The High Cost of Buying Through Amazon
Apr. 5th, 2012 09:15 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elrhiarhodanI usually don't post about politics or political issues or real world isses here. But I can't help but pass this story on. Found via Daring Fireball, this article in Mother Jones, I Was A Warehouse Wage Slave tells the story of how you can get all the books and toothpaste and dildos you want at incredible discounts and Amazon and Walmart and Staples still make massive profits.
Honestly, I was under the very mistaken impression that the product warehouses for Amazon were fully automated, to the extent that humans did not do the product picking. My brain could not wrap itself around the concept.
But they do. And the cost is terribly high. The people who work in these huge warehouses do so under appalling physical conditions, can be fired for taking sick time, or for being more than a second late coming back from break, or for simply making a mistake. The majority of workers are hired through temp agencies and have limited rights when it comes to unionization and job protection.
Perhaps the only different between the warehouse job described in the Mother Jones article and a Dickensian workhouse is that ...
Actually, I can't think of any difference.
If you want to understand why Amazon can offer you 43% off that bottle of shampoo or case of toilet paper or whatever, read the article.
And then go buy locally if you can afford to.
Honestly, I was under the very mistaken impression that the product warehouses for Amazon were fully automated, to the extent that humans did not do the product picking. My brain could not wrap itself around the concept.
But they do. And the cost is terribly high. The people who work in these huge warehouses do so under appalling physical conditions, can be fired for taking sick time, or for being more than a second late coming back from break, or for simply making a mistake. The majority of workers are hired through temp agencies and have limited rights when it comes to unionization and job protection.
Perhaps the only different between the warehouse job described in the Mother Jones article and a Dickensian workhouse is that ...
Actually, I can't think of any difference.
If you want to understand why Amazon can offer you 43% off that bottle of shampoo or case of toilet paper or whatever, read the article.
And then go buy locally if you can afford to.
no subject
Date: 2012-04-05 02:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-05 02:58 pm (UTC)There was a report of workers collapsing from heat exhaustion in an Amazon warehouse last summer, but I thought they just handled the packaging for shipment, not the actual picking of the products.
Unbelievable.
no subject
Date: 2012-04-05 07:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-04-05 07:42 pm (UTC)So there's no incentive to do anything but maximize profits. A horrible and telling indictment of 21st Century America