4 ms·

Humans aren't a fungible resource. When Amazon fires a worker, or that worker quits because of poor conditions, it's going to be significantly more difficult to

Humans aren't a fungible resource. When Amazon fires a worker, or that worker quits because of poor conditions, it's going to be significantly more difficult to convince that person to come back. Amazon sets up its warehouses in low-cost areas where fewer people live. I can certainly imagine that they could run out of people. How many times can you source a 350k person workforce before you exhaust the local supply of willing laborers? Not that many, I imagine.

newsclues 5y ago
How many people enter the workforce annually? Workers are renewable for annual exploitation
- werber 5y ago
  This comment is so bleak it made me think of Amazon going the route of the US military and recruiting in high schools
  - Frost1x 5y ago
    It's what tech companies already try to do recruiting fresh out of college and promoting their specific tech in highschool curriculia as well as just hoping to pad the future workforce. Not that different than the military and its ROTC programs in highschools. Obviously, working at Amazon as an SDE or whatever isn't quite the same as signing up for the military but the recruitment strategy isn't all that different.
    - marcosdumay 5y ago
      The tech industry is grooming people for a highly paying kind of job. That is much less problematic (maybe even not a problem at all) than grooming people for a low paying high demanding job.
  - newsclues 5y ago
    Tech boot camps!
- ruined 5y ago
  Workers don't enter the market naive. Every viral shitting-in-a-bag story is another generation of kids with an aversion to Amazon
  - newsclues 5y ago
    I don’t think people are totally naive, but naïveté is a spectrum and youth tend to have higher levels until age and experience occur. This is why the army uses young men for combat and why apprenticeships in trades work exist. To exploit young people
    - ziml77 5y ago
      Which ends up being a problem for young people who know and are trying not to be exploited. There's enough capable but uninformed people out there that it's no problem to these companies that they're missing a portion of the pool of potential employees by paying nothing or very little.
    - ruined 5y ago
      so, once amazon provides the ideological glorification, personal fulfillment, and material rewards those other careers can offer to at least a fraction of their members, they will perhaps be able to reliably exploit newcomers. soldiers can at least be promoted. apprentices may eventually become journeymen. both provide skills training that enable you to become an independent contractor, and the higher tiers offer quite decent pay. but for now everyone knows amazon is just a dehumanizing dead-end survival-wage job that will wreck your body, and the executives know everybody knows this, thus tfa
matz1 5y ago
Not true, at least in restaurant industry, people rage quit (because horrible condition or whatever) all the time, yet some time latter they show up again at work at the same place, same pay, same position. Coupled with increase pay incentives, yeah they will come back.
toast0 5y ago
If you've worked there before and they'll rehire you, it may be an easy option for people when they quit or get fired for some other job. If they were fired for not hitting metrics and not for misconduct, they're probably willing to rehire.
- tablespoon 5y ago
  > If they were fired for not hitting metrics and not for misconduct, they're probably willing to rehire. My understanding is that "hitting metrics" in these warehouses is so exhausting that most people can't do it indefinitely.
  - toast0 5y ago
    Sure, which is why there's no reason not to rehire that person after a while.
tablespoon 5y ago
> How many times can you source a 350k person workforce before you exhaust the local supply of willing laborers? Not that many, I imagine. IIRC, there are quite a few people who work at these Amazon warehouses who are essentially nomadic (e.g. living out of camper or van), but I don't it's enough to really change that equation. Honestly, the next step Amazon needs to do is get serfdom legalized. Then they could purchase a fief in these areas and require a customary amount of labor from each household per year.
- watwut 5y ago
  That sounds homeless rather then nomadic.
inglor_cz 5y ago
From my limited contacts with the Czech Amazon, people do return to work there. Mostly because Amazon is almost certain to take them back, unless bridges were thoroughly burnt. (I.e. stealing.)

newsclues 5y ago

How many people enter the workforce annually? Workers are renewable for annual exploitation

werber 5y ago
This comment is so bleak it made me think of Amazon going the route of the US military and recruiting in high schools
- Frost1x 5y ago
  It's what tech companies already try to do recruiting fresh out of college and promoting their specific tech in highschool curriculia as well as just hoping to pad the future workforce. Not that different than the military and its ROTC programs in highschools. Obviously, working at Amazon as an SDE or whatever isn't quite the same as signing up for the military but the recruitment strategy isn't all that different.
  - marcosdumay 5y ago
    The tech industry is grooming people for a highly paying kind of job. That is much less problematic (maybe even not a problem at all) than grooming people for a low paying high demanding job.
- newsclues 5y ago
  Tech boot camps!
ruined 5y ago
Workers don't enter the market naive. Every viral shitting-in-a-bag story is another generation of kids with an aversion to Amazon
- newsclues 5y ago
  I don’t think people are totally naive, but naïveté is a spectrum and youth tend to have higher levels until age and experience occur. This is why the army uses young men for combat and why apprenticeships in trades work exist. To exploit young people
  - ziml77 5y ago
    Which ends up being a problem for young people who know and are trying not to be exploited. There's enough capable but uninformed people out there that it's no problem to these companies that they're missing a portion of the pool of potential employees by paying nothing or very little.
  - ruined 5y ago
    so, once amazon provides the ideological glorification, personal fulfillment, and material rewards those other careers can offer to at least a fraction of their members, they will perhaps be able to reliably exploit newcomers. soldiers can at least be promoted. apprentices may eventually become journeymen. both provide skills training that enable you to become an independent contractor, and the higher tiers offer quite decent pay. but for now everyone knows amazon is just a dehumanizing dead-end survival-wage job that will wreck your body, and the executives know everybody knows this, thus tfa

matz1 5y ago

Not true, at least in restaurant industry, people rage quit (because horrible condition or whatever) all the time, yet some time latter they show up again at work at the same place, same pay, same position. Coupled with increase pay incentives, yeah they will come back.

toast0 5y ago

If you've worked there before and they'll rehire you, it may be an easy option for people when they quit or get fired for some other job. If they were fired for not hitting metrics and not for misconduct, they're probably willing to rehire.

tablespoon 5y ago
> If they were fired for not hitting metrics and not for misconduct, they're probably willing to rehire. My understanding is that "hitting metrics" in these warehouses is so exhausting that most people can't do it indefinitely.
- toast0 5y ago
  Sure, which is why there's no reason not to rehire that person after a while.

tablespoon 5y ago

> How many times can you source a 350k person workforce before you exhaust the local supply of willing laborers? Not that many, I imagine. IIRC, there are quite a few people who work at these Amazon warehouses who are essentially nomadic (e.g. living out of camper or van), but I don't it's enough to really change that equation. Honestly, the next step Amazon needs to do is get serfdom legalized. Then they could purchase a fief in these areas and require a customary amount of labor from each household per year.

watwut 5y ago
That sounds homeless rather then nomadic.

inglor_cz 5y ago

From my limited contacts with the Czech Amazon, people do return to work there. Mostly because Amazon is almost certain to take them back, unless bridges were thoroughly burnt. (I.e. stealing.)