Pervasive trend in America:

erode peoples' standard of living, erode the laws protecting them from abusive working environments, force them into a position where they only have the option of working for one company, and then blame them for trying to ask for better conditions.

If you went into your job every day and criticized the job with a coworker, you would in fact not lose your job (or have the option for a nice settlement), because American labor law specifically protects workers' rights to talk about their working conditions?

That's a gross exaggeration; Amazon is not even close to being the only company you can work for.

The point is that in many of these communities where retail jobs have been absolutely decimated (because of Amazon), working for Amazon is often the only game in town

Can you name any of these cities? People keep using this argument in discussions about Amazon, but I've not seen any specific evidence for it - i.e., a town where it really is true.

I'm conscious I'm starting to sound like a broken record, having posed this question several times in another recent thread, but where is the evidence that Amazon has access to an endless supply of workers who are at-once sufficiently able-bodied, able-minded and otherwise capable of doing the work Amazon needs done, and also so desperate for work that they will tolerate any level of mistreatment?

My claim is not that Amazon has no room to improve pay and conditions for its workers. I'm sure it does. I'm just questioning the assumption that Amazon is able to endlessly exploit and mistreat its workers without consequence.

Move somewhere else. If you can't find a perfered job in your hometown, you don't force the local company to make a job to your satisfaction, you move to a different part of the country.

Why should these people get any other type of consideration.

When you can barely even pay each month’s rent, just moving to a new apartment locally can require a year or two of savings. And thats assuming you don’t have children or any other unexpected (car broke down, medical bills).

We're not asking them to make the job to our satisfaction.

We're asking them to treat people with the minimum of respect and dignity.

If you feel like you're not being treated with dignity and respect, then quit the job.

You've said that in another branch of this thread.

Do you understand that some people don't have that option? Or cannot move to a new location? Through no fault of their own?

Why can't people use the powers they have delegated to the government to put a stop to these practices, for the growing class of people who are trapped in jobs with conditions similar to this?

I never said they can't lobby the government. I said they shouldn't feel entitled.

If I'm destitute and I'm at a soup kitchen; I wouldn't complain about the food even if it sucks, because the alternative is to starve.

It's the same thing here, beggars can't be choosers. If you want the government to change the rules, go ahead. But don't demonize the company that's literally putting food on your table because you don't like the only job you can find.

So better for these folks to have retail jobs that pay far less? Not sure I understand your argument here.

Yet options are dwindling here where I am. As a teen there was a shopping mall packed with choices. Now the nearby mall has so many vacant slots it's a wonder they're still open.

Amazon may not owe them a job, but a government ought to make sure that it's citizens are not treated like animals to just make a living, no matter where they choose to work.

It's a shame that any country allows conditions like this to exist, under the excuse of "the free market will solve this problem, just get a job elsewhere"

The balance of power between government, people + companies has made this extremely difficult, and the "free market" is just optimizing for this imbalance by allowing conditions to get this bad in the first place.

If a politician's solution to "making sure people aren't treated like animals" is going after a single company; rather than fixing the system, then they've failed as politicians.

You fix the system by going after the miscreants and holding them to account, one by one, and accumulating a record that can be used to provide more general laws and regulations for the future. Lawmakers do that by investigating specific companies for specific reasons.

You have, by my count at this time, 14 posts in this thread.

What is it that you might have left to say that you were unable to put in to words in the first 13?

We're all out here only able to fix one bug at a time.

You make it sound like any of the conditions are pervasive, they employ 876,000 people, if the conditions were as bad as the media makes it seem I would imagine there being more outcry instead of the media having to blow up specific instances of things happening.

Where there's smoke there is fire is the saying, so maybe it is that bad but that's not what I understand it to be.

Edit: Also from all the documents we've seen it would appear Amazon leaks like a sieve so I would also expect way more damning evidence to have appeared by now.

Whether or not they are pervasive, they should not have occurred in the first place. What kind of culture allowed this to happen even once? Why hasn't there been a statement or commitment from Amazon on fixing this, rather than doubling down on "it doesn't happen" ?

This specific Amazon incident is just one of may incidents across many major employers where workers end up suffering. Regulations should exist that prevent this from even happening, but political will doesn't seem to exist, sadly.

Blowing up this incident helps refocus the attention on trying to fix this nationwide, rather than this specific incident at amazon.

> This specific Amazon incident is just one of may incidents across many major employers where workers end up suffering. Regulations should exist that prevent this from even happening, but political will doesn't seem to exist, sadly.

Okay if the goal is bringing attention to general workplace issues across major companies, then why is it only ever Amazon taking flak? What is special about them that they're the whipping post? Walmart is egregious, systematically so, shown time and time again over decades, but Amazon is the beacon of workforce mal-treatment? Please.

> Also from all the documents we've seen it would appear Amazon leaks like a sieve so I would also expect way more damning evidence to have appeared by now.

This is some the most impressive circular logic I’ve seen in my day.

I don't think you know what that means.

I think it's generally okay to complain about a system that forces you to pee in bottles due to lack of restroom breaks. People have quit, and they still have every right to complain even after quitting

Sure, but then why are you still working there if its so terrible?

Most people in America would not have any money for food or shelter if they missed just one paycheck. When the option is between pissing in a bottle and becoming homeless, most people will piss in the bottle. That's a choice people shouldn't have to make.

Try to imagine a situation where this crappy job is the best of the available options.

They’re not forcing anyone and most workers don’t do that. The ones that do are probably just not productive and are making up the loss of production by peeing in bottles. That’s not necessarily an indictment of the company. Their policy, from leaked documents, is that workers should not be doing this.

Something being legal does not make it right or just.

Sure, but it isn't just legal it's better (in some ways) than most things in the same class. Amazon tracks you and makes you work harder, but compensates you better and doesn't fuck around with hours as much as other jobs in the same fields. It does seem unfair to target them specifically.

For example the piss bottles. It is a thing for truckers and delivery workers to piss in bottles. UPS people, FedEx people, Truckers more than the others will talk about it anonymously. But everyone acts like Amazon isn't acting within the unspoken norms of society.

I would argue the "justice" system is the best determinant of what's "just" by definition.

I can call my car a “flying system” all day long. Doesn’t make it an airplane.

But ideas of what is “just” change and the justice system is often slow to react. Sometimes things that are technically unjust (banning gay marriage) are allowed. Slavery was once legal. Justice system at the time said so. Also, as an anecdote, speaking as someone who has participated in the justice system quite a bit, for me it was very rarely the best determinant of what was “just” on the small scale of my life. I would hesitate to assume on the larger scale of society as a whole it is any more accurate.

The problem is that the "justice system" is the only universally agreed upon system. The alternative is everybody upholds their own justice and we have anarchy.

If you want to change the justice system, go ahead. But there's a difference between changing labour laws and going after one specific company.

> To think I'd be able to criticize my organization and still be entitled to a job is lunacy.

Well I would certainly never want to work for an organization that would fire someone, especially a good coworker, for this.

I wouldn't either; that's why I don't. Just like how these people, if they don't want to work for Amazon, shouldn't.

> If Amazon is your best option, then you should be grateful for it.

As we drift back into company towns here in the Midwest US I do hope change will come before company scrip.

Then why should we have any worker protection laws. Shouldn't everyone just be greatful.

There's a massive power imbalance between individuals and corporations. In a way they are modern royalty, controlling a large amount of the world

But Amazon didn't break any worker protection laws, they're within bounds.

So we should change the rules? Accepting laws because that's the way it is to be blunt silly. Why do we have child labor laws? Those families and children should have just been greatful? Or maybe things can be better and the law isn't perfect

Sure, change the rules. If you can get everybody to agree to it. But until then, what's legal is legal; and Amazon is within the bounds of the law.

You’re all over this discussion trying to argue from a place of “legal = humane/ethical/moral/etc.” and I’m sorry, but this premise just doesn’t hold water.

What's the alternative? Having people independently decide what humane/ethical/moral means?

They're tiptoeing the line. So, yes, you're right; They haven't broken the law, but when they have to stand right on that line to get what they want, it's clear they want to go past it.

Same as mine operators employing kids in 19th century England, or current Chinese companies with their fucked 9-9-6 system.

Ha-Joon Chang's 23 Things They Don't Tell You About Capitalism should be mandatory reading for any person commenting online about the modern economic system.

Here's Wiki and Goodreads to save y'all a few seconds

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/23_Things_They_Don%27t_Tell_...

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8913542-23-things-they-d...