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It's kind of interesting because Amazon has built a reputation for being absolutely ruthless to their workers (not just delivery or warehouse). You have the no

It's kind of interesting because Amazon has built a reputation for being absolutely ruthless to their workers (not just delivery or warehouse). You have the notorious NYT article from 2015 (the article mentions this): https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/technology/inside-amazon-wrestling-big-ideas-in-a-bruising-workplace.html https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/technology/inside-amazon-... The online perception is that it has only gotten worse. It doesn't take much to find stories on teamblind, twitter, reddit, or even hackernews about hire to fire, stack ranking/pip, and even just general mental abuse. I mean just read this excerpt from the article about a working needing to go see a dentist about an infected tooth: > The problem, he said, was that he only had seven hours of unpaid time off but ended up missing 20 hours of work; he had enough paid vacation time to cover the absence, but he said the company did not pull from that separate bank of days because Pagan would have had to apply for vacation time in advance. Pagan said he also had a doctor’s note but was told the company did not need to accept it as an excuse, even though he had been excused from work with a doctor’s note previously. He said he worked for another full week without issue, until he showed up one night for his overnight shift and his badge no longer worked. He was eventually told he had been terminated. At what point do we simply ask if Amazon leaders have no sense of decency? [1] [1] https://www.senate.gov/about/powers-procedures/investigations/mccarthy-hearings/have-you-no-sense-of-decency.htm https://www.senate.gov/about/powers-procedures/investigation...

mtnGoat 4y ago
Always remember there are many sides to most stories. I have a cousin who works at an Amazon warehouse and loves it, he says it’s the funnest and most rewarding job he has had. He’s in his late 40s and has worked all kinda of jobs. His schedule allows him a lot of work life balance, he knows exactly what is expected of him and advancement is possible and also easy to understand. In fact he said he doesn’t understand the hate aside from lazy people that have no work ethic complaining they are being asked to actually work, and work hard, consistently. If it was as terrible as some articles make it sound, I’d doubt they’d have so many employees.
- alangibson 4y ago
  And he'll think that until one day they can him for missing work due to a health issue. This is why I find a lack of solidarity between working people to be somewhere between selfish and disgusting.
  - gnulinux 4y ago
    Exactly, it means nothing to me when some workers say they're ok with their job when I see evidence dozens upon dozens of their coworkers are abused. It means nothing because I have no reason to assume they won't turn back on their employers once they have a conflict as well. It merely signals a lack of solidarity and nothing else.
  - oh_sigh 4y ago
    I find it disgusting that you think you can take someone's few sentence anecdote about their cousin and think that you know better than both of them about what is good for them.
- azemetre 4y ago
  I don't need many sides of a story when there is one damning example of a human needing to see a medical professional then getting fired shortly after because no leader at Amazon took 5 seconds to think if this was compassionate or not. Why should I give Amazon the benefit of the doubt when they have proven time and time again to be actively hostile and dehumanizing? Maybe we should expect Amazon to not treat their fellow humans as some flesh automaton and just be decent for a change.
  - iinnPP 4y ago
    I've worked ~5 low skill jobs that meet this description. It is the norm, not the exception. At least in Canada. Jobs advertised as permanent full-time where they can you on the last day they are allowed to are also very common. Also, my co-workers at these jobs were 90% lazy slobs who did maybe 25% of the load I would while getting paid the same amount. No amount of write ups would alter their behaviour. I'm blessed, truly, to have escaped poverty.
taway2dfadf4 4y ago
>> It's kind of interesting because Amazon has built a reputation for being absolutely ruthless to their workers (not just delivery or warehouse). Even if Amazon changed their policies, I'd be cautious about any AMZN managers or directors. The fact that they survived there, or thrived, means they are probably ruthless and I wouldnt want to work with such an individual (or hire them, for that matter.)
russh 4y ago
I have a friend that works in an Amazon data center and he describes the work environment as “Have you seen any of the hunger games movies?”
- gitfan86 4y ago
  When I interviewed for Amazon, they had an online screen that was basically asking which employee should be fired based on the metrics in a table. I'm all for firing bad employees, productivity matters, but it does seem like the culture promotes looking for people to fire.
- scollet 4y ago
  Like batoru rowaiaru? Or...? Cause I'm pretty sure that is about the emergent workforce and subjugation of academics into kamikaze roles. So I assume that's what you mean.
batmaniam 4y ago
> At what point do we simply ask if Amazon leaders have no sense of decency? We don't need to ask, we already know. Actions speak louder than words anyway, and we've all seen how they treat all their workers: from warehouse to corporate. One would be a bit naive to think only their warehouse workers get treated badly, corporate workers are slapped around just as much in their own way. Even in death, Amazon doesn't care and will lie through its teeth: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/oct/17/amazon-warehouse-worker-deaths https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/oct/17/amazon-wa... > Billy had lain on the floor for 20 minutes before receiving treatment from Amazon’s internal safety responders. > Bill was laying there for 20 minutes and nobody nearby saw until an Amnesty worker with a radio came by. > A couple of days before, he put the wrong product in the wrong bin and within two minutes management saw it on camera and came down to talk to him about it > “After the incident, everyone was forced to go back to work. No time to decompress. Basically watch a man pass away and then get told to go back to work, everyone, and act like it’s fine,” > Amazon said it had responded to Foister’s collapse “within minutes”. Amazon will just keep doing what it's doing because it can. Like you mentioned, online perception has gotten worse ever since that 2015 article, so clearly they just don't care about anything other than profit. Warehouse workers have had enough, they're pushing back by organizing their rights collectively. But so should corporate workers, we shouldn't have to keep watch over our shoulders every time we go to work in fear of PIP, or even at the interview stage where we have to suspect if we're getting "hired to be fired". It's ridiculous. We should organize too.
- bcassedy 4y ago
  Technically 20 is a number of minutes... But yeah even as a software engineer I'm often torn about wanting to work for Amazon. They have quite a few interesting projects and the pay is solid, but there are a lot of horror stories out there that suggest it is a brutal place to work even for engineers.
  - rainbowzootsuit 4y ago
    One could even say that "they responded in microseconds."
XorNot 4y ago
Skip sense of decency this is just downright stupid: a worker with an urgent medical issue needed time off for it. They had accrued leave, but you don't let them take it. They resolve the issue, come back to work and then you fire then anyway...and what, now have to train a new person up? What the hell was gained by any of that?

mtnGoat 4y ago

Always remember there are many sides to most stories. I have a cousin who works at an Amazon warehouse and loves it, he says it’s the funnest and most rewarding job he has had. He’s in his late 40s and has worked all kinda of jobs. His schedule allows him a lot of work life balance, he knows exactly what is expected of him and advancement is possible and also easy to understand. In fact he said he doesn’t understand the hate aside from lazy people that have no work ethic complaining they are being asked to actually work, and work hard, consistently. If it was as terrible as some articles make it sound, I’d doubt they’d have so many employees.

alangibson 4y ago
And he'll think that until one day they can him for missing work due to a health issue. This is why I find a lack of solidarity between working people to be somewhere between selfish and disgusting.
- gnulinux 4y ago
  Exactly, it means nothing to me when some workers say they're ok with their job when I see evidence dozens upon dozens of their coworkers are abused. It means nothing because I have no reason to assume they won't turn back on their employers once they have a conflict as well. It merely signals a lack of solidarity and nothing else.
- oh_sigh 4y ago
  I find it disgusting that you think you can take someone's few sentence anecdote about their cousin and think that you know better than both of them about what is good for them.
azemetre 4y ago
I don't need many sides of a story when there is one damning example of a human needing to see a medical professional then getting fired shortly after because no leader at Amazon took 5 seconds to think if this was compassionate or not. Why should I give Amazon the benefit of the doubt when they have proven time and time again to be actively hostile and dehumanizing? Maybe we should expect Amazon to not treat their fellow humans as some flesh automaton and just be decent for a change.
- iinnPP 4y ago
  I've worked ~5 low skill jobs that meet this description. It is the norm, not the exception. At least in Canada. Jobs advertised as permanent full-time where they can you on the last day they are allowed to are also very common. Also, my co-workers at these jobs were 90% lazy slobs who did maybe 25% of the load I would while getting paid the same amount. No amount of write ups would alter their behaviour. I'm blessed, truly, to have escaped poverty.

taway2dfadf4 4y ago

>> It's kind of interesting because Amazon has built a reputation for being absolutely ruthless to their workers (not just delivery or warehouse). Even if Amazon changed their policies, I'd be cautious about any AMZN managers or directors. The fact that they survived there, or thrived, means they are probably ruthless and I wouldnt want to work with such an individual (or hire them, for that matter.)

russh 4y ago

I have a friend that works in an Amazon data center and he describes the work environment as “Have you seen any of the hunger games movies?”

gitfan86 4y ago
When I interviewed for Amazon, they had an online screen that was basically asking which employee should be fired based on the metrics in a table. I'm all for firing bad employees, productivity matters, but it does seem like the culture promotes looking for people to fire.
scollet 4y ago
Like batoru rowaiaru? Or...? Cause I'm pretty sure that is about the emergent workforce and subjugation of academics into kamikaze roles. So I assume that's what you mean.

batmaniam 4y ago

> At what point do we simply ask if Amazon leaders have no sense of decency? We don't need to ask, we already know. Actions speak louder than words anyway, and we've all seen how they treat all their workers: from warehouse to corporate. One would be a bit naive to think only their warehouse workers get treated badly, corporate workers are slapped around just as much in their own way. Even in death, Amazon doesn't care and will lie through its teeth: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/oct/17/amazon-warehouse-worker-deaths https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/oct/17/amazon-wa... > Billy had lain on the floor for 20 minutes before receiving treatment from Amazon’s internal safety responders. > Bill was laying there for 20 minutes and nobody nearby saw until an Amnesty worker with a radio came by. > A couple of days before, he put the wrong product in the wrong bin and within two minutes management saw it on camera and came down to talk to him about it > “After the incident, everyone was forced to go back to work. No time to decompress. Basically watch a man pass away and then get told to go back to work, everyone, and act like it’s fine,” > Amazon said it had responded to Foister’s collapse “within minutes”. Amazon will just keep doing what it's doing because it can. Like you mentioned, online perception has gotten worse ever since that 2015 article, so clearly they just don't care about anything other than profit. Warehouse workers have had enough, they're pushing back by organizing their rights collectively. But so should corporate workers, we shouldn't have to keep watch over our shoulders every time we go to work in fear of PIP, or even at the interview stage where we have to suspect if we're getting "hired to be fired". It's ridiculous. We should organize too.

bcassedy 4y ago
Technically 20 is a number of minutes... But yeah even as a software engineer I'm often torn about wanting to work for Amazon. They have quite a few interesting projects and the pay is solid, but there are a lot of horror stories out there that suggest it is a brutal place to work even for engineers.
- rainbowzootsuit 4y ago
  One could even say that "they responded in microseconds."

XorNot 4y ago

Skip sense of decency this is just downright stupid: a worker with an urgent medical issue needed time off for it. They had accrued leave, but you don't let them take it. They resolve the issue, come back to work and then you fire then anyway...and what, now have to train a new person up? What the hell was gained by any of that?