5 ms·

Amazon CEO Andy jassy broke federal labor law with anti-union remarks

friend_and_foe 2y ago
So this decision hinges on construing his statement as a threat. If anything makes the consortium trying to get rid of the NLRB look right, this is it.
- tw04 2y ago
  Which it was. He lied about a union taking away employees “empowerment”, and got smacked down by a judge for doing so. If anything it’s a reminder of exactly why unions are needed more than ever. Amazon of all companies is known to treat their employees like disposable cogs.
  - freedomben 2y ago
    Have you ever worked in a union in the US? Some absolutely do take away employee empowerment. I worked a number of blue collar jobs earlier in life, and have many stories. I worked as an auto parts delivery driver, and one day I delivered some parts to a machine shop. As I started opening the front door, I could hear a blaring high-pitch wining noise coming from the shop area. I got to the office and there were 4 guys just sitting with earplugs in. I asked the what was going on, and they told me that one of the machines had broken but they weren't allowed to turn off the power switch because of union rules. They had to wait until the proper union guy showed up to turn off the switch. And no, this wasn't some super special switch, it was just a 50 amp breaker. I think it's pretty clear they lost some empowerment. I worked as an aircraft refueler in a climate that during fall would get fairly cold in the morning (20 deg F) and warm in the day (70+ deg F). One of our trucks had sensitive brakes that would often need a quarter-turn on a small screw that controlled airflow once the temperature went up (or down at night). It was trivial to do, but I wasn't allowed to even touch it because of union rules taht specified that only the mechanics union could "perform maintenance on the vehicles." So I routinely had to sit on the ramp for hours in the middle of the day waiting for maintenance to drive their truck out and turn the screw. I once suggested to our manager that we should schedule daily maintenance around noon each day since that is around when it usually stopped working, and union rules had an enumerated list of valid "scheduled maintenance" work that could be done, and that wasn't on the list, so he was powerless to do anything about it. I'm sure it didn't hurt that "unscheduled maintenance" cost us more than scheduled. I've heard plenty more stories from friends as well. Our local plumbers union was apprently quite something. They had rules around seniority that basically fucked over everyone with less than 10 years experience and made for a sweet life for everyone over. People worked their asses off for the worst jobs with inferior pay on the hope and dream for their turn at the top end of the pyramid some day when they got their turn to sit on top and exploit the people on the bottom. I'm not anti-union (some situations absolutely need unions to prevent extreme exploitation), but I am anti-blanket-pro-union. Some unions are really trash and should not exist. So yeah, if you're going to say that he "lied" then I think you need to explain what evidence you have that he knew what he said was not true. If he has any experience with unions, there's a good chance he has specific situations in mind.
    - ImPostingOnHN 2y ago
      My amateur take here is, saying that something is a possibility, however remote, is different from "if you vote this way, this will happen to you" said by people with the power and motivation to make it happen to you if you vote that way. Would we expect the same deference given to a mob boss issuing thinly-veiled threats to witnesses? After all, it's not impossible that an accident will totally randomly happen to the witness or their loved ones that prevents them from testifying. The boss is just sayin' there's data that shows accidents sometimes happen to people who testify, that's all.
      - freedomben 2y ago
        Yeah that's fair. CEOs being human, it seems unreasonable to expect them to never have opinions, but given the power dynamics/differential they absolutely must be held to a very high standard. This comment didn't feel at all like a threat to me given my personal experience (it felt like a blatant statement of fact), so while I don't agree that this broke the law, I do agree it isn't something he should have said and he needs to do better. Though personally, I'd much rather know my CEOs real opinion on things, because whether they say it out loud or not they still believe it. I'd rather know where people stand than have to guess/assume.
        ImPostingOnHN 2y ago
        I wouldn't have minded if he had issued an opinion that the union _might_ do something to members, rather than the leader of the company saying bad stuff will definitely happen to people who side against the company. After all, he has more motivation and opportunity than anyone else to follow through on that credible threat. Otherwise, is the mob boss in my example just expressing an opinion, too?
    - busterarm 2y ago
      I've been in three different unions and posted similar about my experiences in the past and am usually downvoted to hell for it because of peoples' ideological alignment not allowing them to consider opposing experiences/viewpoints as reasonable.
  - FireBeyond 2y ago
    > Amazon of all companies is known to treat their employees like disposable cogs. Amazon in my area has literally ran media ads (not paraphrasing, direct quotes): "Need a job? Can pass a background check? No interview, start as soon as tomorrow."
    - oefrha 2y ago
      Duh, it’s unskilled labor and not customer-facing, what do you expect? A coding interview? Culture fit assessment?
      - drewcoo 2y ago
        Culture fit assessment would make sense, actually, if they did interviews at all. That's how companies skirt the law and apply biases during job interviews.
    - jprete 2y ago
      That sounds very much like a disposable cog job. The lower the requirements, the more easily the workers are replaced.
      - mensetmanusman 2y ago
        Such jobs may be necessary if you want low youth unemployment (us has about a third of the rate of youth unemployment as the eu).
  - WWLink 2y ago
    > If anything it’s a reminder of exactly why unions are needed more than ever. Except in the software industry, there's too many stupid people who think they are really a "10x programmer" and fall for the Hank Hill special "SHH I'M PAYING YOU MORE BECAUSE YOU'RE A ROCKSTAR! DON'T TELL YOUR COWORKERS!" It's like most people took a boot licking course or something lol.
    - Macha 2y ago
      As time goes on, it's feeling more and more that the HN userbase has never found a boot it didn't identify with
  - friend_and_foe 2y ago
    It could have been a lie. It was most certainly not a threat.
- jsyang00 2y ago
  and people wonder why all corporate comms come in the form of babblespeak...
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
elevatedastalt 2y ago
Jassy told CNBC in April 2022 that if employees were to vote in a union, they may be less empowered in the workplace and things would become “much slower” and “more bureaucratic.” Similarly, in the Bloomberg interview, Jassy remarked, “if you see something on the line that you think could be better for your team or you or your customers, you can’t just go to your manager and say, ‘Let’s change it.’” How can expressing an opinion be in violation of federal law?
- interroboink 2y ago
  I think when a CEO, in their official capacity, says something relating to their employees, it is more than just "expressing an opinion." He is speaking for the company. The claim was that he was “interfering with, restraining, and coercing employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed.” I'm not a lawyer, but the "coerce" language, in particular, seems like it could be relevant. If a CEO makes statements about how unions are bad, it can have a chilling effect on employees' efforts to unionize. Regardless, a judge, with more facts available than we have, and more knowledge of the relevant law than we have, made this ruling. Update I think this is the one, if you want to read it: https://www.scribd.com/document/728670161/NLRB-Administrative-Law-Judge-on-Amazon-CEO-union-comments https://www.scribd.com/document/728670161/NLRB-Administrativ... Excerpt: As explained below, I find that Jassy’s predictions that unionization would change the employee-employer relationship were lawful under Tri-Cast and progeny. As to Jassy’s predictions that employees would be less empowered, would find it harder to get things done quickly, and would be better off without a union, those statements violated Section 8(a)(1) because they went beyond merely commenting onthe employee-employer relationship and did not comply with the standards for protected speech established by NLRB v. Gissell PackingCo ., 395 U.S. 575, 618 (1969)
  - abduhl 2y ago
    Like many NLRB administrative law judges, the judge here has done nothing outside of work for the NLRB. It is no surprise that he found a violation here and it will also be no surprise when he is overturned on appeal. “Judge Brian D. Gee was appointed in May 2022. Prior to his appointment, he served as the Regional Attorney in the West Los Angeles office of the NLRB (Region 31) for 10 years. Judge Gee joined the Agency as a Field Attorney in Region 31 in 1996. During the first 12 years of his career with the Agency, he gained experience as one of the Region’s lead trial attorneys. He was promoted to Supervisory Attorney in March 2008, Deputy Regional Attorney in May 2010, and Regional Attorney in August 2012. A graduate of Vanderbilt University School of Law, Judge Gee earned his Juris Doctorate in 1995. He graduated from Occidental College in 1987, where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in History.” Edit: turning to the linked opinion, we can see how flawed the judge’s argument is based on his argument on 8 where his primary support for his position is a case where both the ALJ and the Board were overturned on appeal: Hendrickson USA, LLC , 366 NLRB No. 7 (2018), enforcement denied by the Sixth Circuit in 932 F.3d 465 (2019), in which the Board agreed with the administrative law judge’s (ALJ)finding that the respondent violated Section 8(a)(1) by saying, “the culture will definitely change,” “relationships will suffer,” and “flexibility is replacedby inefficiency.” This is the most relevant portion of Hendrickson. You can decide whether or not Jassy’s statements are similar to this fact pattern. In our view, the Board’s opinion on this issue is inconsistent with Tri-Cast , and therefore its application of the law to the facts of this case does not meet the substantial evidence standard. The statements singled out from the PowerPoint slide can only be reasonably understood as elaborating upon and summarizing the company’s position on the ineffectiveness of third-party representation, which was a lawful argument for the company to make. The first statement—"the culture will definitely change"—does not have negative connotations in isolation and can only take meaning from the surrounding statements. The statements that "relationships suffer" and "flexibility is replaced by inefficiency" are certainly negative, but context shows that they are protected predictions of the consequences of unionization. The slides at appendix 64 and 65 together show that the "loss of our direct employee relationship " (emphasis added) directly stems from the fact that the employees "lose the right to represent themselves." The comments at the August 21 meeting likewise tie interference in the employer-employee relationship to the union’s right to intervene: "we don’t want [a] third party to have to intervene, we want to talk directly to our employees." And the August 24 letter similarly emphasizes the company’s belief that "employees are entitled to represent themselves without third party interference ." (emphasis added). Taken together, these remarks show that the only reasonable way to interpret the brief statements at issue is that Hendrickson believes that a union’s formal right under Section 9(c) to intervene in the adjustment of grievances renders untenable the casual, efficient communication of the company’s "open door policy" and "easy-going atmosphere," and the slide at issue "simply explicates" that position "in layman’s terms." Tri-Cast, Inc. , 274 NLRB at 377. Finally, the Board’s opinion erroneously suggests that Hendrickson had a duty to present both the pros and cons of union representation. The opinion faults the company’s presentation for suggesting that employees would have a more difficult time influencing their working conditions while "ignoring the fact that, although they may not be at the negotiating table, union members most often have a say in developing bargaining proposals concerning their wages and benefits and other working conditions." 366 NLRB No. 7, *9. But Hendrickson had the right to emphasize the negative aspects of the loss of "direct" relationship, as the Board found in the first portion of its opinion, and Supreme Court precedent does not require Hendrickson to provide the counterargument to its own argument. This language in the Board’s opinion is inconsistent with the NLRA’s policy of "uninhibited, robust, and wide-open debate in labor disputes," Chamber of Commerce , 554 U.S. at 68, 128 S.Ct. 2408, in which both sides may "express themselves on the merits of the dispute in order to influence its outcome," Va. State Bd. of Pharmacy , 425 U.S. at 762, 96 S.Ct. 1817 (citing Gissel , 395 U.S. at 617–18, 89 S.Ct. 1918 ). Therefore, the Board’s conclusion is not supported even by substantial evidence
ckdarby 2y ago
What if the company had industry data that the statement is factual? That unionized employees are less empowered and companies that have unions do not yield the same ROI in their respective industry as their count parts? Would it still break federal law if the statement is factual from data? I feel like then the argument can be made that in his capacity it is no longer an opinion or representation of the company, but a stated observation of the industry itself.
- ImPostingOnHN 2y ago
  Are we sure that the company has industry data proving their claims that the disempowerment etc. is a sure thing, as the CEO phrased it, rather than just a possibility? If so, that makes the sure-thing claim truly factual, and it will likely be a good defense.

So this decision hinges on construing his statement as a threat. If anything makes the consortium trying to get rid of the NLRB look right, this is it.

tw04 2y ago
Which it was. He lied about a union taking away employees “empowerment”, and got smacked down by a judge for doing so. If anything it’s a reminder of exactly why unions are needed more than ever. Amazon of all companies is known to treat their employees like disposable cogs.
- freedomben 2y ago
  Have you ever worked in a union in the US? Some absolutely do take away employee empowerment. I worked a number of blue collar jobs earlier in life, and have many stories. I worked as an auto parts delivery driver, and one day I delivered some parts to a machine shop. As I started opening the front door, I could hear a blaring high-pitch wining noise coming from the shop area. I got to the office and there were 4 guys just sitting with earplugs in. I asked the what was going on, and they told me that one of the machines had broken but they weren't allowed to turn off the power switch because of union rules. They had to wait until the proper union guy showed up to turn off the switch. And no, this wasn't some super special switch, it was just a 50 amp breaker. I think it's pretty clear they lost some empowerment. I worked as an aircraft refueler in a climate that during fall would get fairly cold in the morning (20 deg F) and warm in the day (70+ deg F). One of our trucks had sensitive brakes that would often need a quarter-turn on a small screw that controlled airflow once the temperature went up (or down at night). It was trivial to do, but I wasn't allowed to even touch it because of union rules taht specified that only the mechanics union could "perform maintenance on the vehicles." So I routinely had to sit on the ramp for hours in the middle of the day waiting for maintenance to drive their truck out and turn the screw. I once suggested to our manager that we should schedule daily maintenance around noon each day since that is around when it usually stopped working, and union rules had an enumerated list of valid "scheduled maintenance" work that could be done, and that wasn't on the list, so he was powerless to do anything about it. I'm sure it didn't hurt that "unscheduled maintenance" cost us more than scheduled. I've heard plenty more stories from friends as well. Our local plumbers union was apprently quite something. They had rules around seniority that basically fucked over everyone with less than 10 years experience and made for a sweet life for everyone over. People worked their asses off for the worst jobs with inferior pay on the hope and dream for their turn at the top end of the pyramid some day when they got their turn to sit on top and exploit the people on the bottom. I'm not anti-union (some situations absolutely need unions to prevent extreme exploitation), but I am anti-blanket-pro-union. Some unions are really trash and should not exist. So yeah, if you're going to say that he "lied" then I think you need to explain what evidence you have that he knew what he said was not true. If he has any experience with unions, there's a good chance he has specific situations in mind.
  - ImPostingOnHN 2y ago
    My amateur take here is, saying that something is a possibility, however remote, is different from "if you vote this way, this will happen to you" said by people with the power and motivation to make it happen to you if you vote that way. Would we expect the same deference given to a mob boss issuing thinly-veiled threats to witnesses? After all, it's not impossible that an accident will totally randomly happen to the witness or their loved ones that prevents them from testifying. The boss is just sayin' there's data that shows accidents sometimes happen to people who testify, that's all.
    - freedomben 2y ago
      Yeah that's fair. CEOs being human, it seems unreasonable to expect them to never have opinions, but given the power dynamics/differential they absolutely must be held to a very high standard. This comment didn't feel at all like a threat to me given my personal experience (it felt like a blatant statement of fact), so while I don't agree that this broke the law, I do agree it isn't something he should have said and he needs to do better. Though personally, I'd much rather know my CEOs real opinion on things, because whether they say it out loud or not they still believe it. I'd rather know where people stand than have to guess/assume.
      - ImPostingOnHN 2y ago
        I wouldn't have minded if he had issued an opinion that the union _might_ do something to members, rather than the leader of the company saying bad stuff will definitely happen to people who side against the company. After all, he has more motivation and opportunity than anyone else to follow through on that credible threat. Otherwise, is the mob boss in my example just expressing an opinion, too?
  - busterarm 2y ago
    I've been in three different unions and posted similar about my experiences in the past and am usually downvoted to hell for it because of peoples' ideological alignment not allowing them to consider opposing experiences/viewpoints as reasonable.
- FireBeyond 2y ago
  > Amazon of all companies is known to treat their employees like disposable cogs. Amazon in my area has literally ran media ads (not paraphrasing, direct quotes): "Need a job? Can pass a background check? No interview, start as soon as tomorrow."
  - oefrha 2y ago
    Duh, it’s unskilled labor and not customer-facing, what do you expect? A coding interview? Culture fit assessment?
    - drewcoo 2y ago
      Culture fit assessment would make sense, actually, if they did interviews at all. That's how companies skirt the law and apply biases during job interviews.
  - jprete 2y ago
    That sounds very much like a disposable cog job. The lower the requirements, the more easily the workers are replaced.
    - mensetmanusman 2y ago
      Such jobs may be necessary if you want low youth unemployment (us has about a third of the rate of youth unemployment as the eu).
- WWLink 2y ago
  > If anything it’s a reminder of exactly why unions are needed more than ever. Except in the software industry, there's too many stupid people who think they are really a "10x programmer" and fall for the Hank Hill special "SHH I'M PAYING YOU MORE BECAUSE YOU'RE A ROCKSTAR! DON'T TELL YOUR COWORKERS!" It's like most people took a boot licking course or something lol.
  - Macha 2y ago
    As time goes on, it's feeling more and more that the HN userbase has never found a boot it didn't identify with
- friend_and_foe 2y ago
  It could have been a lie. It was most certainly not a threat.
jsyang00 2y ago
and people wonder why all corporate comms come in the form of babblespeak...

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

elevatedastalt 2y ago

Jassy told CNBC in April 2022 that if employees were to vote in a union, they may be less empowered in the workplace and things would become “much slower” and “more bureaucratic.” Similarly, in the Bloomberg interview, Jassy remarked, “if you see something on the line that you think could be better for your team or you or your customers, you can’t just go to your manager and say, ‘Let’s change it.’” How can expressing an opinion be in violation of federal law?

interroboink 2y ago
I think when a CEO, in their official capacity, says something relating to their employees, it is more than just "expressing an opinion." He is speaking for the company. The claim was that he was “interfering with, restraining, and coercing employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed.” I'm not a lawyer, but the "coerce" language, in particular, seems like it could be relevant. If a CEO makes statements about how unions are bad, it can have a chilling effect on employees' efforts to unionize. Regardless, a judge, with more facts available than we have, and more knowledge of the relevant law than we have, made this ruling. Update I think this is the one, if you want to read it: https://www.scribd.com/document/728670161/NLRB-Administrative-Law-Judge-on-Amazon-CEO-union-comments https://www.scribd.com/document/728670161/NLRB-Administrativ... Excerpt: As explained below, I find that Jassy’s predictions that unionization would change the employee-employer relationship were lawful under Tri-Cast and progeny. As to Jassy’s predictions that employees would be less empowered, would find it harder to get things done quickly, and would be better off without a union, those statements violated Section 8(a)(1) because they went beyond merely commenting onthe employee-employer relationship and did not comply with the standards for protected speech established by NLRB v. Gissell PackingCo ., 395 U.S. 575, 618 (1969)
- abduhl 2y ago
  Like many NLRB administrative law judges, the judge here has done nothing outside of work for the NLRB. It is no surprise that he found a violation here and it will also be no surprise when he is overturned on appeal. “Judge Brian D. Gee was appointed in May 2022. Prior to his appointment, he served as the Regional Attorney in the West Los Angeles office of the NLRB (Region 31) for 10 years. Judge Gee joined the Agency as a Field Attorney in Region 31 in 1996. During the first 12 years of his career with the Agency, he gained experience as one of the Region’s lead trial attorneys. He was promoted to Supervisory Attorney in March 2008, Deputy Regional Attorney in May 2010, and Regional Attorney in August 2012. A graduate of Vanderbilt University School of Law, Judge Gee earned his Juris Doctorate in 1995. He graduated from Occidental College in 1987, where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in History.” Edit: turning to the linked opinion, we can see how flawed the judge’s argument is based on his argument on 8 where his primary support for his position is a case where both the ALJ and the Board were overturned on appeal: Hendrickson USA, LLC , 366 NLRB No. 7 (2018), enforcement denied by the Sixth Circuit in 932 F.3d 465 (2019), in which the Board agreed with the administrative law judge’s (ALJ)finding that the respondent violated Section 8(a)(1) by saying, “the culture will definitely change,” “relationships will suffer,” and “flexibility is replacedby inefficiency.” This is the most relevant portion of Hendrickson. You can decide whether or not Jassy’s statements are similar to this fact pattern. In our view, the Board’s opinion on this issue is inconsistent with Tri-Cast , and therefore its application of the law to the facts of this case does not meet the substantial evidence standard. The statements singled out from the PowerPoint slide can only be reasonably understood as elaborating upon and summarizing the company’s position on the ineffectiveness of third-party representation, which was a lawful argument for the company to make. The first statement—"the culture will definitely change"—does not have negative connotations in isolation and can only take meaning from the surrounding statements. The statements that "relationships suffer" and "flexibility is replaced by inefficiency" are certainly negative, but context shows that they are protected predictions of the consequences of unionization. The slides at appendix 64 and 65 together show that the "loss of our direct employee relationship " (emphasis added) directly stems from the fact that the employees "lose the right to represent themselves." The comments at the August 21 meeting likewise tie interference in the employer-employee relationship to the union’s right to intervene: "we don’t want [a] third party to have to intervene, we want to talk directly to our employees." And the August 24 letter similarly emphasizes the company’s belief that "employees are entitled to represent themselves without third party interference ." (emphasis added). Taken together, these remarks show that the only reasonable way to interpret the brief statements at issue is that Hendrickson believes that a union’s formal right under Section 9(c) to intervene in the adjustment of grievances renders untenable the casual, efficient communication of the company’s "open door policy" and "easy-going atmosphere," and the slide at issue "simply explicates" that position "in layman’s terms." Tri-Cast, Inc. , 274 NLRB at 377. Finally, the Board’s opinion erroneously suggests that Hendrickson had a duty to present both the pros and cons of union representation. The opinion faults the company’s presentation for suggesting that employees would have a more difficult time influencing their working conditions while "ignoring the fact that, although they may not be at the negotiating table, union members most often have a say in developing bargaining proposals concerning their wages and benefits and other working conditions." 366 NLRB No. 7, *9. But Hendrickson had the right to emphasize the negative aspects of the loss of "direct" relationship, as the Board found in the first portion of its opinion, and Supreme Court precedent does not require Hendrickson to provide the counterargument to its own argument. This language in the Board’s opinion is inconsistent with the NLRA’s policy of "uninhibited, robust, and wide-open debate in labor disputes," Chamber of Commerce , 554 U.S. at 68, 128 S.Ct. 2408, in which both sides may "express themselves on the merits of the dispute in order to influence its outcome," Va. State Bd. of Pharmacy , 425 U.S. at 762, 96 S.Ct. 1817 (citing Gissel , 395 U.S. at 617–18, 89 S.Ct. 1918 ). Therefore, the Board’s conclusion is not supported even by substantial evidence

ckdarby 2y ago

What if the company had industry data that the statement is factual? That unionized employees are less empowered and companies that have unions do not yield the same ROI in their respective industry as their count parts? Would it still break federal law if the statement is factual from data? I feel like then the argument can be made that in his capacity it is no longer an opinion or representation of the company, but a stated observation of the industry itself.

ImPostingOnHN 2y ago
Are we sure that the company has industry data proving their claims that the disempowerment etc. is a sure thing, as the CEO phrased it, rather than just a possibility? If so, that makes the sure-thing claim truly factual, and it will likely be a good defense.