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Is there an argument for not having Amazon as an employer in these towns? Is there an argument for not having Amazon support the local school system? I unders

Is there an argument for not having Amazon as an employer in these towns? Is there an argument for not having Amazon support the local school system? I understand that working conditions are rarely ideal. Many would prefer to enjoy leisure and collect a paycheck as the ideal source of income. Jobs pay because workers need an incentive to provide labor. What exactly would JacobinMag.com's alternative to Amazon employment look like? Why aren't they providing this alternative? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy#Perfect_solution_fallacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy#Perfect_soluti...

PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
> Why aren't they providing this alternative? Because Bezos/Amazon spent years building barriers to entry? Because people's preference for shopping at Amazon, like their preference for shopping at malls 30-40 years earlier, began the disintegration of other forms of retail work? Because "fulfillment" centers (are you fulfilled yet?) benefit from being in locations that are not typically the ones where people are choosing to live. They need only space and transportation (typically highway) access, and there's no need for there to be other excellent reasons for vibrant human communities to be in the vicinity. Because employee-owned business (a Jacobin and personal favorite) face numerous obstacles in the US due to legal, political and cultural factors. Because it's the entire economy, not just Amazon, that is collapsing into "low wage jobs that we don't have robots for yet" and "high wage jobs that can be done from anywhere" (plus, well paid skilled manual labor). When the alternative to one low wage job that will eventually be automated is another low wage job that will eventually be automated, there's not a lot of motivation to create that alternative.
- gruez 5y ago
  >Because Bezos/Amazon spent years building barriers to entry? What barriers? Is amazon lobbying local governments to prevent competitor warehouses from being built? Or is they're just so ahead of everyone in terms of service/price? >Because people's preference for shopping at Amazon, like their preference for shopping at malls 30-40 years earlier, began the disintegration of other forms of retail work? People's preferences change. If something better comes along, you have to adapt as well, not complain that your competitor is "disintegrat[ing]" your business model. >Because "fulfillment" centers (are you fulfilled yet?) benefit from being in locations that are not typically the ones where people are choosing to live. From the rest of the argument it looks like you're trying to paint this as an advantage for amazon, but to me it seems more like a disadvantage. If amazon warehouses are located in "locations that are not typically the ones where people are choosing to live", doesn't that mean they'll have an harder time finding workers and you having an easier time finding workers? Also, I'm not sure how applicable your claim is across all of amazon. In a rural area your argument would make sense (ie. warehouse in the middle of nowhere rather than in a population center), but in metropolitan areas they're almost always surrounded by houses (eg. https://goo.gl/maps/bfT3ePP1dfupKnuo6 https://goo.gl/maps/bfT3ePP1dfupKnuo6) >Because employee-owned business (a Jacobin and personal favorite) face numerous obstacles in the US due to legal, political and cultural factors. I'm not sure why it has to be employee owned. It seems like you're repeating the nirvana fallacy that gp was talking about.
  - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
    > What barriers? It's likely that you don't know that I was the 2nd employee at Amazon. I don't want to spend time here going into all the ways that Bezos sought to create barriers to entry for competitors, but Brad Stone's two books on the company get into this. > People's preferences change. If something better comes along, People in general are very bad at carrying out long term analysis of their preference-based decisions. People went to malls while professing to love Main St., most of them not realizing that the former would eventually kill the economics of the latter. Likewise, people's preference for online shopping doesn't actually amount to a desire to kill bricks-n-mortar retail, even though that is (likely) the eventual result. People's preferences generally express short-term feelings, rather than longer term rational analyses of how their lives, homes and societies may be affected by their choices. > If amazon warehouses are located in "locations that are not typically the ones where people are choosing to live", doesn't that mean they'll have an harder time finding workers and you having an easier time finding workers? That's why there's an article on HN (Jacobin, really) title "Amazon is creating company towns across the United States". > but in metropolitan areas they're almost always surrounded by houses Most of amzn's fulfillment centers are rural or exurban. Most of amzn's current development plans are focused on rural locations. And I described this in order to make the point that rural areas are almost always more difficult places to generate economic alternatives than cities. > I'm not sure why it has to be employee owned The question was about alternatives. Jacobin authors probably don't see much difference trading one multi-billionaire CEO for another, so I was mentioning the most practical genuine alternative to the sort of economic entity that amzn represents.
beckman466 5y ago
> Is there an argument for not having Amazon as an employer in these towns? > Why aren't they providing this alternative? > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy#Perfect_soluti https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy#Perfect_soluti... Why are you opposed to this critique? You can offer critique without needing to provide alternatives. From your questions it sounds like you yourself are falling victim to the 'just world fallacy'. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis If you have/had kids, would you be excited to hear the following story from them about their day? Probably not, yet this is exactly what's happened in marginalized communities. From the article: ""A dozen students sat clustered at work tables inside an air-conditioned classroom, which was designed to emulate the inside of an Amazon facility. On one wall, Amazon’s giant logo grinned across a yellow and green banner. The words “CUSTOMER OBSESSION” and “DELIVER RESULTS” were painted against a corporate-style yellow backdrop. On a whiteboard, a teacher had written the words “Logistics Final Project,” and the lesson of the day was on Amazon’s “14 Leadership Principles.” Each teenager wore a company golf shirt emblazoned with the Amazon logo. Students and staff members expressed pride in being associated with the company. Amazon partnered with the school as part of its five-year anniversary in the Inland Empire, donating $50,000 to start the pilot program, the giant sweepstakes-style Amazon check displayed prominently at the classroom entrance. The students had already taken field trips to tour the nearby Amazon warehouse." A public high-school classroom designed to resemble an Amazon facility, with students wearing Amazon logos on their clothing as they memorize Amazon’s leadership principles (which, it is worth noting, also include “Ownership” and “Think Big,” injunctions that hold merit for readers of this magazine when imagining how we might solve the problems exemplified by Amazon). Such a relationship between the company and public goods like a high school is part of what it means to consider Amazon as “the major working-class space of suburban and exurban socialization.” The behemoth is here, producing not only profit but people, too. That entails corporate indoctrination, social estrangement, and profound alienation from one’s labor, which is particularly meaningless as one breaks one’s body to get so many goods to people’s doors."
- aww_dang 5y ago
  Employees work for Amazon because it is an improvement over their current situation. If it wasn't an improvement, they wouldn't take the job. Whether they deserve it or not is something the employee has to evaluate, along with the subjective valuation of their labor. If there's an alternative where employees could earn more for less labor, that might be a good opportunity to explore. Not just for the employees, but any potential entrepreneurs as well. There are several areas where I feel critical of Amazon's policies. Voluntary employment isn't one of them. Nor am I a fan of the public education system. If I found myself in that situation, it would be a teachable moment.
azemetre 5y ago
The argument against Amazon not "supporting the local school system" is that it's a public good in most western democracies. Amazon can support the school system by appropriately paying taxes. I won't argue against the employer aspect, because many of these jobs are in dilapidated towns and they are often better than the alternatives (unemployment/workmans comp claims or fast food versus getting scheduled work with great benefits).

PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago

> Why aren't they providing this alternative? Because Bezos/Amazon spent years building barriers to entry? Because people's preference for shopping at Amazon, like their preference for shopping at malls 30-40 years earlier, began the disintegration of other forms of retail work? Because "fulfillment" centers (are you fulfilled yet?) benefit from being in locations that are not typically the ones where people are choosing to live. They need only space and transportation (typically highway) access, and there's no need for there to be other excellent reasons for vibrant human communities to be in the vicinity. Because employee-owned business (a Jacobin and personal favorite) face numerous obstacles in the US due to legal, political and cultural factors. Because it's the entire economy, not just Amazon, that is collapsing into "low wage jobs that we don't have robots for yet" and "high wage jobs that can be done from anywhere" (plus, well paid skilled manual labor). When the alternative to one low wage job that will eventually be automated is another low wage job that will eventually be automated, there's not a lot of motivation to create that alternative.

gruez 5y ago
>Because Bezos/Amazon spent years building barriers to entry? What barriers? Is amazon lobbying local governments to prevent competitor warehouses from being built? Or is they're just so ahead of everyone in terms of service/price? >Because people's preference for shopping at Amazon, like their preference for shopping at malls 30-40 years earlier, began the disintegration of other forms of retail work? People's preferences change. If something better comes along, you have to adapt as well, not complain that your competitor is "disintegrat[ing]" your business model. >Because "fulfillment" centers (are you fulfilled yet?) benefit from being in locations that are not typically the ones where people are choosing to live. From the rest of the argument it looks like you're trying to paint this as an advantage for amazon, but to me it seems more like a disadvantage. If amazon warehouses are located in "locations that are not typically the ones where people are choosing to live", doesn't that mean they'll have an harder time finding workers and you having an easier time finding workers? Also, I'm not sure how applicable your claim is across all of amazon. In a rural area your argument would make sense (ie. warehouse in the middle of nowhere rather than in a population center), but in metropolitan areas they're almost always surrounded by houses (eg. https://goo.gl/maps/bfT3ePP1dfupKnuo6 https://goo.gl/maps/bfT3ePP1dfupKnuo6) >Because employee-owned business (a Jacobin and personal favorite) face numerous obstacles in the US due to legal, political and cultural factors. I'm not sure why it has to be employee owned. It seems like you're repeating the nirvana fallacy that gp was talking about.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
  > What barriers? It's likely that you don't know that I was the 2nd employee at Amazon. I don't want to spend time here going into all the ways that Bezos sought to create barriers to entry for competitors, but Brad Stone's two books on the company get into this. > People's preferences change. If something better comes along, People in general are very bad at carrying out long term analysis of their preference-based decisions. People went to malls while professing to love Main St., most of them not realizing that the former would eventually kill the economics of the latter. Likewise, people's preference for online shopping doesn't actually amount to a desire to kill bricks-n-mortar retail, even though that is (likely) the eventual result. People's preferences generally express short-term feelings, rather than longer term rational analyses of how their lives, homes and societies may be affected by their choices. > If amazon warehouses are located in "locations that are not typically the ones where people are choosing to live", doesn't that mean they'll have an harder time finding workers and you having an easier time finding workers? That's why there's an article on HN (Jacobin, really) title "Amazon is creating company towns across the United States". > but in metropolitan areas they're almost always surrounded by houses Most of amzn's fulfillment centers are rural or exurban. Most of amzn's current development plans are focused on rural locations. And I described this in order to make the point that rural areas are almost always more difficult places to generate economic alternatives than cities. > I'm not sure why it has to be employee owned The question was about alternatives. Jacobin authors probably don't see much difference trading one multi-billionaire CEO for another, so I was mentioning the most practical genuine alternative to the sort of economic entity that amzn represents.

beckman466 5y ago

> Is there an argument for not having Amazon as an employer in these towns? > Why aren't they providing this alternative? > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy#Perfect_soluti https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_fallacy#Perfect_soluti... Why are you opposed to this critique? You can offer critique without needing to provide alternatives. From your questions it sounds like you yourself are falling victim to the 'just world fallacy'. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-world_hypothesis If you have/had kids, would you be excited to hear the following story from them about their day? Probably not, yet this is exactly what's happened in marginalized communities. From the article: ""A dozen students sat clustered at work tables inside an air-conditioned classroom, which was designed to emulate the inside of an Amazon facility. On one wall, Amazon’s giant logo grinned across a yellow and green banner. The words “CUSTOMER OBSESSION” and “DELIVER RESULTS” were painted against a corporate-style yellow backdrop. On a whiteboard, a teacher had written the words “Logistics Final Project,” and the lesson of the day was on Amazon’s “14 Leadership Principles.” Each teenager wore a company golf shirt emblazoned with the Amazon logo. Students and staff members expressed pride in being associated with the company. Amazon partnered with the school as part of its five-year anniversary in the Inland Empire, donating $50,000 to start the pilot program, the giant sweepstakes-style Amazon check displayed prominently at the classroom entrance. The students had already taken field trips to tour the nearby Amazon warehouse." A public high-school classroom designed to resemble an Amazon facility, with students wearing Amazon logos on their clothing as they memorize Amazon’s leadership principles (which, it is worth noting, also include “Ownership” and “Think Big,” injunctions that hold merit for readers of this magazine when imagining how we might solve the problems exemplified by Amazon). Such a relationship between the company and public goods like a high school is part of what it means to consider Amazon as “the major working-class space of suburban and exurban socialization.” The behemoth is here, producing not only profit but people, too. That entails corporate indoctrination, social estrangement, and profound alienation from one’s labor, which is particularly meaningless as one breaks one’s body to get so many goods to people’s doors."

aww_dang 5y ago
Employees work for Amazon because it is an improvement over their current situation. If it wasn't an improvement, they wouldn't take the job. Whether they deserve it or not is something the employee has to evaluate, along with the subjective valuation of their labor. If there's an alternative where employees could earn more for less labor, that might be a good opportunity to explore. Not just for the employees, but any potential entrepreneurs as well. There are several areas where I feel critical of Amazon's policies. Voluntary employment isn't one of them. Nor am I a fan of the public education system. If I found myself in that situation, it would be a teachable moment.

azemetre 5y ago

The argument against Amazon not "supporting the local school system" is that it's a public good in most western democracies. Amazon can support the school system by appropriately paying taxes. I won't argue against the employer aspect, because many of these jobs are in dilapidated towns and they are often better than the alternatives (unemployment/workmans comp claims or fast food versus getting scheduled work with great benefits).