6 ms·

My view on this is if you want to be paid better, work somewhere else. Or encourage an environment where there are more alternative employers. Nobody is holdi

My view on this is if you want to be paid better, work somewhere else. Or encourage an environment where there are more alternative employers. Nobody is holding a gun to anyone's head and forcing them to take a job there. (And yes, I know that Europe has a different view of unions than the US)

DigitalJack 13y ago
I totally agree with this.
- DigitalJack 13y ago
  I understand the down voting because it was essentially devoid of meaty content, but considering the GP's point of view is unpopular in HN, I thought sharing my agreement was enough reason to post. In that way it is deeper than the normal "me too" or +1 post.
  - collyw 13y ago
    Maybe because it shows a lack of critical thinking.
    - DigitalJack 13y ago
      Well I can't help how you interpret things, but it seems pretty superficial to think me uncritical based on what little you read of me on HN. The medium is so devoid of expression that on any given post the reader is filling in much of the information they attribute to the sender.
levosmetalo 13y ago
Unless that's the only job you can actually find. Not a nice position to be, but it always happens to someone, since there are more people that jobs in many parts of the world. Or would it be better those people "choose" not to have any job just because they find their current one is shitty? If everyone had that attitude in 19th century, we would still work 16 hours a day, without fighting for change.
- mathattack 13y ago
  I appreciate your thoughts. I still think it's better to spend time and energy on education and increasing corporate creation initiatives, than strong arming companies. Let's take your example further... Yes, unions (especially in the auto industry) had a lot of success. This was alongside efforts by Henry Ford to increase pay. But where did it lead? The unions kept winning, and look at where Detroit is now. The unions won victory after victory, only to wind up with companies so hollowed out that they can't afford their hard won pensions.
  - levosmetalo 13y ago
    I'm not talking about this specific case right now. The problem of lack of jobs is systemic, and applies to all professions, with a strong tendency to be even more pressing. Due to automation, software and other things the number of jobs, especially low skilled ones is shrinking. Yes, you can educate yourself, and anyone can/should, but in the end, one quarter of the people will be undereducated just because the bar is higher, and will still not be able to find a better job. We, as a mankind, have to seriously consider radical solutions to this problem, and not focus short term on any specific industry. Should be start decreasing working hours due to productivity increase, or just invent bullshit jobs just to keep people employed? Or to progress to Star Trek economy where people will be provided with all basic needs and work only on what they would like to? I know what I would like to happen, but I also fear what would happen. Talking only about unions, Detroit or any specific industry or place is not going to "fix" the global problem, and that is that the need for jobs is decreasing, and number of people is rising. We should tackle that problem instead. Sorry for rambling, it might only be tangentially relevant to the article and discussion, but what I see in all this cases is just this problem. Ok, I might be overgeneralizing, since I'm software engineer, but not to much.
    - mathattack 13y ago
      Two paragraphs isn't rambling. I appreciate your thoughts. I would certainly like to work 30 hours a week too. :-) And I share a concern that the middle class is getting squeezed, so that it's not a bottom 25% that struggle, it's a bottom 50-75%. That said, I still believe the solution is creating more opportunities for potential job providers, and encouraging them to compete for talent. I think this helps everyone. When there's collusion on the part of labor or capital, everyone suffers. To personalize the situation, as individuals in technology, we have the most job opportunities when there are many firms competing for our talent. (Like 1998, or now) The best thing we can do is encourage this for ourselves. Similarly, a pro-job-creator agenda on a country-wide basis will help pull up everyone.
jeena 13y ago
They kind of do, because if you've been unemployed for some amount of time you have to take every job they offer you, otherwise you don't get any unemployment money at all, then you can't pay your rent and have to start stealing food, etc. Not everybody is fortune enough to be born into such an environment where he/she is able to get a reasonable education so he/she can chose where he/she would like to work.
- Artistry121 13y ago
  My great grandfather spent most of his money to get to America (from Germany) by boat, didn't speak English, arrived in New Orleans and worked his way to the Midwest where he toiled as a grocery store worker for years before starting his own store in another town. No education, no money, no connections and he spoke broken english throughout his life. He would have envied the opportunities even the bottom 5% of Americans and Germans today have. Hard work and willingness to learn leads to success and then the ability to choose work. There is a spectrum that underlies this issue. On one side is the freedom of individuals to contract with other individuals and on one side is government setting contract policies. If freedom and respect for individuality are strong values (which I think they are post-enlightenment) policies and views should be closer to the former. Also note that any change to labor laws affects small business far more than large business. Amazon can create robots to do the jobs of sorting where smaller firms cannot. The more regulation on labor in industries and companies the more important capital is and the more valuable size is. The financial industry in America (and in many other countries) is a key example of this.
  - phaer 13y ago
    > He would have envied the opportunities even the bottom 5% of Americans and Germans today have And most of the top 5% Americans and Germans back than lived in fear of militant strikes, riots and revolutionary workers in general. They would have envied the social peace of modern western societies. And I don't know when your Great grandfather migrated but one hand you can't draw conclusions from a single persons experiences and on the other hand stories like this have a lot to do with the specific economic situation in his new homeland at that time
conorh 13y ago
I'm a strong believer in the idea that a society can be judged by how it treats those weakest and least able to defend themselves. I do agree that encouraging alternative employment is necessary, but if you read the article you will see that often the reality is that there is no other option. Therefore these people at the bottom of the employment pole are taken advantage of because they can be. I do not think this is a state of affairs that we should encourage, or that needs to exist, and companies like Costco show otherwise. I hope that those of us with the means will spend our money in as conscionable a way as we can (ie. not at companies encouraging this).
- mathattack 13y ago
  Wouldn't it seem reasonable that it's better to give people better access to more jobs (through education or improving the environment for new business creation) than strong-arming existing employers? The former assumes that the pie can be grown. The latter assume we're fighting over a limited pie, which actually winds up shrinking it.
  - Uchikoma 13y ago
    Education in Germany is mostly free except a (unfortunate) selection process after 4th grade (most states). So people have access to education, and Germany made some great steps forward towards easy business creation (new limited company types, standard contracts, lower costs, ...) in the last 10 years [1]. So what's next? [1] That said the common idea is in school and on television since around the 70s: The coolest guy is the one with the worst grades - every celebrity boosts how bad they were at school. And living on welfare has become a verb ("harzen") and is the live goal (perspective?) of many young people.
    - biafra 13y ago
      Universities are not free anymore in most states of Germany. And the selection after 4th grade is very much determined by the area you live in because you have to send your kids to the public school where you live.
mrweasel 13y ago
I think one important point is that Germany currently doesn't have a minimum wage. It is the job of the union to negotiate a reasonable salary for the workers in a given field. In many European countries unions and employers have historically been able to work together and reach agreements that have been better for both parties, compared having a law impossed by the government. Amazon is ruining that, and I don't believe that the rules that will follow from the governments will be as good as an agreement reach between an employers and the people who work for him.
- mathattack 13y ago
  I fully agree that it's best to be in an environment where people and companies come to agreements on wages that is best. My thought is about what happens when you don't agree - in that case, go work for someone else. And as a society, we're better off encouraging the creation of new companies, and educating people to get better jobs.
  - mrweasel 13y ago
    Not everyone are meant to start a business and while education is important, it's not always the answer either. Currently someone has to pick stuff of the shelves for Amazon. Regardless of how highly educated a society is or how many new companies we start, there's still someone who has to do the manual picking in the warehouse. Someday that job may be automated away, but until then, we need to ensure that the people taking these jobs are treated decently and paid a wage that will sustain them. Amazon can move their warehouse to Poland, and pay a little less and still provide a decent salary. The behavior however should be the same regardless of which country they operate in. We often forget that there are bad/boring/hard/dirty jobs and that they actually need to be done. Education won't make these jobs go away. Just as often we forget that there are people who enjoy them and have no desire to educate themselves further. Regardless of our feeling towards the lack of education or dislike of the job fulfilled by the people "at the bottom of society", we should be respectful of their choices in life and help them should they feel exploited. Just for the record I work for a online shop and are on occasion asked to help in the warehouse. It's physical hard work, boring and you're on a strict schedule to ensure that everything is ready then the delivery companies arrive to pick up orders. We pay a lot better than Amazon, almost double it seems and your not given a fixed time in which to complete the picking of an order, so there's hopefully less stress. So I have no reason to believe that Amazon couldn't a nice place to work as well, and still make a profit.
collyw 13y ago
You swallowed the USA flavoured cool aid didn't you.
- mathattack 13y ago
  I spent enough time looking at Detroit. :-) The US is by no means perfect, but I think encouraging entrepreneurship is a better solution than organized labor. But the reality is, if Amazon is so bad, folks should just go work somewhere else.
  - mratzloff 13y ago
    Organized labor had an overwhelmingly positive impact on Western workers that you also benefit from in terms of work hours, weekends, holidays, and so on. But because there are some cases where unions contributed in part to financial problems (which have quite a bit to do with government corruption and corporate greed as well), they are now an antiquated artifact of the past? > Folks should just go work somewhere else. This is really tone deaf to the realities of the people who must accept jobs like these, though.
    - mathattack 13y ago
      First - thanks for jumping in to a contentious debate. In terms of being tone deaf, isn't that more for politicians and corporate heads? Here we're arguing ideas, like should we support unions that strike during peak periods, and what should Amazon's response be? While I have a general dislike for unions in some places, it is specifically their company-harming tactics that bother me the most. This can be striking during the holidays (which is the situation mentioned) and can also be protesting in front of hotels, scaring away customers. This is an attitude of, "If you don't see if my way, I'll destroy the company." While unions have made some strides, some improvements have also been a result of unilateral action by employers. Take the Henry Ford example, of shortening days and raising wages. [1] As a broader society, we can help those who "must accept jobs like these" by encouraging entrepreneurs to create companies that could hire people like them. Employees get better treatment when there are more people fighting to hire them. [1] http://corporate.ford.com/news-center/press-releases-detail/677-5-dollar-a-day http://corporate.ford.com/news-center/press-releases-detail/...

DigitalJack 13y ago

I totally agree with this.

DigitalJack 13y ago
I understand the down voting because it was essentially devoid of meaty content, but considering the GP's point of view is unpopular in HN, I thought sharing my agreement was enough reason to post. In that way it is deeper than the normal "me too" or +1 post.
- collyw 13y ago
  Maybe because it shows a lack of critical thinking.
  - DigitalJack 13y ago
    Well I can't help how you interpret things, but it seems pretty superficial to think me uncritical based on what little you read of me on HN. The medium is so devoid of expression that on any given post the reader is filling in much of the information they attribute to the sender.

levosmetalo 13y ago

Unless that's the only job you can actually find. Not a nice position to be, but it always happens to someone, since there are more people that jobs in many parts of the world. Or would it be better those people "choose" not to have any job just because they find their current one is shitty? If everyone had that attitude in 19th century, we would still work 16 hours a day, without fighting for change.

mathattack 13y ago
I appreciate your thoughts. I still think it's better to spend time and energy on education and increasing corporate creation initiatives, than strong arming companies. Let's take your example further... Yes, unions (especially in the auto industry) had a lot of success. This was alongside efforts by Henry Ford to increase pay. But where did it lead? The unions kept winning, and look at where Detroit is now. The unions won victory after victory, only to wind up with companies so hollowed out that they can't afford their hard won pensions.
- levosmetalo 13y ago
  I'm not talking about this specific case right now. The problem of lack of jobs is systemic, and applies to all professions, with a strong tendency to be even more pressing. Due to automation, software and other things the number of jobs, especially low skilled ones is shrinking. Yes, you can educate yourself, and anyone can/should, but in the end, one quarter of the people will be undereducated just because the bar is higher, and will still not be able to find a better job. We, as a mankind, have to seriously consider radical solutions to this problem, and not focus short term on any specific industry. Should be start decreasing working hours due to productivity increase, or just invent bullshit jobs just to keep people employed? Or to progress to Star Trek economy where people will be provided with all basic needs and work only on what they would like to? I know what I would like to happen, but I also fear what would happen. Talking only about unions, Detroit or any specific industry or place is not going to "fix" the global problem, and that is that the need for jobs is decreasing, and number of people is rising. We should tackle that problem instead. Sorry for rambling, it might only be tangentially relevant to the article and discussion, but what I see in all this cases is just this problem. Ok, I might be overgeneralizing, since I'm software engineer, but not to much.
  - mathattack 13y ago
    Two paragraphs isn't rambling. I appreciate your thoughts. I would certainly like to work 30 hours a week too. :-) And I share a concern that the middle class is getting squeezed, so that it's not a bottom 25% that struggle, it's a bottom 50-75%. That said, I still believe the solution is creating more opportunities for potential job providers, and encouraging them to compete for talent. I think this helps everyone. When there's collusion on the part of labor or capital, everyone suffers. To personalize the situation, as individuals in technology, we have the most job opportunities when there are many firms competing for our talent. (Like 1998, or now) The best thing we can do is encourage this for ourselves. Similarly, a pro-job-creator agenda on a country-wide basis will help pull up everyone.

jeena 13y ago

They kind of do, because if you've been unemployed for some amount of time you have to take every job they offer you, otherwise you don't get any unemployment money at all, then you can't pay your rent and have to start stealing food, etc. Not everybody is fortune enough to be born into such an environment where he/she is able to get a reasonable education so he/she can chose where he/she would like to work.

Artistry121 13y ago
My great grandfather spent most of his money to get to America (from Germany) by boat, didn't speak English, arrived in New Orleans and worked his way to the Midwest where he toiled as a grocery store worker for years before starting his own store in another town. No education, no money, no connections and he spoke broken english throughout his life. He would have envied the opportunities even the bottom 5% of Americans and Germans today have. Hard work and willingness to learn leads to success and then the ability to choose work. There is a spectrum that underlies this issue. On one side is the freedom of individuals to contract with other individuals and on one side is government setting contract policies. If freedom and respect for individuality are strong values (which I think they are post-enlightenment) policies and views should be closer to the former. Also note that any change to labor laws affects small business far more than large business. Amazon can create robots to do the jobs of sorting where smaller firms cannot. The more regulation on labor in industries and companies the more important capital is and the more valuable size is. The financial industry in America (and in many other countries) is a key example of this.
- phaer 13y ago
  > He would have envied the opportunities even the bottom 5% of Americans and Germans today have And most of the top 5% Americans and Germans back than lived in fear of militant strikes, riots and revolutionary workers in general. They would have envied the social peace of modern western societies. And I don't know when your Great grandfather migrated but one hand you can't draw conclusions from a single persons experiences and on the other hand stories like this have a lot to do with the specific economic situation in his new homeland at that time

conorh 13y ago

I'm a strong believer in the idea that a society can be judged by how it treats those weakest and least able to defend themselves. I do agree that encouraging alternative employment is necessary, but if you read the article you will see that often the reality is that there is no other option. Therefore these people at the bottom of the employment pole are taken advantage of because they can be. I do not think this is a state of affairs that we should encourage, or that needs to exist, and companies like Costco show otherwise. I hope that those of us with the means will spend our money in as conscionable a way as we can (ie. not at companies encouraging this).

mathattack 13y ago
Wouldn't it seem reasonable that it's better to give people better access to more jobs (through education or improving the environment for new business creation) than strong-arming existing employers? The former assumes that the pie can be grown. The latter assume we're fighting over a limited pie, which actually winds up shrinking it.
- Uchikoma 13y ago
  Education in Germany is mostly free except a (unfortunate) selection process after 4th grade (most states). So people have access to education, and Germany made some great steps forward towards easy business creation (new limited company types, standard contracts, lower costs, ...) in the last 10 years [1]. So what's next? [1] That said the common idea is in school and on television since around the 70s: The coolest guy is the one with the worst grades - every celebrity boosts how bad they were at school. And living on welfare has become a verb ("harzen") and is the live goal (perspective?) of many young people.
  - biafra 13y ago
    Universities are not free anymore in most states of Germany. And the selection after 4th grade is very much determined by the area you live in because you have to send your kids to the public school where you live.

mrweasel 13y ago

I think one important point is that Germany currently doesn't have a minimum wage. It is the job of the union to negotiate a reasonable salary for the workers in a given field. In many European countries unions and employers have historically been able to work together and reach agreements that have been better for both parties, compared having a law impossed by the government. Amazon is ruining that, and I don't believe that the rules that will follow from the governments will be as good as an agreement reach between an employers and the people who work for him.

mathattack 13y ago
I fully agree that it's best to be in an environment where people and companies come to agreements on wages that is best. My thought is about what happens when you don't agree - in that case, go work for someone else. And as a society, we're better off encouraging the creation of new companies, and educating people to get better jobs.
- mrweasel 13y ago
  Not everyone are meant to start a business and while education is important, it's not always the answer either. Currently someone has to pick stuff of the shelves for Amazon. Regardless of how highly educated a society is or how many new companies we start, there's still someone who has to do the manual picking in the warehouse. Someday that job may be automated away, but until then, we need to ensure that the people taking these jobs are treated decently and paid a wage that will sustain them. Amazon can move their warehouse to Poland, and pay a little less and still provide a decent salary. The behavior however should be the same regardless of which country they operate in. We often forget that there are bad/boring/hard/dirty jobs and that they actually need to be done. Education won't make these jobs go away. Just as often we forget that there are people who enjoy them and have no desire to educate themselves further. Regardless of our feeling towards the lack of education or dislike of the job fulfilled by the people "at the bottom of society", we should be respectful of their choices in life and help them should they feel exploited. Just for the record I work for a online shop and are on occasion asked to help in the warehouse. It's physical hard work, boring and you're on a strict schedule to ensure that everything is ready then the delivery companies arrive to pick up orders. We pay a lot better than Amazon, almost double it seems and your not given a fixed time in which to complete the picking of an order, so there's hopefully less stress. So I have no reason to believe that Amazon couldn't a nice place to work as well, and still make a profit.

collyw 13y ago

You swallowed the USA flavoured cool aid didn't you.

mathattack 13y ago
I spent enough time looking at Detroit. :-) The US is by no means perfect, but I think encouraging entrepreneurship is a better solution than organized labor. But the reality is, if Amazon is so bad, folks should just go work somewhere else.
- mratzloff 13y ago
  Organized labor had an overwhelmingly positive impact on Western workers that you also benefit from in terms of work hours, weekends, holidays, and so on. But because there are some cases where unions contributed in part to financial problems (which have quite a bit to do with government corruption and corporate greed as well), they are now an antiquated artifact of the past? > Folks should just go work somewhere else. This is really tone deaf to the realities of the people who must accept jobs like these, though.
  - mathattack 13y ago
    First - thanks for jumping in to a contentious debate. In terms of being tone deaf, isn't that more for politicians and corporate heads? Here we're arguing ideas, like should we support unions that strike during peak periods, and what should Amazon's response be? While I have a general dislike for unions in some places, it is specifically their company-harming tactics that bother me the most. This can be striking during the holidays (which is the situation mentioned) and can also be protesting in front of hotels, scaring away customers. This is an attitude of, "If you don't see if my way, I'll destroy the company." While unions have made some strides, some improvements have also been a result of unilateral action by employers. Take the Henry Ford example, of shortening days and raising wages. [1] As a broader society, we can help those who "must accept jobs like these" by encouraging entrepreneurs to create companies that could hire people like them. Employees get better treatment when there are more people fighting to hire them. [1] http://corporate.ford.com/news-center/press-releases-detail/677-5-dollar-a-day http://corporate.ford.com/news-center/press-releases-detail/...