10 ms·

Amazon’s newest euphemism for overworked employees is ‘industrial athlete’

150 points by sidcool 5y ago

RalfWausE 5y ago
I may be an extremist in some ways, but i have sworn myself (a long time ago where i was nearly homeless) that i will never work for amazon or other modern wage-slave-holders ... even if this means i have to go full on hobo.
- leaveyou 5y ago
  You will change your mind and become much more flexible when you'll get to the next level: if you AND YOUR KIDS will risk ending up hobos.
  - Aaargh20318 5y ago
    You know having kids is optional, right ? There is no requirement to follow the Standard Life Plan™
    - eric__cartman 5y ago
      There are events that drastically change people's lives. Do you think every homeless (or close to becoming) family chose to me in that position and had the ability to plan long term? Maybe they were better off when they had their kids and for some variety of reasons reasons some time later ended up below the poverty line.
      - Aaargh20318 5y ago
        You miss the point. I was responding to someone who was assuming everyone would choose to procreate: ‘when you …’ instead of ‘if you …’ I’m just pointing out that this is not a position that everyone would automatically find themselves in.
        leaveyou 5y ago
        ‘when you …’ instead of ‘if you …’ Good point. Thx. My english is kind of negligent.
    - TeMPOraL 5y ago
      It is, but this observation generalizes. It's easy to talk brave and be picky if you have nobody that depends on you.
    - lr4444lr 5y ago
      Individually it's optional, societally it's not. Point being, much as I'm happy the OP has an out, this is not a realistic nuclear option for most people to impose suffering on other dependents.
    - leaveyou 5y ago
      I know it's optional, staying in the gene pool is optional. But in the long term, there looks like there will always be someone there to take these jobs. The ones resisting too succesfuly are leaving the gene pool and make room for the ones who really have no choice in the end.
    - wayoutthere 5y ago
      Having kids in this world, knowing what’s coming, is to set yourself up for a lifetime of fear. Basically every friend I have with kids is terrified of what the US (and the world) will become in 10 years.
      - Aeolun 5y ago
        Huh? I’m terrified of what the world will end up like if I don’t have kids.
        Aaargh20318 5y ago
        We have close to 8 billion people on this planet. About twice as many as 50 years ago, 4 times as many as 100 years ago, and 8 times the number we had 200 years ago. We're not running out of humans any time soon. In fact, humanity is a plague.
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
        wayoutthere 5y ago
        It’s specifically that things are likely going to fall to shit before the kids have a chance to become adults. And that nothing those kids will be able to do as adults will have any effect on the domino effects of climate change that will make WW2 look like a leisurely stroll through Europe. If y’all know any Gen Z people, the generational hallmark is nihilism. Their humor is dark. There are good reasons for this.
  - Aeolun 5y ago
    I never see hobos with kids. Does that mean they’re always taken care of before they actually end up on the street? Or does it just mean instant confiscation by CPS?
    - shortlived 5y ago
      You’ve seen hobos in real life?
- capableweb 5y ago
  > ... or other modern wage-slave-holders I'm interested in hearing what you are currently doing that is not "modern wage-slave-holder". Full time employee at any company would be "wage-slaving" and even being a freelancer is slaving for wage as well.
- imtringued 5y ago
  Interesting, what if we had a union for the unemployed? They could collectively boycott Amazon. Defeat the monopsony with a oligopoly!
  - chrisseaton 5y ago
    In the UK the Unite union will 'represent' you if you are unemployed. I'm not sure what that practically involves though.
  - RalfWausE 5y ago
    This is an really interesting thought and could really be a gamechanger...
  - gruez 5y ago
    >Interesting, what if we had a union for the unemployed? They could collectively boycott Amazon. I'm sure amazon would be terrified if a bunch of people with zero income stopped buying their goods. /s
PoignardAzur 5y ago
> Trainers don’t seek to extract the maximum value from an athlete only to discard them if they’re hurt. They kind of do? I get the point the article is trying to make, but they're just throwing everything at the wall to make that point, even when it doesn't really match reality. > It’s little wonder then that reports continue to find Amazon’s comparatively high injury rates: Amazon’s warehouse workers had almost double the number of serious injuries compared to other warehouse workers in 2020, which is actually a “marked” improvement compared to the numbers from 2017, 2018, and 2019. The article they quote says "the interpretation of the OSHA data used to classify a “serious” injury — which, in the various reports here, is defined as those that require time off or work reassignments — is skewed by what the company claims is more generous recovery time". (I don't know whether this explanation even makes sense, though I feel it does. On an intuitive level, it feels to me that every logistics company probably overworks its employees; I don't see a reason to assume Amazon does anything that every other warehouse doesn't do. But maybe I'm wrong and Amazon is uniquely bad.) But when they quote their own article, they get to skip the counter-claim (which the original article doesn't refute) and make it sound like their point is undisputed. This is bad faith journalism.
- Mauricebranagh 5y ago
  I suspect its because "Amazon" is the most visible there are far worse stories about UK warehouses. Its a bit like the protestors against Mc Donalds. And I do wonder if Amazon might have stricter reporting when compared to smaller industrial sites who might hide acidents.
- capableweb 5y ago
  > I don't see a reason to assume Amazon does anything that every other warehouse doesn't do Being one of the worlds biggest companies that wants to eat everything and everyone (considering the verticals they are expanding into) surely would give them some reason to push their employees more than others. Some logistic companies are fine with their current size and quality, while others try to grow and satisfy their shareholders, that must have some impact on how the companies also treat their employees.
  - 5y ago
leemcd56 5y ago
This comes as no surprise. I mean, this is the same company who thinks adding little booths into their warehouses to try and improve mental health will benefit these overworked employees. They look like those suicide booths in Futurama. Is it too much to ask for them not to treat their employees like slaves? Is it too much to ask for an eight hour work day? Actual bathroom breaks (I read their forklift drivers pee in bottles because they aren’t allowed to take appropriate bathroom breaks). All while paying them what they’re actually worth, given the work they’re doing and the level of stress Amazon puts them under?
- falcor84 5y ago
  I'm not disputing any of your other points, but what does "paying them what they’re actually worth" mean? Is there some objectively fair remuneration calculation that others are using and I wasn't aware of?
  - Google234 5y ago
    Fair worth is probably less since robots can do much of the eorl.
  - croon 5y ago
    1) I'm assuming GP missed a negation, "not", before that. 2) Obviously if you can find workers for your compensation level that's some market definition of worth. But I would also argue that ones society is broken if there are people who stay at a job where they have to resort to peeing in bottles because (ostensibly) they don't feel that taking 3 minutes to go to the bathroom is possible.
  - faceplanted 5y ago
    There's no objectively "fair" number, but there are far better approximations. No-one really cares if it's perfectly equitable between every employee, but they _can_ see obvious inequities harming people's lives.
  - crispyambulance 5y ago
    > Is there some objectively fair remuneration calculation [...]? Lopsided power arrangements will always be grossly unfair to one side and generous the other. In this case it's Amazon vs the Precariat. Moreover, the two sides (and everyone else) will always have a very different idea about what is fair. The best way to address this without directly getting into the vast grey-area of "what is fair" is to limit the political power of corporations and then address labor laws and union formation. The sad thing is we've been through this before. There's a reason labor unions came into being. Do we really have to wait until labor conditions for workers become the 21st century equivalent of Industrial Age steel mills run by robber-barrons? Can't we learn from history?
newaccount123JJ 5y ago
thanks
j_barbossa 5y ago
Amazon treats employees like soulless robots. This already starts when you apply there (as a SWE) and instead of talking to people you get an automated coding test.
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  Every BigCo that hires tons of un/minimally skilled workers does. That's their whole shtick and a main part of their competitive advantage. By process-ifying everything they can use the cheapest, crappiest parts of the labor pool and still get good results. The operations that haven't abstracted away the need for employees to think somewhat about what they're doing either need to hire better labor or put up with lesser results.
- rejectedandsad 5y ago
  Coding tests aren’t uncommon at all as a prerequisite to talking to a human, I’ve had them as the first step when applying to Twitter, Akuna Capital, Asana, Airbnb, Yelp (though I asked for it from a recruiter so perhaps not the same), Dropbox, Zoox, Robinhood….
rory_isAdonk 5y ago
Veteran of Labour
intricatedetail 5y ago
How come Amazon makes so much money, pays next to no tax, floods countries with Chinese junk and pay employees below living wage? How is it legal? The system is broken.
- danuker 5y ago
  The bigger a company, the more disposable its employees. When you quit, you lose 100% of your income, but when Amazon fires you, they lose 0.0001% of their productivity. This is why I am in support of unions in general.
  - intricatedetail 5y ago
    I think more effective would be if salaries were tied to company revenue (Not profits, as they disappear with creative accounting), so that employee gets a fair share. Offshoring work to countries without employee protections should be illegal as well. If revenue-salaries gets company under, they could apply for tax credits. I think unions need a reform and more accountability. Often they work in their own interest instead of employees.
    - AdrianB1 5y ago
      That is closer to a shareholder than an employee type of relation.
    - dbrueck 5y ago
      Tying it to revenues sounds nice, but isn't feasible. Or, in order to make it feasible, the slice the employees get would have to be vanishingly small in order to mitigate the risk.
- dbrueck 5y ago
  Well... this perspective oversimplifies things a bit. Amazon pays little or no corporate tax, but it still pays a lot in other taxes (such as payroll taxes). See, for example, https://www.forbes.com/sites/stephaniedenning/2019/02/22/why-amazon-pays-no-corporate-taxes/?sh=7d73e47654d5 https://www.forbes.com/sites/stephaniedenning/2019/02/22/why.... Legal corporate tax breaks are used to encourage incentives that we (as a society) want. We can and should continually monitor and tweak them, but as a concept they are not inherently bad - I mean, Amazon is now this enormous beast, but it's also an enormous beast that created over a million jobs.
MomoXenosaga 5y ago
Is there a euphemism for someone who keeps writing these articles and still order at Amazon? Life at the bottom sucks and if you're a middle class person with parents who payed for your college education thank God you will never know.
- capableweb 5y ago
  > Is there a euphemism for someone who keeps writing these articles and still order at Amazon? Based? Neutral? "Not black and white mindset"? Avoiding outrage? Using the tools provided to you even though you don't like them? Not sure, but I don't think we need to see people who have this view and perform those actions as hypocrites or whatever. I don't like the capitalistic system we have today, but I do participate in it and exploit what I can in order to help me and others close around me. I could spend time trying to go against it, but ultimately that would make things worse for me and my closest, at least in the short-term.
  - imtringued 5y ago
    >I don't like the capitalistic system we have today It mostly boils down to the ability hire labor abroad which creates a minimum level of skill needed to compete in the US labor market. In theory companies would train their workers to reach that minimum level because they would earn more in aggregate, in practice companies pick cherries and hope that the rest educate themselves.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- danuker 5y ago
  Depends what education.
- makeitdouble 5y ago
  The "vote with your wallet" boat has sailed many years ago. In short, they wouldn't be sued by govs if it was just people being hypocriyical.
- 5y ago
Invictus0 5y ago
Actually this term is not new at all. A company I worked with called Strongarm Technologies has been using this term for at least 5 years. https://web.archive.org/web/20160109195713/http://strongarmtech.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20160109195713/http://strongarmt...
- avernon 5y ago
  You are 100% correct. This has been a common term in the manufacturing industry when focusing on ergonomics safety and reducing repetitive stress injuries for quite some time. The connotation has generally been positive and was a created by the staff trying to improve safety and reduce injuries.
markvdb 5y ago
This reminds me of Alexey Stachanov[0], Hero of Socialist Labour, and the movement that sprung up around his efforts. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexey_Stakhanov https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexey_Stakhanov
Havoc 5y ago
Amazon's PR department is just making things worse. Same as with the zen cubicle things - it just comes across as here is your dedicated crying space & you're allotted a full 3 mins of crying time per day. Yes mindfulness etc, but it just doesn't come across as genuine.
- ninkendo 5y ago
  I’m reminded of this YouTube video from Wise Crack on mindfulness: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPKqnI4D2a8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPKqnI4D2a8 Among the pros and cons of mindfulness, the biggest negative they find is that it’s a great way to turn your employees into more efficient cogs. I feel this way about every company that tries to teach their employees about mindfulness (lots of FAANGs do this as well)… they want you to be able to de-stress, not because they care about your well-being, but because they want to increase your tolerance for stress, and thus your expected productivity.
  - LB232323 5y ago
    It's just corporatization of the typical New Age butchering of Eastern philosophy. In other words, it is deeply unsettling cult behavior.
  - Tabular-Iceberg 5y ago
    Work-from-home should really have made this whole mindfulness industry obsolete. You no longer need to do all this crap to look sophisticated in front of your co-workers, you can just, say, pick your nose and contemplate on the gradual change in texture as you rub it between your thumb and index finger. I'm all for mindfulness, but you don't need any fancy techniques or rituals, and you most certainly don't need to pay a subscription for it.
- awestley 5y ago
  I think they are doing all this on purpose. With the long term goal of scaring away most of the human labor. Creating the opportunity to auto the entire process.
NoblePublius 5y ago
It is interesting to me that The Verge quotes a union study as gospel along with a one off anecdote from Britain about peeing in bottles as some sort of official legal conviction. Amazon workers rejected unionization by huge margins. Why is The Verge writing this? Maybe ask yourself about that Union they formed….
goodpoint 5y ago
I saw "adrenaline junkie" used in jobspecs for roles involving devops.
- Aeolun 5y ago
  That sounds wrong on so many levels.
nickthemagicman 5y ago
I've seen less crazy stuff in The Onion. Truly unfortunate that people are abused in this way. I guess we is the consumer are partly to blame.
softwaredoug 5y ago
I work out a lot. And sometimes I work hard at my software job. But the #1 lesson from both had not been to work nonstop and burn yourself out, rather it’s to take regular breaks, slack off, and go easy on yourself. If you’re in a punishing situation, you won’t want to get back on the horse for the next big push. Trainers recognize too that rest and recovery are important. I ran 6 miles Sunday, 2-3 throughout l, and am not running today.
- yowlingcat 5y ago
  Couldn't agree more. I've tried to explain this to people before and gotten a blank stare and/or lip service. I think the problem is that the physical effects of overtraining are hard to ignore, whereas the mental effects are easier to rationalize away (although I would argue equally hard to ignore long-term).
- totalZero 5y ago
  My best work has always occurred in two types of situations: 1. Relaxed and unconstrained by other obligations, whereby I can creatively follow the course of the work rather than trying to jigsaw it into an itinerary that balances several other tasks, or 2. Such extreme time pressure that I get into "the zone." Your comment touches on #1 but there is something to be said for the power of last-minute panic.
  - LordDragonfang 5y ago
    Some people work best under pressure. Effectively no one works best under constant pressure - they burn out[1]. Amazon is trying to promote the latter. [1] There are a very small few that continue to be effective under pressure. They are worth much more than Amazon is willing to pay.
toss1 5y ago
>>"Industrial Athletes" eh? OK, where are the coaches & trainers, the practice & drills, the skill-building, all focused on exceptionally intense competition events that often result in a flow state? Where are the rest & travel days after the competition? Where are the cheering crowds & high salaries for the best? Or at least the acclaim for those who show top performance in the more obscure sports? I've seen Industrial Athletes - a great example is the engine-building competitions at some auto racing trade events. Those guys go from a table of parts to a running 500+hp engine in 20 minutes - its amazing to see! But they don't do that every day. And, having competed at international levels and worked in physically demanding jobs, I've thought about the possibility of assembling high-performance worker teams. The problem is that it isn't economically sustainable. There are very few real-world situations where fewer people working faster really is required, and the extra pay and rest days required for even 80% athletic level performance makes it almost always better to just hire more and work them at a sustainable pace. And sure, using a few tips from athletes such as staying hydrated is good, but trying to trick them into seeing themselves as "industrial athletes", without providing the support (like even bathroom breaks) is disgusting.
kumarvvr 5y ago
Perhaps they will have "Corporate Olympics" to determine performance reviews.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Aeolun 5y ago
Is 13 miles over the course of a day really such a terrible distance? As an untrained and fairly out of shape engineer I can comfortably walk a 20km distance (in around 5 hours, with stops), and if you do it more often it only gets easier. Humans are basically made for walking. I think there’s a lot of bad things about Amazon, but making their warehouse workers walk is not one of them.
- notacoward 5y ago
  It's not just about walking. It's about walking while carrying stuff (not in a backpack either), interspersed with other kinds of physical effort. "13 miles" is just a proxy for total effort, requiring multiplication by some factor to get an equivalent number for walking alone. What would that factor be? A clue might be in the "400 calories per hour" number also mentioned in the story. That's nearly 7km/h at average (male) weight, or 56km equivalent during a shift. Would you feel comfortable walking 40% faster for 60% longer? Every day? It doesn't get that much easier. Appalachian Trail through-hikers would consider 35km to be a good day. I can cover 20km in under two hours, not five, but if I did that every day I'd be seriously over-training and probably headed for an overuse injury. Requiring even half that level of daily effort for people who are not in their twenties any more, who are sleep deprived due to non-work (or other-work) demands, or who already have one or more other injuries or chronic conditions, really is a bit problematic.
- refurb 5y ago
  I did warehouse work when I was in college. That distance is not unusual (I wore a pedometer during a shift one time - about 9 miles a shift, 12 if you did overtime). It’s actually amazing exercise and I was in great shape. Lifting 50 lb boxes, climbing stairs and walking all over the warehouse. I remember my feet swelling so much after hours of over time that if I sat down I could barely walk after getting up. But the pay was great compared to retail work.
LB232323 5y ago
Amazon really strives to push the boundaries of what is inhuman and unnatural. There have got to be some sick people who enjoy this sort of thing. Any sort of large company that employs actual slave labor through the American prison system has a dark character about it. Amazon, Walmart, Microsoft, and similar modern corporate giants.
- bionhoward 5y ago
  Source?
oftenwrong 5y ago
Read the actual pamphlet: https://video-images.vice.com/_uncategorized/1622578816840-amazon1.jpeg?resize=800:\\ https://video-images.vice.com/_uncategorized/1622578816840-a...* https://video-images.vice.com/_uncategorized/1622578795816-amazon2.jpeg?resize=800:\\ https://video-images.vice.com/_uncategorized/1622578795816-a...* My opinion: The pamphlet is tone-deaf in light of the worker abuses at Amazon, but otherwise it's fine. It contains sound advice for staying healthy and uninjured while doing what is a physical job. It emphasises health, and not all-out performance. It contains useful information, like a bullet point about Amazon's program that gives employees a credit that can be used for buying shoes. It's not significantly different from the advice given by posture coaches and dieticians that have been brought into places I've worked as a software developer. Employers want their employees to be healthy and performant. These health initiatives are not altruistic, but also not evil.
rebelshrug 5y ago
> One thing Amazon doesn’t bring up is that athletes train for an event with a definite end date. Athletes aren’t competing day in and day out, and they have time to rest and recuperate in between. The comparison becomes even more ridiculous when you look at what a pro athlete’s day is actually like: significant time is spent warming up to avoid injuries, practice may be only a few hours out of the day (read: not in eight or 10-hour shifts), there’s time made for rest or even naps, and significant effort is spent on nutrition. It’s safe to say that most Amazon warehouse workers don’t have professional nutritionists and / or chefs taking care of their dietary needs. It seems to me that Amazon is trying to set the expectation that their warehouse jobs are physically demanding. Other physically demanding jobs/industries are: the military, construction, landscaping, firefighting, fitness trainers, farmers, dancers, etc... Workers in those fields aren't necessarily given time to nap, and "don't have professional nutritionists and / or chefs taking care of their dietary needs." Of course most employers in those fields don't call their workers "athletes", but most athletes outside of professional sports have perks like naps and nutritionists. I think a lot of amateur athletes have jobs, and practice and compete in their free time.
drummojg 5y ago
It's really ironic that MegaTaylorism is touted as such a great "innovation." I wonder if, like Uber is doing with transport, Amazon is scaffolding their warehouse processes so that it will be an easier transition when the day comes to replace all the wetware with robots.

150 points by sidcool 5y ago

I may be an extremist in some ways, but i have sworn myself (a long time ago where i was nearly homeless) that i will never work for amazon or other modern wage-slave-holders ... even if this means i have to go full on hobo.

leaveyou 5y ago
You will change your mind and become much more flexible when you'll get to the next level: if you AND YOUR KIDS will risk ending up hobos.
- Aaargh20318 5y ago
  You know having kids is optional, right ? There is no requirement to follow the Standard Life Plan™
  - eric__cartman 5y ago
    There are events that drastically change people's lives. Do you think every homeless (or close to becoming) family chose to me in that position and had the ability to plan long term? Maybe they were better off when they had their kids and for some variety of reasons reasons some time later ended up below the poverty line.
    - Aaargh20318 5y ago
      You miss the point. I was responding to someone who was assuming everyone would choose to procreate: ‘when you …’ instead of ‘if you …’ I’m just pointing out that this is not a position that everyone would automatically find themselves in.
      - leaveyou 5y ago
        ‘when you …’ instead of ‘if you …’ Good point. Thx. My english is kind of negligent.
  - TeMPOraL 5y ago
    It is, but this observation generalizes. It's easy to talk brave and be picky if you have nobody that depends on you.
  - lr4444lr 5y ago
    Individually it's optional, societally it's not. Point being, much as I'm happy the OP has an out, this is not a realistic nuclear option for most people to impose suffering on other dependents.
  - leaveyou 5y ago
    I know it's optional, staying in the gene pool is optional. But in the long term, there looks like there will always be someone there to take these jobs. The ones resisting too succesfuly are leaving the gene pool and make room for the ones who really have no choice in the end.
  - wayoutthere 5y ago
    Having kids in this world, knowing what’s coming, is to set yourself up for a lifetime of fear. Basically every friend I have with kids is terrified of what the US (and the world) will become in 10 years.
    - Aeolun 5y ago
      Huh? I’m terrified of what the world will end up like if I don’t have kids.
      - Aaargh20318 5y ago
        We have close to 8 billion people on this planet. About twice as many as 50 years ago, 4 times as many as 100 years ago, and 8 times the number we had 200 years ago. We're not running out of humans any time soon. In fact, humanity is a plague.
        deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - wayoutthere 5y ago
        It’s specifically that things are likely going to fall to shit before the kids have a chance to become adults. And that nothing those kids will be able to do as adults will have any effect on the domino effects of climate change that will make WW2 look like a leisurely stroll through Europe. If y’all know any Gen Z people, the generational hallmark is nihilism. Their humor is dark. There are good reasons for this.
- Aeolun 5y ago
  I never see hobos with kids. Does that mean they’re always taken care of before they actually end up on the street? Or does it just mean instant confiscation by CPS?
  - shortlived 5y ago
    You’ve seen hobos in real life?
capableweb 5y ago
> ... or other modern wage-slave-holders I'm interested in hearing what you are currently doing that is not "modern wage-slave-holder". Full time employee at any company would be "wage-slaving" and even being a freelancer is slaving for wage as well.
imtringued 5y ago
Interesting, what if we had a union for the unemployed? They could collectively boycott Amazon. Defeat the monopsony with a oligopoly!
- chrisseaton 5y ago
  In the UK the Unite union will 'represent' you if you are unemployed. I'm not sure what that practically involves though.
- RalfWausE 5y ago
  This is an really interesting thought and could really be a gamechanger...
- gruez 5y ago
  >Interesting, what if we had a union for the unemployed? They could collectively boycott Amazon. I'm sure amazon would be terrified if a bunch of people with zero income stopped buying their goods. /s

PoignardAzur 5y ago

> Trainers don’t seek to extract the maximum value from an athlete only to discard them if they’re hurt. They kind of do? I get the point the article is trying to make, but they're just throwing everything at the wall to make that point, even when it doesn't really match reality. > It’s little wonder then that reports continue to find Amazon’s comparatively high injury rates: Amazon’s warehouse workers had almost double the number of serious injuries compared to other warehouse workers in 2020, which is actually a “marked” improvement compared to the numbers from 2017, 2018, and 2019. The article they quote says "the interpretation of the OSHA data used to classify a “serious” injury — which, in the various reports here, is defined as those that require time off or work reassignments — is skewed by what the company claims is more generous recovery time". (I don't know whether this explanation even makes sense, though I feel it does. On an intuitive level, it feels to me that every logistics company probably overworks its employees; I don't see a reason to assume Amazon does anything that every other warehouse doesn't do. But maybe I'm wrong and Amazon is uniquely bad.) But when they quote their own article, they get to skip the counter-claim (which the original article doesn't refute) and make it sound like their point is undisputed. This is bad faith journalism.

Mauricebranagh 5y ago
I suspect its because "Amazon" is the most visible there are far worse stories about UK warehouses. Its a bit like the protestors against Mc Donalds. And I do wonder if Amazon might have stricter reporting when compared to smaller industrial sites who might hide acidents.
capableweb 5y ago
> I don't see a reason to assume Amazon does anything that every other warehouse doesn't do Being one of the worlds biggest companies that wants to eat everything and everyone (considering the verticals they are expanding into) surely would give them some reason to push their employees more than others. Some logistic companies are fine with their current size and quality, while others try to grow and satisfy their shareholders, that must have some impact on how the companies also treat their employees.
- 5y ago

leemcd56 5y ago

This comes as no surprise. I mean, this is the same company who thinks adding little booths into their warehouses to try and improve mental health will benefit these overworked employees. They look like those suicide booths in Futurama. Is it too much to ask for them not to treat their employees like slaves? Is it too much to ask for an eight hour work day? Actual bathroom breaks (I read their forklift drivers pee in bottles because they aren’t allowed to take appropriate bathroom breaks). All while paying them what they’re actually worth, given the work they’re doing and the level of stress Amazon puts them under?

falcor84 5y ago
I'm not disputing any of your other points, but what does "paying them what they’re actually worth" mean? Is there some objectively fair remuneration calculation that others are using and I wasn't aware of?
- Google234 5y ago
  Fair worth is probably less since robots can do much of the eorl.
- croon 5y ago
  1) I'm assuming GP missed a negation, "not", before that. 2) Obviously if you can find workers for your compensation level that's some market definition of worth. But I would also argue that ones society is broken if there are people who stay at a job where they have to resort to peeing in bottles because (ostensibly) they don't feel that taking 3 minutes to go to the bathroom is possible.
- faceplanted 5y ago
  There's no objectively "fair" number, but there are far better approximations. No-one really cares if it's perfectly equitable between every employee, but they _can_ see obvious inequities harming people's lives.
- crispyambulance 5y ago
  > Is there some objectively fair remuneration calculation [...]? Lopsided power arrangements will always be grossly unfair to one side and generous the other. In this case it's Amazon vs the Precariat. Moreover, the two sides (and everyone else) will always have a very different idea about what is fair. The best way to address this without directly getting into the vast grey-area of "what is fair" is to limit the political power of corporations and then address labor laws and union formation. The sad thing is we've been through this before. There's a reason labor unions came into being. Do we really have to wait until labor conditions for workers become the 21st century equivalent of Industrial Age steel mills run by robber-barrons? Can't we learn from history?

newaccount123JJ 5y ago

thanks

j_barbossa 5y ago

Amazon treats employees like soulless robots. This already starts when you apply there (as a SWE) and instead of talking to people you get an automated coding test.

throwaway0a5e 5y ago
Every BigCo that hires tons of un/minimally skilled workers does. That's their whole shtick and a main part of their competitive advantage. By process-ifying everything they can use the cheapest, crappiest parts of the labor pool and still get good results. The operations that haven't abstracted away the need for employees to think somewhat about what they're doing either need to hire better labor or put up with lesser results.
rejectedandsad 5y ago
Coding tests aren’t uncommon at all as a prerequisite to talking to a human, I’ve had them as the first step when applying to Twitter, Akuna Capital, Asana, Airbnb, Yelp (though I asked for it from a recruiter so perhaps not the same), Dropbox, Zoox, Robinhood….

rory_isAdonk 5y ago

Veteran of Labour

intricatedetail 5y ago

How come Amazon makes so much money, pays next to no tax, floods countries with Chinese junk and pay employees below living wage? How is it legal? The system is broken.

danuker 5y ago
The bigger a company, the more disposable its employees. When you quit, you lose 100% of your income, but when Amazon fires you, they lose 0.0001% of their productivity. This is why I am in support of unions in general.
- intricatedetail 5y ago
  I think more effective would be if salaries were tied to company revenue (Not profits, as they disappear with creative accounting), so that employee gets a fair share. Offshoring work to countries without employee protections should be illegal as well. If revenue-salaries gets company under, they could apply for tax credits. I think unions need a reform and more accountability. Often they work in their own interest instead of employees.
  - AdrianB1 5y ago
    That is closer to a shareholder than an employee type of relation.
  - dbrueck 5y ago
    Tying it to revenues sounds nice, but isn't feasible. Or, in order to make it feasible, the slice the employees get would have to be vanishingly small in order to mitigate the risk.
dbrueck 5y ago
Well... this perspective oversimplifies things a bit. Amazon pays little or no corporate tax, but it still pays a lot in other taxes (such as payroll taxes). See, for example, https://www.forbes.com/sites/stephaniedenning/2019/02/22/why-amazon-pays-no-corporate-taxes/?sh=7d73e47654d5 https://www.forbes.com/sites/stephaniedenning/2019/02/22/why.... Legal corporate tax breaks are used to encourage incentives that we (as a society) want. We can and should continually monitor and tweak them, but as a concept they are not inherently bad - I mean, Amazon is now this enormous beast, but it's also an enormous beast that created over a million jobs.

MomoXenosaga 5y ago

Is there a euphemism for someone who keeps writing these articles and still order at Amazon? Life at the bottom sucks and if you're a middle class person with parents who payed for your college education thank God you will never know.

capableweb 5y ago
> Is there a euphemism for someone who keeps writing these articles and still order at Amazon? Based? Neutral? "Not black and white mindset"? Avoiding outrage? Using the tools provided to you even though you don't like them? Not sure, but I don't think we need to see people who have this view and perform those actions as hypocrites or whatever. I don't like the capitalistic system we have today, but I do participate in it and exploit what I can in order to help me and others close around me. I could spend time trying to go against it, but ultimately that would make things worse for me and my closest, at least in the short-term.
- imtringued 5y ago
  >I don't like the capitalistic system we have today It mostly boils down to the ability hire labor abroad which creates a minimum level of skill needed to compete in the US labor market. In theory companies would train their workers to reach that minimum level because they would earn more in aggregate, in practice companies pick cherries and hope that the rest educate themselves.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
danuker 5y ago
Depends what education.
makeitdouble 5y ago
The "vote with your wallet" boat has sailed many years ago. In short, they wouldn't be sued by govs if it was just people being hypocriyical.
5y ago

Invictus0 5y ago

Actually this term is not new at all. A company I worked with called Strongarm Technologies has been using this term for at least 5 years. https://web.archive.org/web/20160109195713/http://strongarmtech.com/ https://web.archive.org/web/20160109195713/http://strongarmt...

avernon 5y ago
You are 100% correct. This has been a common term in the manufacturing industry when focusing on ergonomics safety and reducing repetitive stress injuries for quite some time. The connotation has generally been positive and was a created by the staff trying to improve safety and reduce injuries.

markvdb 5y ago

This reminds me of Alexey Stachanov[0], Hero of Socialist Labour, and the movement that sprung up around his efforts. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexey_Stakhanov https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexey_Stakhanov

Havoc 5y ago

Amazon's PR department is just making things worse. Same as with the zen cubicle things - it just comes across as here is your dedicated crying space & you're allotted a full 3 mins of crying time per day. Yes mindfulness etc, but it just doesn't come across as genuine.

ninkendo 5y ago
I’m reminded of this YouTube video from Wise Crack on mindfulness: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPKqnI4D2a8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPKqnI4D2a8 Among the pros and cons of mindfulness, the biggest negative they find is that it’s a great way to turn your employees into more efficient cogs. I feel this way about every company that tries to teach their employees about mindfulness (lots of FAANGs do this as well)… they want you to be able to de-stress, not because they care about your well-being, but because they want to increase your tolerance for stress, and thus your expected productivity.
- LB232323 5y ago
  It's just corporatization of the typical New Age butchering of Eastern philosophy. In other words, it is deeply unsettling cult behavior.
- Tabular-Iceberg 5y ago
  Work-from-home should really have made this whole mindfulness industry obsolete. You no longer need to do all this crap to look sophisticated in front of your co-workers, you can just, say, pick your nose and contemplate on the gradual change in texture as you rub it between your thumb and index finger. I'm all for mindfulness, but you don't need any fancy techniques or rituals, and you most certainly don't need to pay a subscription for it.
awestley 5y ago
I think they are doing all this on purpose. With the long term goal of scaring away most of the human labor. Creating the opportunity to auto the entire process.

NoblePublius 5y ago

It is interesting to me that The Verge quotes a union study as gospel along with a one off anecdote from Britain about peeing in bottles as some sort of official legal conviction. Amazon workers rejected unionization by huge margins. Why is The Verge writing this? Maybe ask yourself about that Union they formed….

goodpoint 5y ago

I saw "adrenaline junkie" used in jobspecs for roles involving devops.

Aeolun 5y ago
That sounds wrong on so many levels.

nickthemagicman 5y ago

I've seen less crazy stuff in The Onion. Truly unfortunate that people are abused in this way. I guess we is the consumer are partly to blame.

softwaredoug 5y ago

I work out a lot. And sometimes I work hard at my software job. But the #1 lesson from both had not been to work nonstop and burn yourself out, rather it’s to take regular breaks, slack off, and go easy on yourself. If you’re in a punishing situation, you won’t want to get back on the horse for the next big push. Trainers recognize too that rest and recovery are important. I ran 6 miles Sunday, 2-3 throughout l, and am not running today.

yowlingcat 5y ago
Couldn't agree more. I've tried to explain this to people before and gotten a blank stare and/or lip service. I think the problem is that the physical effects of overtraining are hard to ignore, whereas the mental effects are easier to rationalize away (although I would argue equally hard to ignore long-term).
totalZero 5y ago
My best work has always occurred in two types of situations: 1. Relaxed and unconstrained by other obligations, whereby I can creatively follow the course of the work rather than trying to jigsaw it into an itinerary that balances several other tasks, or 2. Such extreme time pressure that I get into "the zone." Your comment touches on #1 but there is something to be said for the power of last-minute panic.
- LordDragonfang 5y ago
  Some people work best under pressure. Effectively no one works best under constant pressure - they burn out[1]. Amazon is trying to promote the latter. [1] There are a very small few that continue to be effective under pressure. They are worth much more than Amazon is willing to pay.

toss1 5y ago

>>"Industrial Athletes" eh? OK, where are the coaches & trainers, the practice & drills, the skill-building, all focused on exceptionally intense competition events that often result in a flow state? Where are the rest & travel days after the competition? Where are the cheering crowds & high salaries for the best? Or at least the acclaim for those who show top performance in the more obscure sports? I've seen Industrial Athletes - a great example is the engine-building competitions at some auto racing trade events. Those guys go from a table of parts to a running 500+hp engine in 20 minutes - its amazing to see! But they don't do that every day. And, having competed at international levels and worked in physically demanding jobs, I've thought about the possibility of assembling high-performance worker teams. The problem is that it isn't economically sustainable. There are very few real-world situations where fewer people working faster really is required, and the extra pay and rest days required for even 80% athletic level performance makes it almost always better to just hire more and work them at a sustainable pace. And sure, using a few tips from athletes such as staying hydrated is good, but trying to trick them into seeing themselves as "industrial athletes", without providing the support (like even bathroom breaks) is disgusting.

kumarvvr 5y ago

Perhaps they will have "Corporate Olympics" to determine performance reviews.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

Aeolun 5y ago

Is 13 miles over the course of a day really such a terrible distance? As an untrained and fairly out of shape engineer I can comfortably walk a 20km distance (in around 5 hours, with stops), and if you do it more often it only gets easier. Humans are basically made for walking. I think there’s a lot of bad things about Amazon, but making their warehouse workers walk is not one of them.

notacoward 5y ago
It's not just about walking. It's about walking while carrying stuff (not in a backpack either), interspersed with other kinds of physical effort. "13 miles" is just a proxy for total effort, requiring multiplication by some factor to get an equivalent number for walking alone. What would that factor be? A clue might be in the "400 calories per hour" number also mentioned in the story. That's nearly 7km/h at average (male) weight, or 56km equivalent during a shift. Would you feel comfortable walking 40% faster for 60% longer? Every day? It doesn't get that much easier. Appalachian Trail through-hikers would consider 35km to be a good day. I can cover 20km in under two hours, not five, but if I did that every day I'd be seriously over-training and probably headed for an overuse injury. Requiring even half that level of daily effort for people who are not in their twenties any more, who are sleep deprived due to non-work (or other-work) demands, or who already have one or more other injuries or chronic conditions, really is a bit problematic.
refurb 5y ago
I did warehouse work when I was in college. That distance is not unusual (I wore a pedometer during a shift one time - about 9 miles a shift, 12 if you did overtime). It’s actually amazing exercise and I was in great shape. Lifting 50 lb boxes, climbing stairs and walking all over the warehouse. I remember my feet swelling so much after hours of over time that if I sat down I could barely walk after getting up. But the pay was great compared to retail work.

LB232323 5y ago

Amazon really strives to push the boundaries of what is inhuman and unnatural. There have got to be some sick people who enjoy this sort of thing. Any sort of large company that employs actual slave labor through the American prison system has a dark character about it. Amazon, Walmart, Microsoft, and similar modern corporate giants.

bionhoward 5y ago
Source?

oftenwrong 5y ago

Read the actual pamphlet: https://video-images.vice.com/_uncategorized/1622578816840-amazon1.jpeg?resize=800:\\ https://video-images.vice.com/_uncategorized/1622578816840-a...* https://video-images.vice.com/_uncategorized/1622578795816-amazon2.jpeg?resize=800:\\ https://video-images.vice.com/_uncategorized/1622578795816-a...* My opinion: The pamphlet is tone-deaf in light of the worker abuses at Amazon, but otherwise it's fine. It contains sound advice for staying healthy and uninjured while doing what is a physical job. It emphasises health, and not all-out performance. It contains useful information, like a bullet point about Amazon's program that gives employees a credit that can be used for buying shoes. It's not significantly different from the advice given by posture coaches and dieticians that have been brought into places I've worked as a software developer. Employers want their employees to be healthy and performant. These health initiatives are not altruistic, but also not evil.

rebelshrug 5y ago

> One thing Amazon doesn’t bring up is that athletes train for an event with a definite end date. Athletes aren’t competing day in and day out, and they have time to rest and recuperate in between. The comparison becomes even more ridiculous when you look at what a pro athlete’s day is actually like: significant time is spent warming up to avoid injuries, practice may be only a few hours out of the day (read: not in eight or 10-hour shifts), there’s time made for rest or even naps, and significant effort is spent on nutrition. It’s safe to say that most Amazon warehouse workers don’t have professional nutritionists and / or chefs taking care of their dietary needs. It seems to me that Amazon is trying to set the expectation that their warehouse jobs are physically demanding. Other physically demanding jobs/industries are: the military, construction, landscaping, firefighting, fitness trainers, farmers, dancers, etc... Workers in those fields aren't necessarily given time to nap, and "don't have professional nutritionists and / or chefs taking care of their dietary needs." Of course most employers in those fields don't call their workers "athletes", but most athletes outside of professional sports have perks like naps and nutritionists. I think a lot of amateur athletes have jobs, and practice and compete in their free time.

drummojg 5y ago

It's really ironic that MegaTaylorism is touted as such a great "innovation." I wonder if, like Uber is doing with transport, Amazon is scaffolding their warehouse processes so that it will be an easier transition when the day comes to replace all the wetware with robots.