon would put so much effort into fighting this if their employee treatment, benefits and compensation and general employer track record made employees genuinely not even consider the Union option. As an outsider, it just feels like watching media reporting a war. I don't trust it due to propaganda and clearly opposing biases at play between the interested parties.
- refurb 6y ago
  Voting goes the way I think it should = people rationally voted for their best interest despite all the propaganda Voting doesn't go the way I think it should = people were clearly swayed by propaganda and didn't vote in their best interest Either we treat people like adults and trust their voting or we don't. One doesn't get to pick and choose which voting is "right".
  - Dobbs 6y ago
    In the article it was made very clear that this wasn't about propaganda, what is being alleged is that they have evidence that Amazon threatened and coerced people into voting against the union. Propaganda may or may not be dirty, but threats of firings, plant closure, etc if the Union passes is illegal. Very very different.
    - refurb 6y ago
      Did you read the comment I was replying to? It wasn’t talking about threats it was talking about Amazon’s anti-union campaign.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - jiminymcmoogley 6y ago
    Lots of propaganda and dark pattern stuff I saw with my own two eyes used in the campaign, and now possibly even coercion (compulsion to act involuntarily under threat of force) = people may or may not have voted rationally in their best interest despite or because of all the propaganda. my opinion on the result irrelevant either way. in fact i dont even need to mention it, it's that irrelevant. the outcome of the election itself was compromised and there is no magic time travel button to find out what would have happened if we did it over. therefore we must take the results at face value and just really really hope as hard as we can that this is the same outcome as it would have been otherwise Not lots of propaganda and dark pattern etc etc = people rationally voted for their best interest, again regardless of my opinion on the result Either we treat elections like they matter and dont unduly manipulate the outcome or we don't. One doesn't get to pick and choose which elections are "questionably carried out"
- chrisseaton 6y ago
  > And I certainly don't think Amazon would put so much effort into fighting this if their employee treatment, benefits and compensation and general employer track record made employees genuinely not even consider the Union option. You can say the same thing about any political campaign! Do you think people must not really want Joe Biden as president because he had to spend $6 billion to persuade them through campaigning?
  - nraynaud 6y ago
    it's a bit different, voting for a Democrat president is excluding the Republican one. When you vote for an union, you absolutely do not vote for your employer to become an asshole, it's not "either the union make the employer improve employees work OR the employer does it on its own". The union and the employer could create an alliance to make life better for the employees. Look at what police unions and conservative towns have done, unionized policemen can literally get away with murder. There is no exclusive choice as to who should plan bathrooms breaks for runners and drivers: either the employer, or the union, as long as people stop having to pee in a bottle, you could even have a coalition with a giant conspiracy to have employee go to the bathroom when they need to.
  - hnbad 6y ago
    > Do you think people must not really want Joe Biden as president because he had to spend $6 billion to persuade them through campaigning? Unironically, yes. But that doesn't mean they would have wanted Trump.
- wdn 6y ago
  One of my neighbor works fir Amazon warehouse here in NJ, he is quite happy, never heard him complain about it. Yeap, I agreed with you. The media is untrustworthy and is a propaganda machine. Good thing is they are digging their own grave now.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - rovr138 6y ago
    Have you looked at social media? Most people live by appearances and fake a lot of emotions. Not saying this is the case with your neighbor, but if they’re just a neighbor, not a close friend, they might simply not feel okay talking about it with you.
  - Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
    I despise my job, but I'm unskilled and considering my pay, benefits, and responsibilities it's the best compromise I've found. I'd tell you, and my coworkers, that I'm happy. But I'm lying and no one wants to hear me complain about the bad hand life has dealt me so I put my face on and pretend, like just about everyone else.
- bko 6y ago
  The union is free to pay Amazon employees $15 an hour to watch their propaganda videos. This paternalism of low wage employees needs to stop. They can make up their own mind and actually have skin in the game as opposed to some tech worker making 10x as much telling them they're being brainwashed
  - geofft 6y ago
    Why are you deeply concerned about paternalism from tech workers who aren't even in contact with the employees in question and are just posting on a message board, and not concerned about potentially-illegal paternalism from the bosses of the employees?
  - claudiawerner 6y ago
    Of course they can make up their own mind - but simply pointing out the existence of propaganda and other factors at play, and the fact that ideology plays a large role in our lives, does not imply 'brainwashing' as much as ideological forces. The tug-of-war between labour and capital has been raging for centuries, and at no time hitherto is it more visible that it has graduated to the ideological battlefield when Amazon starts putting up posters and training their employees on otherwise hilarious videos to push their point of view. And I think anyone should point that out - whether it's a union organizer in Alabama, a tech worker making 10x the salary (who, by the way, may also have an interest in improving cultural support for unions if they are a tech worker in favour of software engineer unions) or a historian on capital-labour relations. As far as I know, however, no tech worker has contacted anyone in Alabama and told them they're brainwashed. 'Paternalism' would be someone pushing the ballot for them 'for their own interests'. That does not preclude discussion of priorities, rationality, and the rational frameworks (epistemological/ideological/moral/practical/etc.) we have available to discuss how wise those decisions are.
    - refurb 6y ago
      ”simply pointing out the existence of propaganda” Why do you assume only you can see that’s it’s propaganda and they can’t?
andybak 6y ago
Maybe. Maybe not. Once it's determined whether this was a fair vote, we'll know for sure I guess. > The RWDSU submitted nearly two dozen objections to Amazon's conduct during the election, which it said prevented employees from a "free and uncoerced exercise of choice" on whether to create the company's first U.S. union.
robobro 6y ago
As an iww organizer with friends across the US in Amazon warehouse management and on the ground- no Unions are just bringing democracy into capitalism. How can any red blooded American oppose them? Edit: not sure why I'm being down voted, did I say something offensive??
- esyir 6y ago
  You have democracy in your capitalism already, that's what your elected government and their regulations are.
  - gspr 6y ago
    And who's to say that that has to be the only one? (Except that there's not even just one; there's a wide range of elections from the national level, to the local, or even maybe down to your city block in some places).
- chrisseaton 6y ago
  > Unions are just bringing democracy into capitalism. How can any red blooded American oppose them? Well they had a democratic vote and decided they did not want to be represented by this union. That's democracy working.
  - Dobbs 6y ago
    In the article it is made very clear that what is being alleged is that it wasn't a democratic vote. What is being alleged is that Amazon threatened to close the warehouse, and/or fire people based upon how they vote. Something that if I understand correctly is illegal, and even if not illegal is definitely not a democratic vote.
    - chrisseaton 6y ago
      > If you read the article It's against the site rules here to suggest people haven't read the article - please don't do this. I was replying to a parent comment which said 'how can anyone oppose a union'. Some people legitimately don't want to have to deal with a union, for any of many reasons. For example because the union supports political goals they don't agree with, or because the union favours other employees over them, or they just don't want to have to deal with two overlords, neither of which may be working to their benefit. If they're asked and they say 'no thanks' then the union should just say 'ok thanks for letting us know' and leave them alone. There's a weird attitude amongst unions that there is no possible way anyone could not want to be represented by them. That leads them to accuse any vote against them of being illegitimate.
LatteLazy 6y ago
I try not to have a strong opinion about amazon workers, because I am not an amazon worker, so it isn't my business. If they want to unionised, that's their right, if not, that's their right too. That said, I was deeply unsurprised by the result of the vote. I looked at the pay and benefits and thought "I wouldn't rock the boat if I were them". It seems odd to me that people think a union would be popular here. Unions I've dealt with were a nightmare of politics and ineffectiveness. Partly that's their own problem, partly its a result of legal frameworks that they're stuck in. I was also surprised how much of a fuss people made about Amazon when 101 other companies are worse and older and get a free pass (Walmart still has more employees than amazon in the US I think). I think this and other issues around big tech (Google and competition, Apple and supply chains) are more about their failures to engage in PR than them actually being worse than average. I wonder if we will see a move from all/any of them to plug this gap in their moats
MomoXenosaga 6y ago
One analysis in a local newspaper was something that blew my mind: in the US your health insurance is tied to your employer?!. Just think about how absolutely insane that is. Your boss has life or death power over you and your loved ones. Apparently that's how Amazon was able to threaten it's workers.
- djbebs 6y ago
  There is nothing stopping you from buying your own health insurance. You used to be able to go without, but thanks to Obama care that is now not an option, and you are forced to do business with insurers
  - enkid 6y ago
    Imagine a world where being able to not have access to healthcare is a good thing.
    - IntelMiner 6y ago
      Americans always say it should be "their choice" and I just feel like I'm staring at an incomplete jigsaw puzzle Like. It's your choice to...go bankrupt or die from a treatable illness? I don't know what they expect non-Americans to draw from that line of reasoning
      - deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
      - infamia 6y ago
        Before WWII, people in the U.S. bought catastrophic insurance and generally paid for their medical care out of pocket without much trouble. This kind of insurance was around $80/month or less in my state before Obamacare was implemented (it doubled after that). Before WWII, everyone simply paid for common Doctor visits and relied on their insurance for larger bills. After WWII, the US made gave employers tax incentives to provide insurance, which in hindsight was a huge mistake.
zelon88 6y ago
"Competitive" wages are a form of slavery. It means you don't truly consider the employees value. You just pay him 15 cents more than the guy down the street.
- Jyaif 6y ago
  But then the guy down the street will have no one to employ, so he'll have to pay 15 cents more than the other guy, and so on and so forth.
geofft 6y ago
Maybe! If so, a free, fair, and legal vote will tell us that!
heymijo 6y ago
> Maybe a majority of the workers there prefer the status quo? Analysis showed this is what happened. Please don't mistake that to mean the status quo is good. There is an enormous power imbalance between Amazon and the laborers in Bessemer, Alabama. This has happened many, many times throughout American history. Coal towns are a canonical example of holding all the cards against labor. The hallmarks of that relationship exist here.
- pydry 6y ago
  IIRC amazon managed to swing it so the cohort voting was dominated by newbies who got hit only by the anti union propaganda, hadn't yet suffered the worst excesses from management and were keen to not rock the boat and lose the job they'd just gotten.
  - heymijo 6y ago
    That’s good context. Thank you. It speaks to the power imbalance.
Kneecaps07 6y ago
If this is what the workers got without a union, imagine how much better it could be with a union negotiating on their behalf?
Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
>Amazon is offering competitive wages (especially for Albama's cost of living), and benefits from day one. No. Amazon does not. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/18/business/economy/amazon-wages-alabama-union.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/18/business/economy/amazon-w... >The most recent figure for the median wage in greater Birmingham, a metropolitan area of roughly one million people that includes Bessemer, was nearly $3 above Amazon’s pay there, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
- LatteLazy 6y ago
  Exactly. You can work at amazon with zero skills and be only 3 dollars behind the median of a population full of doctors and lawyers...

by dannyw 6y ago

Amazon is offering competitive wages (especially for Albama's cost of living), and benefits from day one. Maybe a majority of the workers there prefer the status quo?

sammorrowdrums 6y ago

I would be willing to listen to that line of argument, but having seen the Amazon manager training videos, the doitwithoutdues.com site, the countless other articles, evidence and anecdotes about Amazon's particularly aggressive forms of trying to prevent unionisation, the twitter ambassadors tweeting the official talking points etc. I don't think we can rule out the possibility we don't actually know what the employees truly think because they're in the middle of an all out propaganda war. And I certainly don't think Amazon would put so much effort into fighting this if their employee treatment, benefits and compensation and general employer track record made employees genuinely not even consider the Union option. As an outsider, it just feels like watching media reporting a war. I don't trust it due to propaganda and clearly opposing biases at play between the interested parties.

refurb 6y ago
Voting goes the way I think it should = people rationally voted for their best interest despite all the propaganda Voting doesn't go the way I think it should = people were clearly swayed by propaganda and didn't vote in their best interest Either we treat people like adults and trust their voting or we don't. One doesn't get to pick and choose which voting is "right".
- Dobbs 6y ago
  In the article it was made very clear that this wasn't about propaganda, what is being alleged is that they have evidence that Amazon threatened and coerced people into voting against the union. Propaganda may or may not be dirty, but threats of firings, plant closure, etc if the Union passes is illegal. Very very different.
  - refurb 6y ago
    Did you read the comment I was replying to? It wasn’t talking about threats it was talking about Amazon’s anti-union campaign.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- jiminymcmoogley 6y ago
  Lots of propaganda and dark pattern stuff I saw with my own two eyes used in the campaign, and now possibly even coercion (compulsion to act involuntarily under threat of force) = people may or may not have voted rationally in their best interest despite or because of all the propaganda. my opinion on the result irrelevant either way. in fact i dont even need to mention it, it's that irrelevant. the outcome of the election itself was compromised and there is no magic time travel button to find out what would have happened if we did it over. therefore we must take the results at face value and just really really hope as hard as we can that this is the same outcome as it would have been otherwise Not lots of propaganda and dark pattern etc etc = people rationally voted for their best interest, again regardless of my opinion on the result Either we treat elections like they matter and dont unduly manipulate the outcome or we don't. One doesn't get to pick and choose which elections are "questionably carried out"
chrisseaton 6y ago
> And I certainly don't think Amazon would put so much effort into fighting this if their employee treatment, benefits and compensation and general employer track record made employees genuinely not even consider the Union option. You can say the same thing about any political campaign! Do you think people must not really want Joe Biden as president because he had to spend $6 billion to persuade them through campaigning?
- nraynaud 6y ago
  it's a bit different, voting for a Democrat president is excluding the Republican one. When you vote for an union, you absolutely do not vote for your employer to become an asshole, it's not "either the union make the employer improve employees work OR the employer does it on its own". The union and the employer could create an alliance to make life better for the employees. Look at what police unions and conservative towns have done, unionized policemen can literally get away with murder. There is no exclusive choice as to who should plan bathrooms breaks for runners and drivers: either the employer, or the union, as long as people stop having to pee in a bottle, you could even have a coalition with a giant conspiracy to have employee go to the bathroom when they need to.
- hnbad 6y ago
  > Do you think people must not really want Joe Biden as president because he had to spend $6 billion to persuade them through campaigning? Unironically, yes. But that doesn't mean they would have wanted Trump.
wdn 6y ago
One of my neighbor works fir Amazon warehouse here in NJ, he is quite happy, never heard him complain about it. Yeap, I agreed with you. The media is untrustworthy and is a propaganda machine. Good thing is they are digging their own grave now.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- rovr138 6y ago
  Have you looked at social media? Most people live by appearances and fake a lot of emotions. Not saying this is the case with your neighbor, but if they’re just a neighbor, not a close friend, they might simply not feel okay talking about it with you.
- Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
  I despise my job, but I'm unskilled and considering my pay, benefits, and responsibilities it's the best compromise I've found. I'd tell you, and my coworkers, that I'm happy. But I'm lying and no one wants to hear me complain about the bad hand life has dealt me so I put my face on and pretend, like just about everyone else.
bko 6y ago
The union is free to pay Amazon employees $15 an hour to watch their propaganda videos. This paternalism of low wage employees needs to stop. They can make up their own mind and actually have skin in the game as opposed to some tech worker making 10x as much telling them they're being brainwashed
- geofft 6y ago
  Why are you deeply concerned about paternalism from tech workers who aren't even in contact with the employees in question and are just posting on a message board, and not concerned about potentially-illegal paternalism from the bosses of the employees?
- claudiawerner 6y ago
  Of course they can make up their own mind - but simply pointing out the existence of propaganda and other factors at play, and the fact that ideology plays a large role in our lives, does not imply 'brainwashing' as much as ideological forces. The tug-of-war between labour and capital has been raging for centuries, and at no time hitherto is it more visible that it has graduated to the ideological battlefield when Amazon starts putting up posters and training their employees on otherwise hilarious videos to push their point of view. And I think anyone should point that out - whether it's a union organizer in Alabama, a tech worker making 10x the salary (who, by the way, may also have an interest in improving cultural support for unions if they are a tech worker in favour of software engineer unions) or a historian on capital-labour relations. As far as I know, however, no tech worker has contacted anyone in Alabama and told them they're brainwashed. 'Paternalism' would be someone pushing the ballot for them 'for their own interests'. That does not preclude discussion of priorities, rationality, and the rational frameworks (epistemological/ideological/moral/practical/etc.) we have available to discuss how wise those decisions are.
  - refurb 6y ago
    ”simply pointing out the existence of propaganda” Why do you assume only you can see that’s it’s propaganda and they can’t?

andybak 6y ago

Maybe. Maybe not. Once it's determined whether this was a fair vote, we'll know for sure I guess. > The RWDSU submitted nearly two dozen objections to Amazon's conduct during the election, which it said prevented employees from a "free and uncoerced exercise of choice" on whether to create the company's first U.S. union.

robobro 6y ago

As an iww organizer with friends across the US in Amazon warehouse management and on the ground- no Unions are just bringing democracy into capitalism. How can any red blooded American oppose them? Edit: not sure why I'm being down voted, did I say something offensive??

esyir 6y ago
You have democracy in your capitalism already, that's what your elected government and their regulations are.
- gspr 6y ago
  And who's to say that that has to be the only one? (Except that there's not even just one; there's a wide range of elections from the national level, to the local, or even maybe down to your city block in some places).
chrisseaton 6y ago
> Unions are just bringing democracy into capitalism. How can any red blooded American oppose them? Well they had a democratic vote and decided they did not want to be represented by this union. That's democracy working.
- Dobbs 6y ago
  In the article it is made very clear that what is being alleged is that it wasn't a democratic vote. What is being alleged is that Amazon threatened to close the warehouse, and/or fire people based upon how they vote. Something that if I understand correctly is illegal, and even if not illegal is definitely not a democratic vote.
  - chrisseaton 6y ago
    > If you read the article It's against the site rules here to suggest people haven't read the article - please don't do this. I was replying to a parent comment which said 'how can anyone oppose a union'. Some people legitimately don't want to have to deal with a union, for any of many reasons. For example because the union supports political goals they don't agree with, or because the union favours other employees over them, or they just don't want to have to deal with two overlords, neither of which may be working to their benefit. If they're asked and they say 'no thanks' then the union should just say 'ok thanks for letting us know' and leave them alone. There's a weird attitude amongst unions that there is no possible way anyone could not want to be represented by them. That leads them to accuse any vote against them of being illegitimate.

LatteLazy 6y ago

I try not to have a strong opinion about amazon workers, because I am not an amazon worker, so it isn't my business. If they want to unionised, that's their right, if not, that's their right too. That said, I was deeply unsurprised by the result of the vote. I looked at the pay and benefits and thought "I wouldn't rock the boat if I were them". It seems odd to me that people think a union would be popular here. Unions I've dealt with were a nightmare of politics and ineffectiveness. Partly that's their own problem, partly its a result of legal frameworks that they're stuck in. I was also surprised how much of a fuss people made about Amazon when 101 other companies are worse and older and get a free pass (Walmart still has more employees than amazon in the US I think). I think this and other issues around big tech (Google and competition, Apple and supply chains) are more about their failures to engage in PR than them actually being worse than average. I wonder if we will see a move from all/any of them to plug this gap in their moats

MomoXenosaga 6y ago

One analysis in a local newspaper was something that blew my mind: in the US your health insurance is tied to your employer?!. Just think about how absolutely insane that is. Your boss has life or death power over you and your loved ones. Apparently that's how Amazon was able to threaten it's workers.

djbebs 6y ago
There is nothing stopping you from buying your own health insurance. You used to be able to go without, but thanks to Obama care that is now not an option, and you are forced to do business with insurers
- enkid 6y ago
  Imagine a world where being able to not have access to healthcare is a good thing.
  - IntelMiner 6y ago
    Americans always say it should be "their choice" and I just feel like I'm staring at an incomplete jigsaw puzzle Like. It's your choice to...go bankrupt or die from a treatable illness? I don't know what they expect non-Americans to draw from that line of reasoning
    - deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
    - infamia 6y ago
      Before WWII, people in the U.S. bought catastrophic insurance and generally paid for their medical care out of pocket without much trouble. This kind of insurance was around $80/month or less in my state before Obamacare was implemented (it doubled after that). Before WWII, everyone simply paid for common Doctor visits and relied on their insurance for larger bills. After WWII, the US made gave employers tax incentives to provide insurance, which in hindsight was a huge mistake.

zelon88 6y ago

"Competitive" wages are a form of slavery. It means you don't truly consider the employees value. You just pay him 15 cents more than the guy down the street.

Jyaif 6y ago
But then the guy down the street will have no one to employ, so he'll have to pay 15 cents more than the other guy, and so on and so forth.

geofft 6y ago

Maybe! If so, a free, fair, and legal vote will tell us that!

heymijo 6y ago

> Maybe a majority of the workers there prefer the status quo? Analysis showed this is what happened. Please don't mistake that to mean the status quo is good. There is an enormous power imbalance between Amazon and the laborers in Bessemer, Alabama. This has happened many, many times throughout American history. Coal towns are a canonical example of holding all the cards against labor. The hallmarks of that relationship exist here.

pydry 6y ago
IIRC amazon managed to swing it so the cohort voting was dominated by newbies who got hit only by the anti union propaganda, hadn't yet suffered the worst excesses from management and were keen to not rock the boat and lose the job they'd just gotten.
- heymijo 6y ago
  That’s good context. Thank you. It speaks to the power imbalance.

Kneecaps07 6y ago

If this is what the workers got without a union, imagine how much better it could be with a union negotiating on their behalf?

Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago

>Amazon is offering competitive wages (especially for Albama's cost of living), and benefits from day one. No. Amazon does not. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/18/business/economy/amazon-wages-alabama-union.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/18/business/economy/amazon-w... >The most recent figure for the median wage in greater Birmingham, a metropolitan area of roughly one million people that includes Bessemer, was nearly $3 above Amazon’s pay there, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

LatteLazy 6y ago
Exactly. You can work at amazon with zero skills and be only 3 dollars behind the median of a population full of doctors and lawyers...