Amazon Warehouse Envoys Rally To Tweet Upbeat Comments About Working Conditions (seattletimes.com)

Amazon has been criticized for years by activists and labor unions for working conditions in its warehouses. So it caught the eye of a Seattle Times journalist when he saw several people, all of which created account recently, tweet positive things about their work experience at Amazon's warehouse. The report says: A group of more than a dozen Amazon Twitter users in the last two weeks started responding to critics of the company on the social media site, sharing upbeat tales of their working conditions and pay at Amazon's distribution network. Identified by first names and "Amazon FC Ambassador," they each opened a Twitter account this month, are unfailingly polite, and pepper emojis into conversations about the generosity of their benefits packages and job satisfaction at Amazon's fulfillment centers, the company's term for its sprawling warehouses.

[...] Amazon's Twitter legion, though small, appears to represent a new front in the company's effort to portray itself as a generous employer. The company has been criticized for years by activists and labor unions for working conditions in its warehouses, with media reports finding the company failed to provide air conditioning at some facilities during the summer, and set work quotas that could exceed employees' ability to keep up.

Comments

Re:Stop the collectivist bullshit

[larryjoe]

None of this is any of our business. Whether those people are happy or unhappy working there, the only things that might legitimately concern those of us without AMZN-stock, is: "are they there voluntarily?"

Until you can no longer legally quit your job for some reason, your not leaving is proof, the job-conditions are Ok.

Nothing to see here, move along.

The private lives of the employees are their own personal lives. Amazon is a private company and can make its own decisions. However, how Amazon operates affects the lives of the people in the surrounding communities. If Amazon employees are underpaid, they place greater burdens on government programs, much as Walmart workers have, with resulting impacts on tax rates and societal impacts on communities, families, schools, etc. If Amazon employees are injured on the job without adequate health coverage, then the government-run health and workers compensation programs will be burdened, again with associated tax and societal impacts. If Amazon pays its employees less than they would have received from other jobs, then the local tax base decreases.

This is not to say that government should dictate to Amazon how to operate their business. However, because Amazon's way of doing business significantly impacts the community, the community should be able to voice their concerns.

Re:Stop the collectivist bullshit

[GameboyRMH]

No. The closest thing to a legal alternative is to find another employer — one who'd be happy to retain the services if the hard-working and dedicated employee, treated so unfairly and harshly by Amazon.

Why, they can pay you the same and win you over just by treating you better!

Funny how that doesn't really happen though - new, better jobs don't magically spring into being to take in refugees from shitty jobs at the bottom of the employment pyramid. Instead all the employers settle on paying minimum wage or close to it, and treating workers about as awfully as they can legally get away with! Isn't that weird? So weird.

Amazon warehouses have been in operation for years now. Maybe you can help these workers by hanging out at one during lunch break and handing out printed contact info for these freely-available better jobs to the workers as they sprint past.