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Amazon Unlawfully Confiscated Union Literature, NLRB Finds

406 points by cf100clunk 5y ago

arberx 5y ago
It's impossible for me to have a positive view of Amazon (the company) at this point. There's way too much evidence pointing to the contrary.
- chad_strategic 5y ago
  Your comment is a broad generalization, yet provides no examples of evidence.
  - chad_strategic 5y ago
    Seriously? I get down-voted for calling someone out. Let me change the wording so we can see the hypocrisy. "It's impossible for me to have a positive view of White People (the company) at this point. There's way too much evidence pointing to the contrary."
    - arberx 5y ago
      A company is completely different from a group or race of individuals. A company is a single entity (individual).
      - InitialLastName 5y ago
        Not just that, but (slave labor aside) a company and its employees are voluntarily associated. Voluntary associations are the kind of thing we (as a society) are usually fine with judging people based on (as opposed to features that are relatively immutable like race).
        jdavis703 5y ago
        In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans. Increasingly we’re seeing police being added to lists of “protected classes” too. This attitude is (unfortunately) changing in society.
        dragonwriter 5y ago
        > In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans Military veterans are federally protected against negative discrimination, and in most public employment at all levels, and many private employment contexts, are also beneficiaries of explicit positive discrimination.
        amyjess 5y ago
        > In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans. We also had a draft for a very long time, and I'm sure that when these laws were put into place, there were a large portion of draftees who were at risk for being discriminated against for something they were forced by the government to do.
        chad_strategic 5y ago
        If you see slave labor, then you have an obligation to report it your local authorities. update: see above
        lmilcin 5y ago
        Can you point to the law or are you making the law as you go? I remind you, your parent comment says "Your comment is a broad generalization, yet provides no examples of evidence." So if you point out people not putting evidence, at least demand the same standard for your own posts.
        lovich 5y ago
        The slave labor I am aware of currently is being used by the authorities
        5y ago
    - lmilcin 5y ago
      You are being downvoted for obvious and blatant disregard of frequent and abundant "examples of evidence" already available on HN. There is so many submissions on HN regarding Amazon that I pretty much expect it to get its own dedicated section pretty soon.
      - chad_strategic 5y ago
        That's not my interpretation of the article. One security officer took some confiscated "material". One incident.
        lmilcin 5y ago
        The article described one incident, true. But the comment was aimed at the fact there are other incidents regularly posted on HN. If you can't use Google, try to learn it. It is really fun and useful. Certainly something I would do if I were you, before I posted any more on the topic.
        chad_strategic 5y ago
        I just googled amazon... This is what I found. 1. AWS is an incredible software/suite /cloud service that I use and millions of others use on regular basis. 2. Amazon prime allows me to purchase products at my convenience. 3. Amazon Fresh allows me to grocery shop with out having to leave the house, as grocery shopping can be time-consuming. 4. Amazon Prime Video isn't too great, but it provides healthy competition to NBC, CBS, NetFlix, etc... 5. If it wasn't for Amazon, Walmart would have become the only and number 1 relatier in America in the early 2000's. 6. We still have high unemployment in America and not enough workers. I didn’t like my job a few years ago, so I quit and these people can to. But just a warning Mr. Amazon hater. Sounds like you got an axe to grind, but hey that’s cool. Let me give you a tip, it’s actually a stock tip. Get on the phone and call your financial advisor and tell him that you want to return all the profits you have made off of AMZN, because you feel bad the NLBR violation. What is that? You don’t have own AMZN stock? Do you own an index stock? SPY, QQQ? Yeap you profited. Try to explain to your financial advisor how to give those profits back. Look at your hands… you are part of the problem. So you might want to tone down your liberal hype, well cause you are just making your argument look weak.
  - davidcbc 5y ago
    The link they are commenting on is part of the evidence, which I assume is why they commented on it
  - ahoy 5y ago
    This is the comments section on that very evidence.
- paxys 5y ago
  Is it possible to have a positive view of any large company? They are all doing a lot of good things and a few bad things. Beyond that it depends on how good their PR department is.
  - Apocryphon 5y ago
    Would like to know if there are any large companies that actually defy this general rule. Costco is a common counter-example, but even they’re imperfect: https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/11/business/costco-5-dollar-chicken/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/11/business/costco-5-dollar-chic...
    - pseudalopex 5y ago
      Few people expect perfection.
  - arberx 5y ago
    Hmm maybe "positive view" is the wrong approach. I think "impossible to not have a negative view" is better wording. Indiffernce is generally how I feel about a lot of companies. My perspective on Amazon is negative.
  - Causality1 5y ago
    Cox Cable fought for their customers. What did it get them? A billion dollar fine.
- newsyyswen 5y ago
  I wonder when the change happened. It seems like there's a fairly broad consensus now, but different people seem to cite different time periods for when things took a bad turn. I had consistently great experiences ~3-8 years ago, but I remember needing to be careful about 3rd party sellers towards the end of that time period. Thing is, I stopped ordering online about a year before the pandemic started. When I returned to Amazon 18 months ago, it felt like the balance had shifted towards the majority of listings being fraud/low quality/unexpectedly comingled/etc. Personally, I blame a shift in perspective. It feels like their retail teams' views on who "The Customer" was shifted from the person placing the order, to the 3rd-party sellers. When do y'all think that happened? 2015? 2017? 2019?
  - onli 5y ago
    For me I can restore it in my blog. At the beginning of 2019 a first article about how Amazon might not be the best option to buy everything anymore, citing the bad quality of user reviews, the potential problem with fakes and the subpar experience with the website (specifically: The search evidently being skewed towards sponsored and not towards good offers, and missing filters to find products by their properties). Then summer 2019 a report on a disastrous support experience (in a case that included a received obvious fake) and the decision to not buy there anymore. That was very fast, in retrospective. I liked Amazon quite a bit before that, the early 2019 articles even clearly reads like that. No criticism before that. Instead a few positive support experiences. But that's just me, and not necessarily a US perspective. The fake problem for example I thought to be more prominent outside of Europe. On the other hand, that amazon seemed to fight against unions had been reported here before, to boycott the site because of that was a fairly common position. Also, I wonder how it would have been if I had been more invested into the ecosystem - there is no Kindle in my home, no Echo, and I started to buy there relatively late. Though a site of mine used their affiliate marketing program even back in 2011...
  - ashtonkem 5y ago
    It’s not just views on Amazon as a company to do business with. Attitudes around these parts have soured on Amazon as a company to work for too.
- alfalfasprout 5y ago
  Thing is, at this point Amazon has mastered the art of getting away with employee-hostile practices. Take, as a separate example, their PIP culture. The bar to get into amazon is fairly low (compared to peer companies) and so they tend to use PIP to maintain a high turnover and filter out unproductive employees. There's no shortage of engineers wanting to apply to Amazon (increasingly from overseas) and this churn seems to be OK because they have very good systems in place to onboard employees fast. For an engineer early in their career having AMZN on their resume can be worth the pain. At least among my peers in senior and staff/principal levels there's very little desire to jump ship to amazon though. Similarly, they can treat warehouse workers like crap because there are others willing to line up to take their place. Regardless of the conditions. What it boils down to is that many of amazon's employees simply don't have a better choice. And I'm not sure what can really help with that.
  - cratermoon 5y ago
    I spent a year working at a very large company that's well known in my part of the country, not because I wanted to work there, but because it was nice to have on my resume. But at least their compensation wasn't back-loaded.
  - omegaworks 5y ago
    >I'm not sure what can really help with that. A basic social safety net. If companies are forced to compete with minimum living standards that are guaranteed to all people, it prevents their worst excesses.
underseacables 5y ago
I think Amazon should be allowed to confiscate union literature, because it is disruptive to the work environment. Talk about unions outside of work, not at work.
- the-dude 5y ago
  So what is allowed at work? Only work?
  - cf100clunk 5y ago
    Better not get caught discussing the company softball team on the clock, right?
- eganist 5y ago
  > I think Amazon should be allowed to confiscate union literature, because it is disruptive to the work environment. Talk about unions outside of work, not at work. This is likely to be illegal under current regulations: https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/rights-we-protect/the-law/employees/your-rights-during-union-organizing https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/rights-we-protect/the-law/em... (site currently down as of this comment) > For example, your employer cannot prohibit you from talking about the union during working time if it permits you to talk about other non-work-related matters during working time. That said, (edited) the NLRB seems more likely to be aligned with the employer if the talk actually disrupts work. https://www.natlawreview.com/article/shhh-nlrb-says-companies-can-block-union-talk-clock https://www.natlawreview.com/article/shhh-nlrb-says-companie... Separately: https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/shop-talk-rules-union-related-conversations-activities-work.html https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/shop-talk-rules-unio...
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- smoldesu 5y ago
  Nowhere did it say that the employee was distracted by it, they just had it on their person. How would you feel if your boss took your phone from you, refusing to give it back until the end of the day since it was "distracting you" from your back pocket?
chad_strategic 5y ago
This might be unpopular opinion but... More robots and more automation comes on line everyday, soon there will be less and less employees at these facilities regardless of unions. Unions or government regulation where not able to save the type writer or the typewriter union. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_of_Women_Clerks_and_Secretaries https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_of_Women_Clerks_an... dissolved in 1989 The market(capitalism) is going to do what the market(capitalism) does.
- criddell 5y ago
  There's nothing wrong with that opinion but you aren't considering all the other things unions do for their members. A union can't make those jobs last forever but it can try to make working conditions better for as long as the job lasts.
- _jal 5y ago
  That's a fine opinion. I happen to agree that some what you imply is true. But you can claim that about a lot of things that we choose to treat differently. Property crime is inevitable, and yet we devote significant resources to fighting that. Same with death. If you don't want to devote resources to figuring out what to do with a lot of "surplus humanity", they'll help you make up your mind later.
- ipaddr 5y ago
  Why wouldn't robots be in unions in the future? It will be part of giving robots human rights and social progress. You won't be able to own robots like they are slaves. Robots will demand and get more.
- hutzlibu 5y ago
  "The market(capitalism) is going to do what the market(capitalism) does. " And unions do, what unions do: try to negotiate better conditions for their members. Whether they provide a net benefit to society, is a different and I think very case specific question.
  - kazen44 5y ago
ericol 5y ago
Whatever you think of union, take this into account: You shouldn't be basing your opinions on your biases. Replace "Union Literature" with: - Soccer Literature - LGBT+ Literature - Harry Potter Literature Do you agree with all this to also be confiscated would it be freely distributed at work?
- chad_strategic 5y ago
  Yes, I don't like Harry Potter and I shouldn't have to hear about him if I don't want to. All this can take place off site.
  - slumpt_ 5y ago
    Fortunately the law disagrees with your regressive, anti-employee perspective.
    - chad_strategic 5y ago
      Are you familiar with at-will employment? If I'm the owner of company and employee talks to be about Harry Potter in the break room. Later that day, or on the spot, I can terminate that employee, without cause or reason. Sure they the employee can sue me for wrongful termination, but the laws are stacked against the employee. (I have been on both side of the argument.) Please reference a law to support your claim. You might want to study up on your law, history and economics.
      - decebalus1 5y ago
        I think you either haven't actually read the article, any of the replies in this thread or you're just a troll. We're not here to educate you, just look up the current US labor laws and see for yourself whether or not your argument has any standing.
        chad_strategic 5y ago
        >Please reference a law to support your claim. ?
Animats 5y ago
This could work out. Each time the employer violates an NRLB rule during an organizing campaign, even if the employer wins, there's another election in 3 months. Until the union wins or the employer stops breaking the rules.
- boomboomsubban 5y ago
  This infraction is about a different Amazon facility, it is unrelated to the vote to unionize.
- PragmaticPulp 5y ago
  I think it's clear that the union wants a do-over and is looking for any technicality that might give them another chance. Does anyone really believe that the Amazon employees voted against the union because Amazon removed some union material from the break room one day? Of course not. The employees knew what they were voting for and were fully capable of researching it themselves. The real question is what does the union plan on doing differently to sway the employees to vote differently next time? Repeatedly trying to overrule the employees about their own voted decisions isn't likely to be popular among those who voted against the union, which is most of them. They'll need a better narrative on top of this if they want to get anywhere. Or alternatively, maybe they don't care so much about this election as they do about making Amazon look bad. Maybe they know these workers don't want to unionize, but they're going to use this opportunity to try to convince the public that the workers were misled by Amazon. If they can't win the workers at this location, maybe they can try to win the public on a wave of anti-Amazon publicity for a do-over in another location.
  - dasudasu 5y ago
    If it had no influence, then why remove the material and break the law?
    - nerfhammer 5y ago
      should we presume this was strategically ordered by upper management and not just someone at the location just assumed outside material wasn't allowed?
LatteLazy 5y ago
>The NLRB’s report on the Bessemer election found that Amazon illegally discouraged labor organizing, in part by pushing post office officials to install a mailbox outside the warehouse where workers were urged to drop their mail-in ballots, which an NLRB officer wrote “destroyed the laboratory conditions and justifies a second election.” Stupid question: how does getting a new post box discourage organising? I feel like I'm missing some clever trick...
- Mathnerd314 5y ago
  > Amazon had a ballot collection box installed in an employee parking lot “without authorization” from the NLRB’s regional director. The NLRB definitively denied Amazon’s request for a drop box on the warehouse property. Amazon installed one anyway. The box was placed under the view of Amazon security cameras, creating "an impression of surveillance." An employee testified to having seen company security guards open the mailbox. In general, if you have a postbox tied to the company, then only people supporting the company will feel comfortable using it. Hence the votes will be biased anti-union.
  - plandis 5y ago
    But why? The post box is presumably run by the USPS, not Amazon.
    - post-it 5y ago
      > An employee testified to having seen company security guards open the mailbox. If this is true, then apparently not.
    - 28053144 5y ago
      "An employee testified to having seen company security guards open the mailbox." Ignore the "testified" part -- even if this was just a rumor that somebody started, imagine the impact it would have.
  - LatteLazy 5y ago
    Thanks, that makes more sense at least.
boomboomsubban 5y ago
The surveillance seems like the more troubling ruling. Having a security guard stand outside a union meeting and photograph the attendants seems like a thinly veiled threat, and if I were in that situation I would likely jump ship.
anigbrowl 5y ago
Note how security guards are being employed to carry out the will of management, even though no safety/security situation obtains. In general, security arrangements involve a transaction of unquestioning obedience to authority in exchange for preferential treatment, which can then be leveraged by the authority holder to pursue illegitimate ends, eg doing things that are outside the legal scope of managers (in the private sector) or elected officials (in the public). Because security personnel are delegated enforcement authority, instant challenges to them are treated as breaches of security; challenges can only be made administratively, even though the act of enforcement can change the fact situation sufficiently to render the administrative challenge impossible or moot (ie people give up because pursuing the administrative route is often not worth the trouble). The security officer's dilemma is that doing their job requires them to not think very much about what they are asked to do. If they begin to have thoughts of their own about what is ethical or not and decline to assist an authority figure who asks them to do something unethical, then they risk loss of their security status and are suddenly treated as a security problem themselves. It's int he interest of authority figures to excuse and cover for minor lapses of security officer behavior so that when the authority figure wants something illegitimate, they have leverage over their security apparatus. Overly scrupulous security personnel don't get promoted. It's worth considering that a high portion of our economy is based on the use of guard labor (not including regular law enforcement) and that this may have or perpetuate distorting economic effects: https://www.brown.edu/Departments/Economics/Faculty/Glenn_Loury/louryhomepage/teaching/Ec%20222/Garrison%20America.pdf https://www.brown.edu/Departments/Economics/Faculty/Glenn_Lo...
- ineedasername 5y ago
  Note how security guards are being employed to carry out the will of management Yes, it falls under the concept of "Guard Labor", basically any workers who don't contribute even indirectly to planning and management or implementation of projects & initiatives. That can be actual guards, managers whose only purpose is to make sure people are doing their job, etc. Work required to keep the status quo as the status quo. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guard_labor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guard_labor
  - 5y ago
blunte 5y ago
Can we just be honest and say that Amazon - it's leadership, especially Bezos - is greedy/sociopathic and frankly detrimental to long term human survival (based on the zero-sum approach to success), but that it's so convenient that we privileged people will still buy stuff off Amazon? As with factory farming, if people could see the conditions which their "food" (living beings) were subjected to, they would make different decisions... we would probably make different buying decisions if we had friends or family who worked in the worst jobs for Amazon. I used to love bacon...
- cwkoss 5y ago
  With Bezos abdicating CEO, will be interesting to see to what extent lack of his influence will change company culture. I expect the rot is pervasive throughout the c-level, but hope to be surprised.
cratermoon 5y ago
Anyone paying attention expected and suspected Amazon to play shady games. Good to see the results.
BugsJustFindMe 5y ago
If it's unlawful, will Amazon be punished? Doesn't breaking the law usually mean punishment?
- Coriolis3 5y ago
  People get punished. Corporations receive (at most) a small fine that usually amounts to far less than what their crimes netted them.
ggm 5y ago
Because my engagement with unions has only been positive, I am interested in the amazing number of people who seem motivated to say how negatively they feel about unions. I get that in an oppositional sense, if you don't want what a union wants, then they tend to cast into the bad, but for the middle ground who are not VCs, owners, Managers, and are candidates for union membership, I find it really strange how much people cast them into a class of "money grabbers for no benefit" Do people feel the same about life insurance, car insurance? Its not that you actually intend being harrassed or sacked (fall ill, have a car accident) It's that you don't want to find yourself on the wrong side of an employment dispute (accident claim) without some insurance. Unions may be taking your hard earned money. They may be doing things which you don't like (do I love my car insurance company?) But, they have a neccessary role in risk management. We talk about risk management in the ICT sector all the time. Why can't we talk about risk management for labour hire? Amazon used "dirty tricks" to win this election. I am sure the Union bust some minor rules too, but overall I am reasonably confident that the vote was neither free, nor fair. I also do think there is no latent 100% pro-union vote out there, and that a large number of the polled workers don't want a union, or the cost of the union, or the risk of jobloss from Amazon if they join the union (which is illegal but still has a risk of happening) -So I don't for a minute believe a re-vote will magically reverse the signal with an overwhelming result. What interests me, is the basis for opposition to the union in the first place. Do people really think the garment workers in New York were backing the wrong horse? Do people think the machineguns which Ford arranged to turn on a union march in Detroit didn't happen? "oh, that would never happen now..."
- nickff 5y ago
  Well, many people have had issues with unions creating an environment where most employees 'soldier' (work slowly and uncreatively), by protecting the unproductive, and preventing the productive from being rewarded. Another issue is that unions seem to 'strangle' marginal, unprotected (by tariff) industries; they drive up the employer's costs, which can kill a business if prices can not be adjusted to compensate (because of foreign competition). In cases where domestic companies are protected, the unions tend to try acting as a cartel and raising the whole industry's cost structure (e.g. auto manufacturing 1940-1970). Lastly, unions have been known to use violence and intimidation, generally in one-on-one situations (against managers and anti-union employees) rather than the large scale that the Pinkertons (and the like) were known for.
refurb 5y ago
Clearly this is what tipped the election from a union win to a 70/30 union loss.
TheJoeDonger 5y ago
I'm honestly not sure why anyone cares?
specialist 5y ago
Union busters. There are professional union busting services for hire. I mean, of course their are. But I just can't get over it. It breaks my brain. Goons, piss bottles, wage theft... What's a little bit of petty larceny?

406 points by cf100clunk 5y ago

It's impossible for me to have a positive view of Amazon (the company) at this point. There's way too much evidence pointing to the contrary.

chad_strategic 5y ago
Your comment is a broad generalization, yet provides no examples of evidence.
- chad_strategic 5y ago
  Seriously? I get down-voted for calling someone out. Let me change the wording so we can see the hypocrisy. "It's impossible for me to have a positive view of White People (the company) at this point. There's way too much evidence pointing to the contrary."
  - arberx 5y ago
    A company is completely different from a group or race of individuals. A company is a single entity (individual).
    - InitialLastName 5y ago
      Not just that, but (slave labor aside) a company and its employees are voluntarily associated. Voluntary associations are the kind of thing we (as a society) are usually fine with judging people based on (as opposed to features that are relatively immutable like race).
      - jdavis703 5y ago
        In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans. Increasingly we’re seeing police being added to lists of “protected classes” too. This attitude is (unfortunately) changing in society.
        dragonwriter 5y ago
        > In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans Military veterans are federally protected against negative discrimination, and in most public employment at all levels, and many private employment contexts, are also beneficiaries of explicit positive discrimination.
        amyjess 5y ago
        > In many US localities it’s illegal to discriminate against military veterans. We also had a draft for a very long time, and I'm sure that when these laws were put into place, there were a large portion of draftees who were at risk for being discriminated against for something they were forced by the government to do.
      - chad_strategic 5y ago
        If you see slave labor, then you have an obligation to report it your local authorities. update: see above
        lmilcin 5y ago
        Can you point to the law or are you making the law as you go? I remind you, your parent comment says "Your comment is a broad generalization, yet provides no examples of evidence." So if you point out people not putting evidence, at least demand the same standard for your own posts.
        lovich 5y ago
        The slave labor I am aware of currently is being used by the authorities
      - 5y ago
  - lmilcin 5y ago
    You are being downvoted for obvious and blatant disregard of frequent and abundant "examples of evidence" already available on HN. There is so many submissions on HN regarding Amazon that I pretty much expect it to get its own dedicated section pretty soon.
    - chad_strategic 5y ago
      That's not my interpretation of the article. One security officer took some confiscated "material". One incident.
      - lmilcin 5y ago
        The article described one incident, true. But the comment was aimed at the fact there are other incidents regularly posted on HN. If you can't use Google, try to learn it. It is really fun and useful. Certainly something I would do if I were you, before I posted any more on the topic.
        chad_strategic 5y ago
        I just googled amazon... This is what I found. 1. AWS is an incredible software/suite /cloud service that I use and millions of others use on regular basis. 2. Amazon prime allows me to purchase products at my convenience. 3. Amazon Fresh allows me to grocery shop with out having to leave the house, as grocery shopping can be time-consuming. 4. Amazon Prime Video isn't too great, but it provides healthy competition to NBC, CBS, NetFlix, etc... 5. If it wasn't for Amazon, Walmart would have become the only and number 1 relatier in America in the early 2000's. 6. We still have high unemployment in America and not enough workers. I didn’t like my job a few years ago, so I quit and these people can to. But just a warning Mr. Amazon hater. Sounds like you got an axe to grind, but hey that’s cool. Let me give you a tip, it’s actually a stock tip. Get on the phone and call your financial advisor and tell him that you want to return all the profits you have made off of AMZN, because you feel bad the NLBR violation. What is that? You don’t have own AMZN stock? Do you own an index stock? SPY, QQQ? Yeap you profited. Try to explain to your financial advisor how to give those profits back. Look at your hands… you are part of the problem. So you might want to tone down your liberal hype, well cause you are just making your argument look weak.
- davidcbc 5y ago
  The link they are commenting on is part of the evidence, which I assume is why they commented on it
- ahoy 5y ago
  This is the comments section on that very evidence.
paxys 5y ago
Is it possible to have a positive view of any large company? They are all doing a lot of good things and a few bad things. Beyond that it depends on how good their PR department is.
- Apocryphon 5y ago
  Would like to know if there are any large companies that actually defy this general rule. Costco is a common counter-example, but even they’re imperfect: https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/11/business/costco-5-dollar-chicken/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/11/business/costco-5-dollar-chic...
  - pseudalopex 5y ago
    Few people expect perfection.
- arberx 5y ago
  Hmm maybe "positive view" is the wrong approach. I think "impossible to not have a negative view" is better wording. Indiffernce is generally how I feel about a lot of companies. My perspective on Amazon is negative.
- Causality1 5y ago
  Cox Cable fought for their customers. What did it get them? A billion dollar fine.
newsyyswen 5y ago
I wonder when the change happened. It seems like there's a fairly broad consensus now, but different people seem to cite different time periods for when things took a bad turn. I had consistently great experiences ~3-8 years ago, but I remember needing to be careful about 3rd party sellers towards the end of that time period. Thing is, I stopped ordering online about a year before the pandemic started. When I returned to Amazon 18 months ago, it felt like the balance had shifted towards the majority of listings being fraud/low quality/unexpectedly comingled/etc. Personally, I blame a shift in perspective. It feels like their retail teams' views on who "The Customer" was shifted from the person placing the order, to the 3rd-party sellers. When do y'all think that happened? 2015? 2017? 2019?
- onli 5y ago
  For me I can restore it in my blog. At the beginning of 2019 a first article about how Amazon might not be the best option to buy everything anymore, citing the bad quality of user reviews, the potential problem with fakes and the subpar experience with the website (specifically: The search evidently being skewed towards sponsored and not towards good offers, and missing filters to find products by their properties). Then summer 2019 a report on a disastrous support experience (in a case that included a received obvious fake) and the decision to not buy there anymore. That was very fast, in retrospective. I liked Amazon quite a bit before that, the early 2019 articles even clearly reads like that. No criticism before that. Instead a few positive support experiences. But that's just me, and not necessarily a US perspective. The fake problem for example I thought to be more prominent outside of Europe. On the other hand, that amazon seemed to fight against unions had been reported here before, to boycott the site because of that was a fairly common position. Also, I wonder how it would have been if I had been more invested into the ecosystem - there is no Kindle in my home, no Echo, and I started to buy there relatively late. Though a site of mine used their affiliate marketing program even back in 2011...
- ashtonkem 5y ago
  It’s not just views on Amazon as a company to do business with. Attitudes around these parts have soured on Amazon as a company to work for too.
alfalfasprout 5y ago
Thing is, at this point Amazon has mastered the art of getting away with employee-hostile practices. Take, as a separate example, their PIP culture. The bar to get into amazon is fairly low (compared to peer companies) and so they tend to use PIP to maintain a high turnover and filter out unproductive employees. There's no shortage of engineers wanting to apply to Amazon (increasingly from overseas) and this churn seems to be OK because they have very good systems in place to onboard employees fast. For an engineer early in their career having AMZN on their resume can be worth the pain. At least among my peers in senior and staff/principal levels there's very little desire to jump ship to amazon though. Similarly, they can treat warehouse workers like crap because there are others willing to line up to take their place. Regardless of the conditions. What it boils down to is that many of amazon's employees simply don't have a better choice. And I'm not sure what can really help with that.
- cratermoon 5y ago
  I spent a year working at a very large company that's well known in my part of the country, not because I wanted to work there, but because it was nice to have on my resume. But at least their compensation wasn't back-loaded.
- omegaworks 5y ago
  >I'm not sure what can really help with that. A basic social safety net. If companies are forced to compete with minimum living standards that are guaranteed to all people, it prevents their worst excesses.

underseacables 5y ago

I think Amazon should be allowed to confiscate union literature, because it is disruptive to the work environment. Talk about unions outside of work, not at work.

the-dude 5y ago
So what is allowed at work? Only work?
- cf100clunk 5y ago
  Better not get caught discussing the company softball team on the clock, right?
eganist 5y ago
> I think Amazon should be allowed to confiscate union literature, because it is disruptive to the work environment. Talk about unions outside of work, not at work. This is likely to be illegal under current regulations: https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/rights-we-protect/the-law/employees/your-rights-during-union-organizing https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/rights-we-protect/the-law/em... (site currently down as of this comment) > For example, your employer cannot prohibit you from talking about the union during working time if it permits you to talk about other non-work-related matters during working time. That said, (edited) the NLRB seems more likely to be aligned with the employer if the talk actually disrupts work. https://www.natlawreview.com/article/shhh-nlrb-says-companies-can-block-union-talk-clock https://www.natlawreview.com/article/shhh-nlrb-says-companie... Separately: https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/shop-talk-rules-union-related-conversations-activities-work.html https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/shop-talk-rules-unio...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
smoldesu 5y ago
Nowhere did it say that the employee was distracted by it, they just had it on their person. How would you feel if your boss took your phone from you, refusing to give it back until the end of the day since it was "distracting you" from your back pocket?

chad_strategic 5y ago

This might be unpopular opinion but... More robots and more automation comes on line everyday, soon there will be less and less employees at these facilities regardless of unions. Unions or government regulation where not able to save the type writer or the typewriter union. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_of_Women_Clerks_and_Secretaries https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_of_Women_Clerks_an... dissolved in 1989 The market(capitalism) is going to do what the market(capitalism) does.

criddell 5y ago
There's nothing wrong with that opinion but you aren't considering all the other things unions do for their members. A union can't make those jobs last forever but it can try to make working conditions better for as long as the job lasts.
_jal 5y ago
That's a fine opinion. I happen to agree that some what you imply is true. But you can claim that about a lot of things that we choose to treat differently. Property crime is inevitable, and yet we devote significant resources to fighting that. Same with death. If you don't want to devote resources to figuring out what to do with a lot of "surplus humanity", they'll help you make up your mind later.
ipaddr 5y ago
Why wouldn't robots be in unions in the future? It will be part of giving robots human rights and social progress. You won't be able to own robots like they are slaves. Robots will demand and get more.
hutzlibu 5y ago
"The market(capitalism) is going to do what the market(capitalism) does. " And unions do, what unions do: try to negotiate better conditions for their members. Whether they provide a net benefit to society, is a different and I think very case specific question.
- kazen44 5y ago

ericol 5y ago

Whatever you think of union, take this into account: You shouldn't be basing your opinions on your biases. Replace "Union Literature" with: - Soccer Literature - LGBT+ Literature - Harry Potter Literature Do you agree with all this to also be confiscated would it be freely distributed at work?

chad_strategic 5y ago
Yes, I don't like Harry Potter and I shouldn't have to hear about him if I don't want to. All this can take place off site.
- slumpt_ 5y ago
  Fortunately the law disagrees with your regressive, anti-employee perspective.
  - chad_strategic 5y ago
    Are you familiar with at-will employment? If I'm the owner of company and employee talks to be about Harry Potter in the break room. Later that day, or on the spot, I can terminate that employee, without cause or reason. Sure they the employee can sue me for wrongful termination, but the laws are stacked against the employee. (I have been on both side of the argument.) Please reference a law to support your claim. You might want to study up on your law, history and economics.
    - decebalus1 5y ago
      I think you either haven't actually read the article, any of the replies in this thread or you're just a troll. We're not here to educate you, just look up the current US labor laws and see for yourself whether or not your argument has any standing.
      - chad_strategic 5y ago
        >Please reference a law to support your claim. ?

Animats 5y ago

This could work out. Each time the employer violates an NRLB rule during an organizing campaign, even if the employer wins, there's another election in 3 months. Until the union wins or the employer stops breaking the rules.

boomboomsubban 5y ago
This infraction is about a different Amazon facility, it is unrelated to the vote to unionize.
PragmaticPulp 5y ago
I think it's clear that the union wants a do-over and is looking for any technicality that might give them another chance. Does anyone really believe that the Amazon employees voted against the union because Amazon removed some union material from the break room one day? Of course not. The employees knew what they were voting for and were fully capable of researching it themselves. The real question is what does the union plan on doing differently to sway the employees to vote differently next time? Repeatedly trying to overrule the employees about their own voted decisions isn't likely to be popular among those who voted against the union, which is most of them. They'll need a better narrative on top of this if they want to get anywhere. Or alternatively, maybe they don't care so much about this election as they do about making Amazon look bad. Maybe they know these workers don't want to unionize, but they're going to use this opportunity to try to convince the public that the workers were misled by Amazon. If they can't win the workers at this location, maybe they can try to win the public on a wave of anti-Amazon publicity for a do-over in another location.
- dasudasu 5y ago
  If it had no influence, then why remove the material and break the law?
  - nerfhammer 5y ago
    should we presume this was strategically ordered by upper management and not just someone at the location just assumed outside material wasn't allowed?

LatteLazy 5y ago

>The NLRB’s report on the Bessemer election found that Amazon illegally discouraged labor organizing, in part by pushing post office officials to install a mailbox outside the warehouse where workers were urged to drop their mail-in ballots, which an NLRB officer wrote “destroyed the laboratory conditions and justifies a second election.” Stupid question: how does getting a new post box discourage organising? I feel like I'm missing some clever trick...

Mathnerd314 5y ago
> Amazon had a ballot collection box installed in an employee parking lot “without authorization” from the NLRB’s regional director. The NLRB definitively denied Amazon’s request for a drop box on the warehouse property. Amazon installed one anyway. The box was placed under the view of Amazon security cameras, creating "an impression of surveillance." An employee testified to having seen company security guards open the mailbox. In general, if you have a postbox tied to the company, then only people supporting the company will feel comfortable using it. Hence the votes will be biased anti-union.
- plandis 5y ago
  But why? The post box is presumably run by the USPS, not Amazon.
  - post-it 5y ago
    > An employee testified to having seen company security guards open the mailbox. If this is true, then apparently not.
  - 28053144 5y ago
    "An employee testified to having seen company security guards open the mailbox." Ignore the "testified" part -- even if this was just a rumor that somebody started, imagine the impact it would have.
- LatteLazy 5y ago
  Thanks, that makes more sense at least.

boomboomsubban 5y ago

The surveillance seems like the more troubling ruling. Having a security guard stand outside a union meeting and photograph the attendants seems like a thinly veiled threat, and if I were in that situation I would likely jump ship.

anigbrowl 5y ago

Note how security guards are being employed to carry out the will of management, even though no safety/security situation obtains. In general, security arrangements involve a transaction of unquestioning obedience to authority in exchange for preferential treatment, which can then be leveraged by the authority holder to pursue illegitimate ends, eg doing things that are outside the legal scope of managers (in the private sector) or elected officials (in the public). Because security personnel are delegated enforcement authority, instant challenges to them are treated as breaches of security; challenges can only be made administratively, even though the act of enforcement can change the fact situation sufficiently to render the administrative challenge impossible or moot (ie people give up because pursuing the administrative route is often not worth the trouble). The security officer's dilemma is that doing their job requires them to not think very much about what they are asked to do. If they begin to have thoughts of their own about what is ethical or not and decline to assist an authority figure who asks them to do something unethical, then they risk loss of their security status and are suddenly treated as a security problem themselves. It's int he interest of authority figures to excuse and cover for minor lapses of security officer behavior so that when the authority figure wants something illegitimate, they have leverage over their security apparatus. Overly scrupulous security personnel don't get promoted. It's worth considering that a high portion of our economy is based on the use of guard labor (not including regular law enforcement) and that this may have or perpetuate distorting economic effects: https://www.brown.edu/Departments/Economics/Faculty/Glenn_Loury/louryhomepage/teaching/Ec%20222/Garrison%20America.pdf https://www.brown.edu/Departments/Economics/Faculty/Glenn_Lo...

ineedasername 5y ago
Note how security guards are being employed to carry out the will of management Yes, it falls under the concept of "Guard Labor", basically any workers who don't contribute even indirectly to planning and management or implementation of projects & initiatives. That can be actual guards, managers whose only purpose is to make sure people are doing their job, etc. Work required to keep the status quo as the status quo. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guard_labor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guard_labor
- 5y ago

blunte 5y ago

Can we just be honest and say that Amazon - it's leadership, especially Bezos - is greedy/sociopathic and frankly detrimental to long term human survival (based on the zero-sum approach to success), but that it's so convenient that we privileged people will still buy stuff off Amazon? As with factory farming, if people could see the conditions which their "food" (living beings) were subjected to, they would make different decisions... we would probably make different buying decisions if we had friends or family who worked in the worst jobs for Amazon. I used to love bacon...

cwkoss 5y ago
With Bezos abdicating CEO, will be interesting to see to what extent lack of his influence will change company culture. I expect the rot is pervasive throughout the c-level, but hope to be surprised.

cratermoon 5y ago

Anyone paying attention expected and suspected Amazon to play shady games. Good to see the results.

BugsJustFindMe 5y ago

If it's unlawful, will Amazon be punished? Doesn't breaking the law usually mean punishment?

Coriolis3 5y ago
People get punished. Corporations receive (at most) a small fine that usually amounts to far less than what their crimes netted them.

ggm 5y ago

Because my engagement with unions has only been positive, I am interested in the amazing number of people who seem motivated to say how negatively they feel about unions. I get that in an oppositional sense, if you don't want what a union wants, then they tend to cast into the bad, but for the middle ground who are not VCs, owners, Managers, and are candidates for union membership, I find it really strange how much people cast them into a class of "money grabbers for no benefit" Do people feel the same about life insurance, car insurance? Its not that you actually intend being harrassed or sacked (fall ill, have a car accident) It's that you don't want to find yourself on the wrong side of an employment dispute (accident claim) without some insurance. Unions may be taking your hard earned money. They may be doing things which you don't like (do I love my car insurance company?) But, they have a neccessary role in risk management. We talk about risk management in the ICT sector all the time. Why can't we talk about risk management for labour hire? Amazon used "dirty tricks" to win this election. I am sure the Union bust some minor rules too, but overall I am reasonably confident that the vote was neither free, nor fair. I also do think there is no latent 100% pro-union vote out there, and that a large number of the polled workers don't want a union, or the cost of the union, or the risk of jobloss from Amazon if they join the union (which is illegal but still has a risk of happening) -So I don't for a minute believe a re-vote will magically reverse the signal with an overwhelming result. What interests me, is the basis for opposition to the union in the first place. Do people really think the garment workers in New York were backing the wrong horse? Do people think the machineguns which Ford arranged to turn on a union march in Detroit didn't happen? "oh, that would never happen now..."

nickff 5y ago
Well, many people have had issues with unions creating an environment where most employees 'soldier' (work slowly and uncreatively), by protecting the unproductive, and preventing the productive from being rewarded. Another issue is that unions seem to 'strangle' marginal, unprotected (by tariff) industries; they drive up the employer's costs, which can kill a business if prices can not be adjusted to compensate (because of foreign competition). In cases where domestic companies are protected, the unions tend to try acting as a cartel and raising the whole industry's cost structure (e.g. auto manufacturing 1940-1970). Lastly, unions have been known to use violence and intimidation, generally in one-on-one situations (against managers and anti-union employees) rather than the large scale that the Pinkertons (and the like) were known for.

refurb 5y ago

Clearly this is what tipped the election from a union win to a 70/30 union loss.

TheJoeDonger 5y ago

I'm honestly not sure why anyone cares?

specialist 5y ago

Union busters. There are professional union busting services for hire. I mean, of course their are. But I just can't get over it. It breaks my brain. Goons, piss bottles, wage theft... What's a little bit of petty larceny?