Amazon Union vote

interesting, I didn't expect that. But seems like stupid Amazon would be smart enough to provide workers with good work conditions to avoid a union. The stuff in the news the last few days doesn't sound good if true.

I mean they can't get make packages here in time so why do they have workers pissing in bottles?
 
I believe you should be allowed to unionize. I also believe no one is forced to keep you employed, except in terms of medical/disability, and even then it may mean that your position within the company changes.
The only people who benefit from the union system these days are the bottom of the barrel employee. If you are at the top of your field of expertise, you can find a better deal elsewhere, which leads to a shortage of those people, which leads to a better deal for those who are next tier down, and it keeps going from there.
The company I used to work for was paying minimum wage to start 25 years ago. They now pay 16+ to start. They have competition from other employers they didn't have in the aftermath of the 80's farm crisis. As they want good people, or now anyone who will show up for 5/10hr shifts, this is what they are paying. It may not seem like much to the 'coasters on here, but for this area it's damn good starting wage for an 18yo kid who can read a drawing and a tape measure. Bonus if you can read dial calipers and veneer micrometers. The conditions are better than they were 3 decades ago, but it's still factory work. Something I try to impart on the youth I speak to: If your young and want top wages, you are going to do some unpleasant things. If you want air conditioning, good heat in the winter, and clean, be prepared to make minimum, or get a degree in something that will pay well for that. Oh, and don't forget to factor in a decade to pay for that degree.
 
i read somewhere that only 55% of the employees actually voted. I also read that amazon forced the USPS to put a mailbox in front of the distro center and employees were afraid to vote. not sure how much of this is true

edit: and some of the accusations seem like they would be better investigated by the labor board instead of a union.
 
IowaOffRoad said:
The only people who benefit from the union system these days are the bottom of the barrel employee.
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I can 100% agree with this. Before i joined the military i had a friend approach me and ask i wanted to white card for the union. Didnt know what that meant at the time, but the pay was good and it was just a 3 week deal. I was leaving in a couple months and said sure.

Get on the job and the majority of the people are average employees who show up, work, and go home. It turned out that my uncle(65ish at the time) and 2 cousins were on the job as well. They are top tier workers. Bust their ass the entire time and simply get shit done. A few days in i started to realize who the real slackers were. I was on hole and fire watch, and i had a couple guys crawl into a tore apart machine. As they crawled in they told me to wake them if i saw anyone with a white hard hat. The guys took a few hour nap while on the clock.

Talked to my uncle a couple days later and asked him what was up with that, and he said it is what it is. Being in the union meant they wouldnt be fired, and with a mill shut down for repairs they would hire anyone in the books which included people who didnt actually do work. He said on normal jobs they most likely wouldnt get a call.


Had a former coworker who did 20 years in the military get out and work as a contractor. After a year he decided he wanted to see what working outside of the government was like so he took a job as a manager at a refinery. He said he was having to bribe union guys to get jobs done so they could start producing again. A motor change that should take a day would take a week if he wasnt paying them on the side. He left that after a year and came back as a contractor.

Im not saying all .gov employees or contractors are good, just pointing out that unions do protect bottom of the barrel employees for the most part.
 
midwestzj said:
i read somewhere that only 55% of the employees actually voted. I also read that amazon forced the USPS to put a mailbox in front of the distro center and employees were afraid to vote. not sure how much of this is true

edit: and some of the accusations seem like they would be better investigated by the labor board instead of a union.
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I don’t know how many voted, but everyone has a choice to make. It’s in line with voter turnout in America.
Yes, if you are truly abusing people there are legal consequences to that, but if you believe you are “in danger” then use your agency to leave. If you aren’t a shitty worker you will find employment elsewhere. If you are, what are you complaining about?
 
amazon already pays above market wages, offers scholarships and schools, above market benefits packages and even minted millionaires with stock packages.

unions are useful in low regulatory environments, they just don't have anything to add anymore.

end the minimum wage, end health insurance mandates, end group life insurance schemes, end social security and then unions can be useful again. until then, they are just another drain
 
MuntCuffin said:
Y'all think Amazon is an honest employer? LOL

I piss on anyone that knows what Amazon is and represents and chooses to work for them.

but while there they should be allowed to unionize. Thats the politics amazon supports. Fuck them.
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what the hell counts as honest? they've been able to literally remake logistics services in this country. massive expenditures for a thing people didn't even know about a mere 20 years ago.

they are allowed to unionize, they rightly decided against it. fuck amazon for their political apparatus.
 
Provience said:
what the hell counts as honest? they've been able to literally remake logistics services in this country. massive expenditures for a thing people didn't even know about a mere 20 years ago.

they are allowed to unionize, they rightly decided against it. fuck amazon for their political apparatus.
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Might be silly, but I don't trust an honest vote from a company the censors websites.
 
amazon is interesting
they're leaders in automation, more robots than any of their competitors
so they spend a fuckton of money trying to raise min wage laws because it doesn't affect their profit margins nearly as much as it does their competitors
 
MuntCuffin said:
Might be silly, but I don't trust an honest vote from a company the censors websites.
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well, just like national politics, when half the people don't vote you get what you get.

it's pretty reasonable to vote against the union. amazon flat out said benefits from the company would be reduced, so you are looking at fewer benefits plus having to pay dues monthly for what will inevitably be a worse job regardless of how shit it is now.

the whole complaints about strict timelines and pissing in bottles and such, yeah i'm 100% a get HR involved or the state if you need to. using that as grounds to unionize? stupid.
 
I'm glad they voted it down. At least this place is giving people somewhere to work. Amazon has two more distribution centers under construction in the Birmingham metro right now and word is they are planning a 4th & 5th. If these fools voted to unionize I could see Amazon saying F-it and shut them all down. The way I see it they have put a lot of people to work in our area and there has been residual jobs tiering off from Amazon as well. That's a bunch of folks not sucking on the government tit.
 
[486 said:
;n374827]amazon is interesting
they're leaders in automation, more robots than any of their competitors
so they spend a fuckton of money trying to raise min wage laws because it doesn't affect their profit margins nearly as much as it does their competitors
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Bingo. Somebody gets it.
 
Provience said:
the whole complaints about strict timelines and pissing in bottles and such, yeah i'm 100% a get HR involved or the state if you need to. using that as grounds to unionize? stupid.
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Agreed, and I question the "bottle piss/time-line" complaint. Maybe it's a full run adhd type job position, and certain employees are on the phone during go to bathroom time? I'm not in the least bit defending Amazon, but I've worked high paced production for 26 years and I've seen how stupid and wasteful humans can be with time.
 
It is interesting that bozo was all for mail in ballots on the presidential election and poo poo voter fraud......

But didn't allow mail in votes to unionize..due to fraud....cant make it up:lmao:
 
DT75FLH said:
It is interesting that bozo was all for mail in ballots on the presidential election and poo poo voter fraud......

But didn't allow mail in votes to unionize..due to fraud....cant make it up:lmao:
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It's almost as if people just make shit up on the fly as they go along to suit their own best interests.
 
Provience said:
well, just like national politics, when half the people don't vote you get what you get.

it's pretty reasonable to vote against the union. amazon flat out said benefits from the company would be reduced, so you are looking at fewer benefits plus having to pay dues monthly for what will inevitably be a worse job regardless of how shit it is now.

the whole complaints about strict timelines and pissing in bottles and such, yeah i'm 100% a get HR involved or the state if you need to. using that as grounds to unionize? stupid.
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as someone that has pissed in bottles to save time. I do not expect my employees to piss in bottles, but understand if they do. It is part of getting stuff done.
 
Provience said:
what the hell counts as honest? they've been able to literally remake logistics services in this country. massive expenditures for a thing people didn't even know about a mere 20 years ago.

they are allowed to unionize, they rightly decided against it. fuck amazon for their political apparatus.
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If you look at the logistics side of it they abuse with impunity because like microsoft in the 90’s it was the thing to have on your resume. I only know a few lower end workers snd several jounior executives and up. All the executives have great pay and benefits provided you are ok with their rotation model. The lower employees make average wages and amazon has a long history of poor work conditions by “union standards”. 2 bathrooms for a 20,0000 Sqft warhorse and only 10 minutes to get it done. Its a 3 minute walk one way. Hope you don't have a stuck turd. My wife was looking at a lower corporate job to get in the door and after talking to her friends that woked there and then their friends she had heard enough to completely rule it out.

They are a large employer that is for sure, but for their emtry level jobs, you will probably never make over 25/hr if you take one, and getting into corporate offices can take an act of God, and thats right on the line where people are afraid to lose that job.

I oppose unions 100% as I have had bad experiences with 2 of them, shop stewards were unresponsive until I showed them the letter that was going out if they didnt email me back. Was sent out in strike ince shortly after they raided the strike fund and we were all threatened with being black listed from future union employment if we crossed the line or refused to picket when we were told to be there. No unions for me.

Nobody is forcing people to work there and its all of us who have Prime that enable the problem. Yes I am including myself in that.
 
Fuck Scamazon.

With that out of the way not a union fan either.
I have worked for Amazon DSP for 13 months as a side job. True as a company Amazon is building their delivery network, and are using DSP/contract workers to get that logistics data.
DSPs are used so they can avoid legal issues and to pawn off their problems onto, finger pointing and blame on both sides while worker takes it into shorts.

Peeing in a bottle is a fact of life when you have 200 plus deliveries and there is nothing nearby in lieu of a gas station etc. Company is focusing heavily on mega cycles where one delivery driver is stuck with 2-3 routes blended into one.
I have heard of over 400 packages recently, let that sink in for a minute.

That is not even discussing piss poor routing by Amazon Flex app, which has one running all over and in circles.

Distribution centers / Sorting stations are run pretty poorly with all kinds of delays as well, a lot of it due to a promised same day delivery, ever changing metrics, staff shortages etc. It is basically a revolving door of people coming and going, I have seen groups of 20-30 walk right off in the middle of their shift.

What most forget is that Amazon delivery model is a small fraction of the company, majority of the money comes from AWS and other business ventures Bozo is invested in.
And fuck that guy big time as well, piece of work.
 
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Gtrplyr78 said:
Fuck Scamazon.

With that out of the way not a union fan either.
I have worked for Amazon DSP for 13 months as a side job. True as a company Amazon is building their delivery network, and are using DSP/contract workers to get that logistics data.
DSPs are used so they can avoid legal issues and to pawn off their problems onto, finger pointing and blame on both sides while worker takes it into shorts.

Peeing in a bottle is a fact of life when you have 200 plus deliveries and there is nothing nearby in lieu of a gas station etc. Company is focusing heavily on mega cycles where one delivery driver is stuck with 2-3 routes blended into one.
I have heard of over 400 packages recently, let that sink in for a minute.

That is not even discussing piss poor routing by Amazon Flex app, which has one running all over and in circles.

Distribution centers / Sorting stations are run pretty poorly with all kinds of delays as well, a lot of it due to a promised same day delivery, ever changing metrics, staff shortages etc. It is basically a revolving door of people coming and going, I have seen groups of 20-30 walk right off in the middle of their shift.

What most forget is that Amazon delivery model is a small fraction of the company, majority of the money comes from AWS and other business ventures Bozo is invested in.
And fuck that guy big time as well, piece of work.
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It you live where I live, the fast shipping is only slightly better than other venues. I just got back from my sister's who lives in the Phoenix area. She gets stuff delivered in between 1hr and 24hrs. The 2 day guarantee for Amazon is more like 2-4 since COVID. I buy from Amazon maybe 2 times a year. Most Amazon sellers have an ebay store, and if you're willing to wait, it's usually cheaper, sometimes significantly so. Lots of the consumer items I've purchased off ebay have come in amazon boxes the last 4 years. If you are in a major metropolitan area, I can see the appeal. Here, doesn't make much difference. I'm too cheap to be that impatient, and hate Bezos enough to keep his bullshit at arms length. Why I preferred Jobs over Gates 20 years ago and Musk over Bezos now is Jobs and Musk have a passion for something and refuse to let society push them in any direction. Gates and Bezos are cartoon character level villains when it comes to hosing people out of their money to do bad things. I'm not a fanboi of either Jobs or Musk, but I respect what they did/do.
 
I haven’t been following the Amazon Union vote shit because I’ve quit watching news so I’m not sure what’s been going on with that, but I will add a couple things.

There are construction projects in my area that are being delayed because Amazon has bought every steel truss available in the Midwest for building warehouses/shipping hubs. That info came from a customer that was going to be building their 100’x200’ fab shop right now but had to put it off till October when trusses are available again.

I worked as a union organizer around 2004/2005 for a construction trade Union. It was a tough sell. Workplace safety has progressed to a point where even nonunion shops are safe, so our only selling points were the pension and health insurance benefits. During that time health insurance wasn’t as crazy expensive as it is now and most construction guys would rather have the extra $5/hr on their check instead of going into a pension. That job sealed in my brain that unions were catering to people that otherwise were unemployable and I haven’t had much love for unions since.
 
Tin Roof said:
I haven’t been following the Amazon Union vote shit because I’ve quit watching news so I’m not sure what’s been going on with that, but I will add a couple things.

There are construction projects in my area that are being delayed because Amazon has bought every steel truss available in the Midwest for building warehouses/shipping hubs. That info came from a customer that was going to be building their 100’x200’ fab shop right now but had to put it off till October when trusses are available again.

I worked as a union organizer around 2004/2005 for a construction trade Union. It was a tough sell. Workplace safety has progressed to a point where even nonunion shops are safe, so our only selling points were the pension and health insurance benefits. During that time health insurance wasn’t as crazy expensive as it is now and most construction guys would rather have the extra $5/hr on their check instead of going into a pension. That job sealed in my brain that unions were catering to people that otherwise were unemployable and I haven’t had much love for unions since.
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were you a working member of the construction union you represented as an organizer?
 
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