Progressives really need to drop the ‘Amazon is the evil’ furor that dominates densely populated areas of blue cities. It’s a toxic message that shows how out of touch progressives can be living in a blue bubble where they can buy anything they want with just a short train or Uber ride. Hating on Bezos isn’t a political philosophy.
For a better approach, look at Virginia. Amazon’s HQ2 is perfect for Northern Virginia, a very blue area and I think we can call Virginia a blue state now.
What makes you happy about this? Is it workers being threatened with disciplinary action for taking a normal time in the bathroom, or the company’s freedom to retaliate against employees for lodging complaints about their working conditions?
However you feel about unions, it seems kind of ghoulish to dance a jig over the powerful crushing the powerless, but you do you.
Fuck that shit.
Unless and until the employees have an equivalent say in how their labor is used the corporations will work them to death, like children in a coal mine.
Because I wanted the focus to be on the political strategy. Progressive Democrats (and independents) nationalising the organizing drive was a death nail into an already long shot.
The workers made their own decision, they’re already making excellent money for low skilled labor. And, I doubt they appreciated being political pawns of Brooklyn progressives who have an unhealthy hatred of Bezos
Well, don’t break out the Champaign bottles just yet. The vote is going to be challenged over Amazons unethical practices like mandatory anti union meetings.
This loss says nothing of what the majority of the public thinks.
What’s the better approach that they took? My impression is that the employees at the HQ are less interested in unionization because they have cushy well-paid office jobs.
Although it looks like the other workers also aren’t that interested in unionization, so
It seems like this topic may already have the well poisoned but the 2 things I am wondering are:
Can unions inherently be as strong as they were when manufacturing was dominant, now that workers have a legitimate fear that a company like Amazon can just pack up and find other unskilled workers in response to unionization?
I do wonder if Sanders visiting the site may have been a negative. Unions always straddle between beibg political and having a more narrow focus but i wonder if Sanders may have made it feel too political/national.
I do hope that there is generally a continued push for stronger labor, less corporate power and tge ability iof people to move beyond living check to check. Hopefully this doesnt take the air out of that
Disclaimers: I’m not pro or anti union. I do like Amazon.
There seems to be a big todo about Amazon getting a Post Box put in at the plant. I can’t follow the logic of how this was bad.
Clearly Amazon has some work practices that aren’t fair. But unionizing plants in the south has always been tough and the union just lost by 2:1. I don’t think the court case will do anything but drag this out.
I know you’re a “centrist,” but I really don’t get why you’d be happy about Amazon’s workers losing a union fight.
I have mixed feelings about unions myself, but it was the people in the collective bargaining fight that had a lot to do with getting many of the things you probably take for granted - you know, things like workplace safety laws and regs, overtime pay, an end to child labor, the 40-hour workweek, and overall better pay and working conditions. Just having a labor relations agency and having the ability to have a vote on organizing is important, and unions give you that ability.
I would acknowledge that unions sometimes overplay their hand, and I wouldn’t say that everything good in the world is specifically attributable to unions themselves, but we have at least some boundaries on what employers can get away with and that is absolutely owing to the fact that we have had people fighting for the same things that unions wanted.
How many posters in this thread work for or know people who work for Amazon? I know two Amazon workers. Both are happy with their jobs and are nervous that their jobs could be in jeopardy over the union action.
