Why Amazon is anti-union

[Champakian]

I've never understood what RWs have against organized labor. Collective bargaining is just another form of negotiation in the marketplace.

I don't have anything against it.

I was even a union steward.

It's just that it's part of a dying paradigm in the US
the reduces our competitive edge internationally and
unlike the heady days of the union, especially after
WWII when we were the only game on the planet, we
do have to compete with countries that employ cheap
labor and lower environmental costs which truly hurts
the American worker a lot more than their employers do.

No amount of unionization can help remedy that situation,
in fact, at this point, it only serves to hinder it and drive
manufacturing out of the country (i.e. UNION jobs)...

 

[Champakian]

Comshaw, as I just stated, I am the proof.

When you are protected by the union,
I know first hand, that it is impossible
to be fired by your employer. I've even
experienced co-workers getting caught
red-handed stealing from our employer
and enjoying union protection while the
employer just had to shrug and let the
theft go on.

Of course, after reading several of the replies
in this thread, I rather gather that there are a
lot here who would cheer and applaud at getting
even with the "rich" guy.

But there, in itself, lies a real problem of perception.
Poor people are incapable of starting a business that
creates employment and the subsequent wages. That
takes Capital, which means that "rich" people/corporations
are the only vehicles in which to start up any business.

Additionally, most of the people who provide the money
for the vast majority of big business are the small investors
trying to build up their retirement nest egg (often the workers)
and the war on big business is thus a war on employees and investors.
This is why we no longer need, or want, unions for they are the enemy of Capital.

 

[GothTalk]

I've spent almost three years working for Amazon.

My sister is upper level (just under the exec running her branch) in Seattle, and has been with Amazon for almost a decade now.

She doesn't hate Amazon either.

Maybe in your specific area of expertise they deal with rare things but most of their business is made up of electronics FFS. Nothing you couldn't get a Best Buy and unless you're picky about it has to be the back lit Neon Green Miraculous Ladybug edition nothing you couldn't get at Walmart.

LOL yea unless you're picky about it.

But when you're needing something REAL specific you're NOT finding locally and the options are janky site from 2008, Bob's Supply inc. I gotta sign up for and Amazon 1 click and 99% chance it's going to be here in the morning and if not I know Amazon will take care of me??

Amazon gets the sale.

And yes, they are like the high end Ebay for uncommon to fairly rare plants.

I'm sure there are other things Amazon has and can get to you faster as well but the point has been made... there is a reason they are so big and so many people use them. They offer one of the best digital marketplace services available.

Not nearly enough to make up for what they are destroying. And like so many of your claims at this point like most of the board I'm fairly comfortable calling you a liar. Lets take you at face value.

I'm sorry but the fact is E-commerce is bigger than brick and mortar ever was and we aren't going back.

You really think Amazon even if you count businesses like yours make up for the business they take away from Brick and mortar locations?

Considerably more so, and growing. The digital economy has ALREADY blown brick and mortars best numbers totally the fuck out of the water. It's the primary market medium and we're never going back to the 80's.

If you would be dishonest about something THIS petty there is no reason to believe anything you say.

Sure.... I didn't treat your troll buddy who hates me honorably, if you think that makes everything I've ever said and will ever say a lie, then cool, be extra childish about it.

You called a riot a peaceful protest, a deliberate and racist lie, therefore EVERYTHING you've ever posted including EVERY word in this thread is 100% an absolute lie and 100% incorrect. See, I can play 5 year old too!!
​

Laws are explicit threats of violence only within your tiny world where things literally don't make sense.

No, in the real world you live in.

It's called "law enforcement" and it's authorized to use violence, up to and including killing you should you sufficiently resist.

I just don't have my head so far up my ass I think the cops are my government friends.... I'm not retarded enough to miss the part where Laws only matter because people with mean dogs, tasers, flash bangs, beat sticks and guns will come fuck you up if you are even SUSPECTED of not following said laws.

The bootheel of your beloved government and the law....

I didn't pay for nearly a decade and never recieved so much as a letter. They don't care about little fish. They just don't.

All that tells me is you didn't make enough to pay taxes for nearly a decade.

Must suck to be poor.
​

​No, it is one of the leading reasons why we have a government.

Literally nowhere in the Constitution, you don't live in the Soviet States of America buddy... you're objectively, factually and demonstrably wrong.

Just because our government fails at its tasks at an alarming rate because a rigged racist system means absolutely fuck all.

Not being the socialist shit hole of your fantasies doesn't mean it's rigged, racist or failing.

 

[Bud_Spencer]

I'm sure a company like Amazon has a sufficient margin of profit to provide better and safer working conditions and stay in business.

Like I said, it's not the money. Union work rules would remove the turn-on-a-dime flexibility that companies like Amazon rely on to respond quickly to changing condisions and circumstances. It simply couldn't remain the same company it is today if it has to refer to an encyclopeadic set of work rules every time someone calls in sick.

 

[SgtSpiderMan]

Like I said, it's not the money. Union work rules would remove the turn-on-a-dime flexibility that companies like Amazon rely on to respond quickly to changing condisions and circumstances. It simply couldn't remain the same company it is today if it has to refer to an encyclopeadic set of work rules every time someone calls in sick.

LOL! Those two things have nothing to do with each other. Amazon's business strategy doesn't depend on if Earl calls out sick one day.

 

[Bud_Spencer]

LOL! Those two things have nothing to do with each other. Amazon's business strategy doesn't depend on if Earl calls out sick one day.

As is your standard fare, you don't have the slightest idea what you're talking about.

 

[SgtSpiderMan]

As is your standard fare, you don't have the slightest idea what you're talking about.

As usual I have to apologize for responding to the words that you wrote.

 

[Rightguide]

Except that isn't how reality works in most areas that want and need unions. They are jobs where it is near impossible to rate individual workers in a meaningful way for for one reason or another.

Additionally setting a floor for what people can be paid working in this or that employer doesn't prevent management from promoting people or even just adjusting their pay based on a meritocracy. Though again many jobs don't have any real way of defining a meritocratic way of measuring worth.

How can you be so friggin' ignorant? Organized labor only controls about 5.8% of the private-sector business. What does that mean? It means that most Americans don't want to work for unionized businesses and that most businesses reject collective bargaining because they believe in meritocracy. Collective bargaining is a Marxist construct, an alien concept to most Americans who understand the implications of a system that allows less productive people to earn the same as productive people simply because they have the same job classification.

 

[GothTalk]

As usual I have to apologize for responding to the words that you wrote.

It's the total lack of understanding the words that he wrote that you should apologize for.

Jesus fuckin' Christ... learn to read you illiterate fuckwit.

 

[GothTalk]

Collective bargaining is a Marxist construct, an alien concept to most Americans who understand the implications of a system that allows less productive people to earn the same as productive people simply because they have the same job classification.

I wouldn't say alien so much as repugnant.... but that's just me.

 

[pecksniff]

I don't have anything against it.

I was even a union steward.

It's just that it's part of a dying paradigm in the US . . .

The reason it is dying was explained by Robert Reich in The Work of Nations: A union works best in the old style of manufacturing business, like an auto plant or steel mill, where you have a vast army of workers facing a small cohesive management. That model has been eroded by offshoring and, more importantly, by automation. The service sector, not so easily unionizable, has been growing in relative importance for decades.

 

[pecksniff]

Collective bargaining is a Marxist construct . . .

It was invented by workers who had never heard of Marx. It had become an important factor in labor relations before anybody had heard of Marx.

 

[GothTalk]

It was invented by workers who had never heard of Marx. It had become an important factor in labor relations before anybody had heard of Marx.

Yes in the same way that socialism is just a commune with people voluntarily living and sharing resources collectively.

Technically yes, but applied to modern politics, not even close.

Modern unions are just as far apart from the first privative collective bargaining as hippie communes are from China.

Modern unions in the US and the union concepts that you and most (D)'eez support are Marx flavored variety of collective bargaining that has thankfully been just as self destructive and toxic as everything else Marx, gnawed the hand that feeds to a bloody stump and now unions are an absolutely microscopic minority of the labor market. Even most of the alleged union advocates with a (D) next to their name want nothing to do with it.

 

[Rightguide]

I wouldn't say alien so much as repugnant.... but that's just me.

I can agree but I'm sure most Americans believe people who work hard and produce more should make more than those who do just enough to get by.

 

[Rightguide]

It was invented by workers who had never heard of Marx. It had become an important factor in labor relations before anybody had heard of Marx.

But early on in the 20th Century, several unions in the US were infiltrated by the CPUSA. The Communications Workers of America and International Longshoremen's Association comes to mind.

 

[Sean Renaud]

How can you be so friggin' ignorant? Organized labor only controls about 5.8% of the private-sector business. What does that mean? It means that most Americans don't want to work for unionized businesses and that most businesses reject collective bargaining because they believe in meritocracy. Collective bargaining is a Marxist construct, an alien concept to most Americans who understand the implications of a system that allows less productive people to earn the same as productive people simply because they have the same job classification.

It doesn't mean that most Americans don't want to work for unions. It means many if not most don't have a real option. I'm old enough to remember when Walmart had a butcher station like supermarkets do. They tried to unionize and the Waltons just cut an entire department. Reagan broke the Air Traffic controllers union and those two are just without me taking the time to google other places.

Most employers pretend to believe in meritocracy but the reality is that there are a ton of jobs where meritocracy doesn't asign value to people who are valuable because it doesn't show up on spread sheets.

Again you are being a bit dishonest about less and more productive workers anyway. There are/were and will be again eventually jobs where your job isn't particularly productive. It really is that frickin simple. We don't debate that first responders of all flavors deserve a living wage. Fire fighters get paid to sleep on the job. Cops are still getting paid when they are chillin in a parking lot eating lunch. Ambulance drivers (And the mechanics and stockers which I was breifly on a 12 on 12 off schedule so I worked three days a week and four the next. I was paid to play video games because not every day do enough emergencies happen that were more than me hopping in, taking inventory and getting the ambulances back to zero.

The military isn't REALLY a meritocracy. I was an outstanding Ordinance man while I was in the Marines. To the point that two (really three but one was so politically correct AND racist at the same time that he was constantly pissing me off. And before you say you can't be both he would get upset if I threw up a peace sign and said 'I'm outtie five thousand. That was me lowering myself to "their" level. But when asked how he would describe me if I were lost he said well Dark skinned, short buzz cut. The description is right but why not say "the tall black guy. Cus it's racist to identify people by their race.) My job was an armorer for helicoptors. Given how important air superiority is in modern combat I was more important than any single grunt but they got the same pay as me (and sometimes more in the grand scheme of things) and their overwhelming common trait. They were sheeple who couldn't get a decent score on the ASVAB.

I was however admittedly a poor Marine over all. I had no interest in parades and medals. I was and remain a gamer first and Marine/Veteran second (and that's if we ignore anime, paleontology and astronomy.) I could pass all the physical tests but I didn't strive to get a perfect score. When your job is to repair and maintain weapons who the fuck cares how fast you can run or how many pull ups you can do. If shit has gotten THAT bad you're not doing shit. They've gotten past the grunts, past security all the way to the gear that's in the rear.

I've worked in warehouses and if a truck was late. . .well we had to look like we were working so we'd wash the bay doors and tables. Sweep up nothing and some of us found very effective hiding places until there was work. How do you judge the guy who works at McDonalds from 10pm to 7:00 am. He's not doing shit but if your location is open 24/7 someone has to man the station.

Also please show me the part where you can't both have a union AND a meritocracy. I know the last time I worked in factory they would just make up titles. So and so stopped being a line workder despite working the line. You are now a tester and make a dollar more.

The handful of people who benefit from not collectively bargaining with employers is negligable. Its rare to find anybody in any profession who cannot be replaced.

 

[jaF0]

If the various local, state and federal offices responsible for labor, workplace and wage/hour violations had been acting on the complaints against the company years ago, there may not have been a need for a union vote.

The stories have been in the news for many years.

 

[Comshaw]

Comshaw, as I just stated, I am the proof.

When you are protected by the union,
I know first hand, that it is impossible
to be fired by your employer. I've even
experienced co-workers getting caught
red-handed stealing from our employer
and enjoying union protection while the
employer just had to shrug and let the
theft go on.

Of course, after reading several of the replies
in this thread, I rather gather that there are a
lot here who would cheer and applaud at getting
even with the "rich" guy.

But there, in itself, lies a real problem of perception.
Poor people are incapable of starting a business that
creates employment and the subsequent wages. That
takes Capital, which means that "rich" people/corporations
are the only vehicles in which to start up any business.

Additionally, most of the people who provide the money
for the vast majority of big business are the small investors
trying to build up their retirement nest egg (often the workers)
and the war on big business is thus a war on employees and investors.
This is why we no longer need, or want, unions for they are the enemy of Capital.

I've been busy the last couple of days, but I wanted to address the opinion and claims you stated above.

First off the tired old, and totally unsupported by fact, claim of "It's impossible to be fired by your employer". Having been a union member for 22 years (before I was promoted to manager) I saw plenty of union members get fired. It happens all the time. Making the statement as you did makes it appear like ALL union members are immune to being fired, which has no factual basis and is a long way from the truth.

There are unions which do have that kind of protection, but it isn't because of the union, it's because of the company those unions members work for. Why do I say that?

Anyone who's been in a union for any time at all knows the union has only one powerful tool: the strike. All union contracts now days carry a "No lockout/no walk out" clause. That means that while the contract is in effect, the union cannot go on strike and the company can not lock out the workers. Because of that the contract is the bible, the gospel of interactions between the union and the company.

Worker disciplinary procedures are covered in and part of any union contract. If as you have pointed out some workers are allowed to get away with stealing or other nefarious actions, the reason is that it is allowed by the contract. As I said, I've sat on both sides of the table during negotiations. During those negotiations, the company and union agree on what will be in the contract. I know for a fact that company's do a cost analysis to determine if it is more costly to discipline employees for infractions, or ignore those infractions. They ignore the moral implications and consider only the monetary ones. So it's usually the company that is responsible for such lax disciplinary procedures in a contract. Personally, I don't believe the unions should ever ask for or allow such in a contract. The reason is it reflects badly on the rest of the union membership.

Let me address the last part of your post. You claim the unions are waging war on business and are the enemy of capital. I beg to differ. Most union members realize that the company they work for is the reason they make a living. Study after study shows that union workers are more productive than nonunion workers.

One I read (link below) shows that workers in the cement industry are 6% to 8% more productive than nonunion workers. If they are more productive, why are those in favor of nonunion workers trying to get rid of the more productive ones? Go back and look at the graph I posted in an earlier post for an answer. The wages taken from workers are added to the profits of the company. They can make more money by screwing the workers, then by allowing more productivity.

Additionally, unions are much safer for the workers. OSHA records show (link below) that union shops comprise 14% of the work force, but only 5% of the on the job accidents.

Unions are still needed. Union workers are more productive. And the union is needed to protect the workers.

In essence, they are good for the companies and investors (productivity) as well as good for the workers (wages and safety).

http://unionstats.gsu.edu/bhirsch/UnionsProductivityGrowth.pdf

https://www.wnylabortoday.com/news/2021/12/07/national-labor-news/new-study-shows-union-construction-jobsites-significantly-safer-than-non-union-sites/
Comshaw

 

[pecksniff]

How can you be so friggin' ignorant? Organized labor only controls about 5.8% of the private-sector business. What does that mean? It means that most Americans don't want to work for unionized businesses . . .

No, it means they never get the chance.

and that most businesses reject collective bargaining because they believe in meritocracy.

No, because they like being able to make all the decisions for whatever reasons seem good to management, without dealing with any workers' organization that has actual power.

Collective bargaining is a Marxist construct . . .

It predates Marx.

So does the socialist movement.