There are also plenty of ideologues in Washington who bristle at the mention of regulation, unions, and anything they don't deem as being "pro business".
This is beyond splitting profits; it's driving back to Victorian era, and that did not end well for businesses. Increase in unemployment is just a sign.
Rates of deaths of despair suggest that people have broken, they just don't have the leverage to significantly change things.
But that's a trade off no one should have to make: it's messed up that we as a society allow this state of affairs to exist in the first place.
And yet here I am, not canceling my Prime membership, because I suck. But hell, if Prime cost 2x what it currently does, and that got the workers involved good working conditions, I would still pay it. Not sure how many people would, though.
I genuinely don’t understand. You have already argued that despite shitty conditions at Amazon, some people are desperate enough for money that the alternative (making less with better working conditions) is even worse. So if enough people cancelled their Amazon subscriptions that they had to scale back operations, wouldn’t those people be worse off than they are now?
Amazon is nowhere near a monopoly (or monopsony), at least when it comes to employers.
Amazon is 10% of retail and retail is only a slice of the economy. If you can't find an alternative to amazon, you aren't looking.
Except now, I’m working myself to the bone trying to fulfill my package counts, peeing in bottles, shitting in bags, constantly stressed about if I can not only meet my quotas, but beat everyone else on the floor with me so that I can get more hours next time. I get back from work miserable, stressed, and probably angry from the constant competition needed to just survive. But this is a valuable opportunity, surely, except for the fact that I’m constantly stressed about work, and now I can’t even complain about how I’m stressed about work because Amazon won’t allow me to have my phone on the floor or say the word “restroom” in their internal chat app.
Oh but right, as you say, it’s a worker-favorable economy! Let me go to packing warehouse and try and get even fifty cents closer to Amazon with the leverage I obviously have. I’m sure the guy there is gonna say no problem, here’s a raise.
This is the lesson that we already learned in the 1800s with monopolies; they distort reality. It’s useless to argue “if you don’t want to work for them, don’t” because they often pay just better than your local alternatives, but by virtue of their economy bending power, they will exert an insane amount of control and influence until they are either regulated or there is no competition left and I don’t even have the fruit packing warehouse anymore, but the Amazon Oranges Fulfillment Center.