[HN Gopher] Amazon Keeps Getting Sued for Paying Drivers Less Th...
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Amazon Keeps Getting Sued for Paying Drivers Less Than Minimum Wage
Author : elsewhen
Score : 249 points
Date : 2021-03-21 12:15 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.vice.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.vice.com)
| legulere wrote:
| What holds true for software also holds true for companies: there
| is no problem that can't be solved with indirection. You want to
| profit from illegal stuff but not be responsible? Let an
| intermediary do it for you.
|
| If I buy a product extremely cheap, I also will be liable if it
| was a stolen product. Why is the same not true for Amazon?
| Klwohu wrote:
| When I read a story like this about some huge company "getting
| sued" I have to laugh. Does anybody think that Amazon and their
| killer attack attorneys are scared of small time civil suits?
| Legislators won't do anything to harm Amazon and the odd minor
| fine is just part of the ongoing expense of running a monopoly.
| SMAAART wrote:
| That's interesting because:
|
| > What is the pay rate at Amazon?: $15 an hour is the Amazon
| minimum wage--although you can make more based on your location
| and the shift you choose.
|
| Source: https://www.amazondelivers.jobs/faqs
| dfhjgkljhf44 wrote:
| Plausible deniability will work fine for Bezos until he's less
| popular than a republican president.
| c3534l wrote:
| > Amazon does not tolerate violations of labor laws," Leah Seay,
| an Amazon spokesperson told Motherboard. "Where we find repeated
| violations, or an inability to correct labor violations, we
| terminate contracts with DSP program participants.
|
| That is NOT a no-tolerance policy. They're literally saying they
| tolerate some violations so long as its not so bad. Amazon is
| responsible for this and I'm guessing it stems from a work
| culture that sees some abuse as inevitable or okay in small
| amounts. Its not okay. You can't violate worker rights just some
| of the time and think you're being responsible. This is well
| outside acceptable business norms in the US. The fact that the
| official spokesperson thought it was okay that to publicly admit
| they sweep violations under the rug so long as it doesn't become
| too bad speaks volumes to Amazon's toxic and amoral work culture.
| AdrianB1 wrote:
| I had some doubts that this is Amazon's problem, but the fact
| that they drive vans with Amazon logo, wear Amazon uniforms and
| are trained by Amazon employees convinced me this is just a
| pathetic attempt by Amazon to hide these practices, push the risk
| and move the blame on contractor companies. This is as bad as it
| goes.
| [deleted]
| barbazoo wrote:
| It's a bit more subtle where I live but rest assured, even the
| unmarked van, the yellow vest, it's pretty obvious even without
| the Amazon logo.
| AdrianB1 wrote:
| Well, at some point you cannot blame a store for the postal
| services abuse on their own workers, but in Amazon's case
| this is their service, not an completely independent external
| service. These are the 2 sides of the problem and this tells
| who is responsible.
| [deleted]
| pharmakom wrote:
| Amazon needs to pay more for their use of public infrastructure.
| The amount of traffic from delivery vehicles has dramatically
| increased in the past 10 years, and the ludicrous performance
| targets that they set for their drivers encourages dangerous
| driving. Congestion and accidents are a predictable consequence.
| AdrianB1 wrote:
| I think they actually reduce the traffic, a single van can
| deliver what 20 SUVs used to do for 20 families.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| Those 20 families tended to keep a list and get a bunch of
| items at once. Now they get a daily dribble of packages -
| I've had three different Amazon deliveries in a day.
|
| I'm not sure it reduces traffic as much as it initially
| seems.
| URSpider94 wrote:
| Yes, but if each of your neighbors is also getting a
| package each day, then the effect is still the same.
| Additionally, that fleet will eventually be electrified,
| much sooner than all of those family SUV's will.
| mc32 wrote:
| They add traffic but reduce your traffic.
|
| The other complaint is valid.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Everyone should pay for road usage and congestion. Variable
| rate tolling and license plate readers are the solution.
| robert_foss wrote:
| Or taxes. Common infrastructure surely is a gold use for
| them.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Tolls are taxes.
| pessimizer wrote:
| Tolls are fees.
| dylan604 wrote:
| depends on what dictionary you use. Merriam-Webster says
| it is a tax. macOS dictionary does not define toll as
| tax, but says it is a synonym.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Depends on where you on how "toll" is being used. In
| Texas, the "tolls" are most definitely not taxes. Taxes
| mean the government is the recepient of that money. In
| Texas, the toll roads are owned by private companies.
| When the gov't ran the tollways, the tolling was removed
| when enough money from tolls was raised to cover the cost
| of building the road. Now, they are privatized, and the
| toll will never be removed.
| Rule35 wrote:
| Do you have evidence (or even a reason to believe) that
| the costs are misrepresented such that the government
| allowed a higher ongoing toll than is appropriate?
|
| Because otherwise ... yeah? Private toll roads can be a
| good solution.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| The fact that an unnecessary middleman is in the equation
| is evidence that the costs will be higher, since the
| middleman wouldn't be interested otherwise.
| Rule35 wrote:
| That doesn't follow - I save money by hiring a plumber,
| who makes money from being hired.
|
| The city simply made an analysis of the number of roads
| they'd build over the years and the cost of being a
| capable engineering organization versus the premium of
| getting existing experts to build it. They probably don't
| generate their own electricity either, for the same
| reasons.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Hiring contractors to build roads and having staff to do
| routine maintenance of roads is part of every
| city/state/federal government's core competencies that
| I've ever lived in.
|
| The only reason they sell it off is to make cash now for
| whatever political reason at the expense of future
| taxpayers.
|
| The delivery of electricity is also handled by
| governments, or companies that are basically government
| since they have to run everything by governments first
| like price increases. Just like water lines and sewer
| lines. Electricity generation does not need to be
| government operated since it can come from multiple
| sources, but the delivery is just like roads since you
| can't have multiple options to each destination.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Before they were private, once enough tolls were
| collected to offset the cost of construction, the tool
| booths were removed. Those roads are now free to drive,
| ex: I-30 through DFW. The current roads under NTTA will
| never be free to drive, ex: George Bush Turn Pike,
| N.Dallas Tollway, Sam Rayburn Tollway,etc
| pfortuny wrote:
| A large part of that is included in the tax on oil, though.
| gruez wrote:
| License plate reader are needed because tax on gasoline
| isn't exactly fair. A hybrid/electric car uses the same
| amount of road as an ICE car, but pays far less tax.
| Variable rate tolling is beneficial because it encourages
| people to take alternatives during rush hour, preventing
| everyone from piling on (because the road is free) and
| causing gridlock.
| lukeschlather wrote:
| Gasoline taxes should be far higher than they are to
| cover the negative externalities of fossil fuels.
| Karunamon wrote:
| Gasoline taxes are, like most other use taxes based on
| things everyone uses, extremely regressive.
| darksaints wrote:
| In the US, it would probably be more accurately labeled a
| tiny part.
|
| A look at first world countries whose use taxes completely
| cover road investments and maintenance shows that we're
| about $4-6/gallon shy of actually covering our costs.
| novia wrote:
| I had to make a long distance move right after the DST change.
| I knew that the drivers on the road would be at higher risk of
| fatal accidents than at other times of the year, so I was extra
| cautious. I would speed up to pass the trucks which were
| serving out of their lane. One truck was consistently swerving
| and speeding past me after I had already passed, and they even
| road rage honked their horn at me one time. Guess which
| company's smile logo was plastered across the truck?
|
| I know truck drivers in general are pressured to meet deadlines
| at the expense of sleep, but this driver seemed like they were
| more sleep deprived and stressed than the normal truck driver.
| They seriously need to treat their employees better, for the
| sake of public safety. And America needs to get rid of this
| contractor loophole. They're employees, even if Amazon likes to
| pretend that they aren't.
| rdudek wrote:
| Most of that is paid through taxes on vehicle
| registration/renewals and fuel.
| blackoil wrote:
| As much as it is a problem of Amazon and its algorithm. It also
| shows how dysfunctional is USA despite being richest nation. I
| believe that the fact that they find people to do this job at the
| price, is a fundamental problem.
| sthnblllII wrote:
| In the 1970's (before outsourcing and immigration became
| significant) tgere wasnt anyone in the country who would work
| in those conditions because there were so many better jobs and
| so few other workers.
| astrange wrote:
| Immigration improves job prospects because immigrants are
| customers. If you're making supply and demand arguments you
| need to consider both supply and demand not just supply.
|
| And in the 70s I think the poor population (esp. the black
| one) was much poorer and possibly not employed at all.
| bopbeepboop wrote:
| I really want to see how the US being the richest is
| calculated.
|
| Not that I doubt it, but simple metrics like GDP per capita
| have obvious problems.
|
| For one, if two women instead of taking care of their own
| families take care of the others for pay, GDP has increased
| (and the government took money from both).
|
| Those two families, however, just lost money (taxes on income)
| while having inferior care and losing 1-2 hours of care a day
| (travel time).
|
| Maximizing GDP can be negative to well-being and it's possible
| that untracked labor such as traditional wives in other
| countries could actually be a gain for their populace over a
| higher GDP nation.
|
| I think how to measure _wealth_ in real terms is difficult.
|
| (This is all setting aside that Wall St is cooked book stew at
| this point and much of US wealth depends on that fabrication.)
| [deleted]
| Rule35 wrote:
| It's not some one-for-one trade where Mom A shows up at
| Family B's home for her shift as nanny, while Mom B does the
| reverse.
|
| In reality Mom A is a nurse, and cares for 20+ people in a
| day, and Mom B is a school administrator, both provide more
| than one-day-of-mothering value per day worked, so it's
| actually in everyone best interest that they leave their kids
| at daycare, consuming 1/6th of a less-talented person's day,
| enabling their professional output. Even the daycare worker
| multiplies their output by watching multiple children.
| RobAtticus wrote:
| >I really want to see how the US being the richest is
| calculated.
|
| I don't think it's really a mystery. When people say this,
| they are referring to the fact that the US has the largest
| GDP (total, not per capita) in the world. Of course there are
| pros/cons to this measure. That said, while your hypothetical
| is true, I'm not sure it's realistic for all the reasons you
| said; it wouldn't make any sense for the parties involved.
| bopbeepboop wrote:
| I didn't know that -- I knew it was a measure, but not
| necessarily that it's _the_ measure most people mean.
|
| > I'm not sure it's realistic for all the reasons you said;
| it wouldn't make any sense for the parties involved.
|
| I would argue that a major economic viewpoint is exactly
| this has happened -- women entered the workforce to do jobs
| that replaced the role they traditionally did at home,
| which boosted GDP but crashed a bunch of untracked value.
|
| I've had several economists explain that to me as the
| source of growing worker discontentment: they give more
| labor for less value delivered to them, but it makes the
| number bigger on the books. You say it doesn't make sense
| for the parties involved, but that's only true of the two
| families: the government gets extra tax revenue if the
| families make that exchange. People outside those families
| have an incentive to force them into that position because
| those people benefit from the families loss.
|
| I think if you added a couple steps to my scenario (and
| some information fuzziness), you could see it happening in
| the real world.
|
| I overly distilled the point to highlight the absurdity.
| Synaesthesia wrote:
| There's a lot wrong with the way GDP is measured.
| Economist Michael Hudson writes about this.
|
| Nevertheless the US is a very wealthy country by any
| measure.
| drpgq wrote:
| Is this indicative of demand for jobs below the minimum wage?
| klyrs wrote:
| There's demand for murder-for-hire, too. So what?
| rcoveson wrote:
| So, with murder-for-hire, the contract stipulates that
| somebody gets murdered. In paying somebody $6/hour to deliver
| packages, the contract requires that people's package get
| delivered.
|
| I think we can agree that the negative side-effects of the
| sub-minimum-wage-package-delivery arrangement are subtler.
| klyrs wrote:
| I met a guy just the other day selling cigarettes by a bus
| stop for half price, no tax. There's clearly demand for
| cigarettes at those prices, right? Does it matter that they
| were stolen from a small business a few blocks away?
|
| The common theme here is that the enterprise is _against
| the law_ , and "there's demand for that" is no excuse to
| break the law. The reason for the law is more "subtle" but
| theft is theft.
|
| Of course, the dude selling cigarettes will probably be
| lucky to make $100 a day, but he's risking jail time. The
| folks stealing wages from delivery drivers are stealing way
| more than that, but they'll pay some fines and settle some
| lawsuits which almost certainly won't overwhelm their
| profits.
|
| Or -- let's say it's more subtle. So what?
| rcoveson wrote:
| I think that bringing up the fact that "there is demand"
| is not necessarily an argument that it's okay to break
| the law. I think it's the start of a proposal that the
| law should be changed. Whether or not we agree, that's
| the thing to address. Not "is breaking the law, in
| general, okay", which is silly.
|
| I also think it's wrong to equate the proposal that
| minimum wage law should be changed because there is
| demand for jobs at a certain wage with the proposal that
| murder-for-hire should be allowed because there is demand
| for it. Minimum wage laws are barely 100 years old in the
| US, while laws against murder are as old as law itself.
|
| I'd venture to say that you could describe punishments
| for murder to any civilization in history and they would
| _at least_ understand why you would propose such a thing.
| Minimum wage law, not so much. If some newcomer to my
| 18th century town is willing to work on my farm for a
| season for nothing but room and board, and you tell me
| that that relationship is exploitative and should be
| illegal, I 'd call you insane.
|
| I think a better comparison we could make is the sale of
| heroin. That's another instance where two consenting
| adults enter into an agreement that is currently, but not
| historically, illegal. It's also an instance where many
| argue that the relationship is exploitative, despite
| being voluntary. The similarities with minimum wage law
| are, from my perspective, deeper and more resonant.
| salawat wrote:
| I'll pay you 25 cents to solve all my problems. Just because
| demand is there doesn't mean it is either
|
| A) practical B ) economical C) moral D) All of the above
|
| Learning to differentiate between the lunacy of market signal
| theory from which reality is abstracted out of and the next big
| thing is a bit of a learned skill.
| Frost1x wrote:
| >"Amazon does not tolerate violations of labor laws," Leah Seay,
| an Amazon spokesperson told Motherboard. "Where we find repeated
| violations, or an inability to correct labor violations, we
| terminate contracts with DSP program participants."
|
| At some point you can't pass blame for repeated violations
| through contract vehicles. The general population are becoming
| aware of these practices. Amazon may not have directly committed
| the violation but they've created and shaped an environment ripe
| for rampantly abusive labor practices.
|
| If Amazon is serious about fixing the problem and committed to
| good labor practices, stop contracting out services and take
| control of the issue. Set policies in place with teeth that
| remove managers and middle managers caught pushing such work
| conditions. Don't just leverage cheaper labor from labor abuse
| until it gets public attention and then terminate a contract set
| in place to pass blame and responsibility.
|
| Are you really outsourcing labor or are you outsourcing the risks
| associated with abuses of labor needed to meet your demands?
| chha wrote:
| The problem here as seen from Amazon's point of view isn't that
| someone broke the rules, it's that they were busted for doing
| so. Same with Apple and any other corp where a contractor
| violates the rules; you punish them for being discovered, not
| for breaking the rules in the first place.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| > Are you really outsourcing labor or are you outsourcing the
| risks associated with abuses of labor needed to meet your
| demands?
|
| The same thing companies do when they go to a different state
| within the US with weaker labor and environmental laws. And the
| same thing individuals do when choosing to purchase products at
| cheaper prices from places with weaker labor/environmental
| laws.
|
| Blaming individual companies for regulatory arbitrage is a
| fruitless endeavor.
| kkielhofner wrote:
| It's amazing to me that people often accept these kinds of
| "explanations" from corporations; as though it was some
| unintended eventuality, mistake, etc.
|
| Not to mention the sheer gall of repeated corporate responses
| when caught like these that are ridiculous even at face value.
|
| Most people don't seem to notice these "mistakes" are always to
| the benefit of the corporation. NEVER to the benefit of the
| customer, employee, etc.
| Qwertious wrote:
| It's rude to call someone incompetent at their job. Unless
| they overlooked corruption, in which case it's rude to call
| them competent at their job. How odd.
| pessimizer wrote:
| > At some point you can't pass blame for repeated violations
| through contract vehicles.
|
| At what hypothetical point is this? I'm pretty sure you can do
| this indefinitely, which is why they do it.
| adamcstephens wrote:
| The latter, and this is the accepted practice in modern
| corporations. How many times have the Gap or Apple been caught
| using child labor, only to terminate the contract and move on?
| If they don't push these boundaries they're considered
| irresponsible fiduciaries and may be replaced.
|
| Amazon is just playing in the same broken system.
| syshum wrote:
| They "terminate" the contract with a "supplier" who often it
| just a holding company or "contractor" in a 5 level deep
| shell game, and the "new" contractor is a name on a form but
| the same factory is making the same product with the same
| labor inside a week...
| salawat wrote:
| The greatest lie ever perpetuated in the United States
| corporate system is that a company's fiduciary duty justifies
| or excuses malbehavior.
|
| You do not get to formulate sketchy ways of doing business
| because you must make shareholders money. They invested, and
| took a risk. They don't always get to win. Losses are not
| something that should be unfathomable. The fact that people
| haven't done that great a job at rooting this stuff out
| sooner is a bit on the mystifying side only up until you
| realize the folks we'd count on to do it are having their
| checks paid by the people getting investigated.
| ModernMech wrote:
| At some point we have to admit that the richest corporations
| and people in the world, with the most power to change the
| system, are not just playing in the system but are a part of
| what makes it broken. From their perspective the system is
| not broken at all -- it's doing exactly what it was designed
| to do, which is to make shareholders (themselves) fabulously
| rich at the expense of laborers.
|
| On one side of the equation we have people being paid poverty
| wages, on the other side we have the richest man in the world
| with the power to change that. This isn't a coincidence or
| just a strange, second-order, unintended byproduct of the
| system. It's cause and effect. It's what the system was
| designed explicitly to do. The system is in fact working to
| spec.
| SpicyLemonZest wrote:
| But on the Amazon side of the fence, they _are_ using their
| power to change that; they pay all employees at least $15,
| and are lobbying to get the federal minimum wage raised to
| that level from $7.25. So this can 't just be a simple
| story of a company paying as little as they can get away
| with. Something's gone wrong to make them not care about
| (or not think they're responsible for) these delivery
| drivers.
| Jochim wrote:
| I've seen this argument around quite often, but it feels
| more and more like the product of the Amazon PR machine.
| It appears that in at least some cases wages for
| warehouse workers fell 30%[0] once Amazon opened it's
| warehouses. Amazon seems to be dragging warehouse wages
| _down_ to $15 rather than up.
|
| [0] https://www.economist.com/united-
| states/2018/01/20/what-amaz...
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| The Amazon jobs aren't forklift drivers. The wages of
| forklift drivers go down because Amazon automates a lot
| of that work, which means there is less demand for
| forklift drivers. It's the classic automation story and
| has basically nothing to do with what they pay to
| pickers.
| Jochim wrote:
| The data in the economist article is for both forklift
| drivers and pickers. It seems fairly clear that even
| lower skilled warehouse workers are being paid less than
| they were before Amazon entered their market.
|
| The fact that automation is both reducing the number and
| quality of jobs probably merits discussion as well. We
| simply don't have anything in place to ensure automation
| doesn't ruin people's standard of living.
| AniseAbyss wrote:
| Building an economy on unskilled labour is a pretty bad
| idea. Anything that can be automated or outsourced WILL-
| capitalism demands it.
| [deleted]
| arrosenberg wrote:
| They enacted the minimum wage when Bernie Sanders
| threatened them, years after they started outsourcing
| labor abuses.
| astrange wrote:
| That was just theater. Bernie's argument here made no
| sense and he knew it, but it sounded good.
|
| He was arguing that society "has to pay people welfare"
| because Amazon doesn't pay enough. In other words he's
| arguing that paying welfare is bad, which is not true and
| goes against the rest of his platform. Actually it's
| good, and the reason it's good is that it raises your
| wages because it gives you more freedom!
|
| In other words, without welfare the employees would be
| getting paid even less.
|
| (This can change depending on work requirement rules,
| which are mostly bad, but not enough of a problem to
| change the dynamic here.)
| DangitBobby wrote:
| My guess is that most of the labor cost is due to
| delivery and not the warehouse. If they advocate for
| higher wages in the warehouse, regulators and the general
| public will be less suspicious of the policies that drive
| the lion's share of their labor costs.
|
| I'm sure if they thought they could get away with
| "subcontracting (wink wink)" all of their labor positions
| so that they are not liable for the wage theft that must
| occur to meet the contracts, they would do so.
| oceanghost wrote:
| I think you're correct. I used to get advertisements all
| the time for "logistics.amazon.com".
|
| Which if you were to believe it, Amazon wants to "help"
| you start a delivery business, with as little as $10k to
| invest.
|
| Think about that for a second.
|
| Instead of paying delivery drivers and providing capital
| (trucks, gasoline, insurance, etc). Amazon wants YOU to
| pay them for the privilege. They've turned what should be
| a job into a contracting business with one, predatory
| customer. Amazon.
| astrange wrote:
| Is Chik-Fil-A preying on people by letting them start
| franchises? The investment requirement is actually the
| same and they're probably more onerous.
| syshum wrote:
| >>>and are lobbying to get the federal minimum wage
| raised to that level from $7.25.
|
| What you fell for the Con...
|
| Amazon wants $15 in order to put the final nail in the
| coffin of small business hiring that teen for their first
| job stocking the small local store...
|
| No they want those positions gone, they want those
| business shuttered.
|
| This idea that Amazon is "fighting for the worker" in
| their drive for $15/hr minimum wage is moronic.
|
| $15/hr min wage is also not based on any economic reality
| and as a basis for a "living wage" it would be far to low
| in some reasons, and far too high in many others.
|
| Minimum Wage should be a LOCAL, or state level policy not
| a national one.
| astrange wrote:
| > Amazon wants $15 in order to put the final nail in the
| coffin of small business hiring that teen for their first
| job stocking the small local store...
|
| This is correct but it's a good thing because small
| businesses are unironically bad. Small business owners
| are the most reactionary demographic in the US, less
| productive than large businesses, the most abusive
| towards employees, and exempt from discrimination laws.
|
| They also don't have negotiation power and can't improve
| anything with their suppliers (e.g. Chinese restaurants
| may all be family-owned, but they're all buying
| ingredients from the same place).
| syshum wrote:
| >> small businesses are unironically bad.
|
| I did not think I would see the day that HN was pro
| corporation and Big business.
|
| Aside from the fact your completely wrong, most people
| are employed by small or medium businessed, and SMB's are
| often more agile and able to respond faster to market
| demands than larger companies
|
| This is why you do not see large companies innovating,
| instead they buy out small companies that have innovated
| in an effort to grab and/or hold the market share they
| lose to upstarts.
|
| Also it is ironic that in a post dedicated to talking
| about how terrible Amazon treats its retail employee's
| and with provable evidence of employment abuse by other
| large companies on the world stage you stake a claim that
| small businesses are more abusive, that is laughably
| absurd
|
| Small and medium business are the backbone of the
| economy, and in large part treat their employee's better
| than large companies. Sure some very small micro business
| with less than 25 employee's might but SMB is generally
| companies 25 - 1000 employees and under 1 billion in
| revenue. Companies this bracket often have some of the
| highest employee satisfaction scores, and lowest turn
| over it is absurd to to think that SMB's are worse than
| the Large Global Corporations.
| pnutjam wrote:
| Have you seen what $15 buys nowadays? Nobody is worth
| less then $15 an hour. Nobody.
| syshum wrote:
| Yes, and a single person in may area can easily survive
| on that, a couple with no kids could likely afford to buy
| home with no problems. I have a feeling you live in one
| of deep blue cities where rent for a small apartment is
| $2,000 a month.
|
| That said however, you have made a common mistake the
| people advocating for artificial increased in minimum
| wage make. It is not about what the person is "worth", it
| is about how much revenue a business can make off that
| labor
|
| if a business has to pay $15 for labor, but can only
| resell that labor for $10, there is no job. hell even if
| a business can resell the labor for $15 there is no job.
|
| This is economic reality, I know using emotion to talk
| about a persons "worth" may seem like a valid argument
| but it is not.
|
| If the economic reality was just as simple as declearing
| labor is worth $15 by fiat, then why stop at $15, why not
| $20 or $50, hell let just demand everyone make $1,000,000
| a year we will all be millionaries.
|
| You likely easily see why this reducto absurdum I am sure
| you will reject it as a fallacy but the economic reality
| does not change
|
| If you want to see wages increase you have to increase
| the value of labor, and government regulation can not
| simply demand the value of labor increase. Attempts to do
| so often have very bad unintended consequences
| aboringusername wrote:
| They don't care. The only reason they have an
| interest/stake at $15 min wage is so they can crush
| anyone who might challenge them. Essentially solidify
| their position.
|
| A rival might not be able to afford that so they let
| everyone go, or Amazon gobbles them up for dinner.
|
| There's _always_ an ulterior motive when lobbying is
| involved.
| SpicyLemonZest wrote:
| I'm not really sure how to engage with this. Surely
| you're not saying that it's _bad_ to pay $15, or that
| Amazon ought to cut everyone 's wages to make room for
| their competitors.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| It's bad to require competitors to pay $15.
|
| This is the thing that regularly gets lost in the minimum
| wage debates. Some jobs suck more than others. Amazon
| warehouse jobs suck kind of a lot. You spend all day
| standing up and doing manual labor. Because that's what
| it takes to make unskilled work produce $15/hour in
| value.
|
| You pass a law requiring competitors to do the same and
| the ones who were paying $10/hour but workers had more
| down time, will have to make them more like Amazon jobs.
| In other words, will have to make them suck more.
|
| There are a lot of people for whom that is not a good
| trade off. For a 20 year old who can physically do the
| Amazon job, it might be a good choice in order to make
| more money. For a 60 year old who _can 't_ physically do
| the Amazon job, taking away the less demanding job they
| _can_ do is really screwing them over.
| dcow wrote:
| Amazon aside, I see the $15 argument more about making
| minimum wage, a concept we're already engaged at a policy
| level, reflect reality. IMO if we're going to have
| minimum wage in the US then we need to make it work for
| its intended purpose of requiring companies to pay people
| a living wage for their labor. If that were the goal we'd
| adjust minimum wage for inflation and cost of living
| since its inception and then require it to adjust every
| year as the value of the dollar does. In its current form
| it is more of an excuse for companies pay below a living
| wage.
| ctdonath wrote:
| _pay people a living wage for their labor_
|
| I truly don't understand why so many think that someone
| doing less than what it takes to live (alone,
| independently) should be paid a living wage. Food,
| housing, energy, care, ... all take productivity; if
| someone can't produce enough to cover their own needs,
| they need be recognized as a dependent and treated as
| such. It's not your obligation to pay me a living wage
| just because you need floors swept or burgers flipped.
| astrange wrote:
| You don't really need that service performed that badly
| if you can't pay that much for it either. Offering crappy
| jobs is bad because people might actually take them; now
| they don't have the free time needed to find better ones.
| It reduces economic productivity and it might be cheaper
| to just pay them unemployment. Makes traffic better too
| since they're not commuting.
| ctdonath wrote:
| What of those unable to produce more than some value less
| than minimum wage? Not everyone is capable of $15/hr
| productivity, why would you deny them work? nobody is
| expecting them to achieve independence (say, bc Down's
| Syndrome) but they can still produce some value and have
| a right to earn what they can.
|
| There are tasks I'd hire people to do, but it's not worth
| enough to pay housing/food/care/heat/etc for.
| astrange wrote:
| Those people are already exempted. Group homes for people
| who can't live independently do have work placement
| programs, although I don't know how you prevent them from
| displacing "real" workers - presumably it's not that much
| of a problem.
|
| Besides that, just paying people to do nothing works fine
| because they can do non-economic work
| (childcare/caretaking) or speculative things (write a
| book, go back to school) and US policy is heading back in
| this direction. We stopped with Reagan because voters
| tend to turn against welfare policies when you point out
| that black people are getting them.
| edoceo wrote:
| Amazon says one thing, behaves "responsibly" internally
| but still works with known bad actors till caught. Greed
| has gone wrong.
| 34679 wrote:
| The whole thing seems to be a corporatized version of a carny
| game. Amazon is behind the counter, promising gullible
| passersby top prizes if they can toss a ring over a bottle.
|
| "Watch me, I'll show you how easy it is!"
|
| But instead of young couples on dates being taken for $20 a pop
| on promises of large stuffed animals, they're luring in new
| business owners with promises of riches. The problem is, it's a
| rigged game. Amazon know it, otherwise they'd do this work
| themselves.
| taf2 wrote:
| I prefer to think if it as "The house always wins"
| stonecraftwolf wrote:
| Reminds me of Terry Pratchett's Going Postal. _spoiler
| warning_
|
| The MC is a conman, given new life and a job resuscitating
| the postal service after a corporation has taken over and
| gutted the Clacks (in-world version of the Telegraph). The MC
| meets the financial architect who masterminded the takeover
| of the Clacks and is struck with immediate recognition: this
| guy is just like him, only infinitely better at it. He plays
| three card Monty with entire companies, and the trail of
| destruction he leaves in his wake is massive.
|
| If you do it with enough money, it's not a crime anymore,
| it's just business.
| artificial wrote:
| The Moist von Lipwig trilogy is fantastic. Have you seen
| the TV movie?
| stonecraftwolf wrote:
| Holy sh*t there's a movie??
|
| Thank you for making my day!
| throwaway2048 wrote:
| Yep, and if the punishment is typically fines that take a
| small percentage of your profit, why wouldn't you turn
| around and keep doing it.
| dcow wrote:
| What is different about a salaried setup (yearly rate) and a
| daily rate position? If we are willing to ban daily pay because
| of its clear potential to result in abusive situations where
| employees are over worked and under paid, then why are we willing
| to allow salaried positions? I would sure love remittance for all
| the overtime I've worked as a salaryman.
| [deleted]
| koolba wrote:
| > Though Amazon's delivery drivers operate Amazon-emblazoned
| vans, wear Amazon uniforms, and are trained by Amazon employees,
| they are technically not employed directly by Amazon but by small
| contractors, known as "delivery service partners," that operate
| out of Amazon warehouses around the country.
|
| After a certain point you have to call it a duck.
| 2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote:
| Could I open an online business, not sell on Amazon, and
| contract my deliveries to these contractors?
| [deleted]
| Animats wrote:
| Wage theft needs to be treated as theft. Jail.
|
| It's easy to detect "time-shaving", what with everyone having a
| trackable cell phone today. If time at work exceeds time on the
| clock for multiple employees, that shows wage theft.
|
| The Wage and Hour Division of the US Department of Labor should
| be able to demand triple damages for wage theft. 2/3 goes to the
| employee, and 1/3 goes to enforcement efforts.
|
| This _never_ happens in union shops, by the way.
| missedthecue wrote:
| Should the reverse be treated the same way? That is, being on
| the clock but not working? I work a low wage job and have seen
| co-workers go to pretty extreme lengths to avoid having to
| actually work.
|
| Time theft is estimated at $400 billion per year, much higher
| than unpaid wages.
| standardUser wrote:
| No, it should not. If an employer has an issue with the way
| an employee conducts themselves during working hours they can
| discuss it with the employee and take disciplinary action if
| needed. That discipline can include reduction in wages,
| withholding wage increases or bonuses or firing. Plenty of
| options for an employer to deal with the situation.
|
| If an employer denies legal wages they are thieves and should
| be held accountable by law enforcement for theft, just like
| any mugger or burglar would.
| syshum wrote:
| >>This never happens in union shops, by the way.
|
| While that exact problem many never happen (and I have by
| doubts about even that statement)
|
| unions are not the panacea of all virtue nor are they the
| solution to all labor problems
| Rule35 wrote:
| No, it's just that in a union the crime flows the other way.
| klyrs wrote:
| Not "never", but when it does happen, they've got vastly more
| resources to hold their employer accountable. Moreover, if a
| single employee notices it happening, they can report it to
| their steward, and then word gets out to _all_ employees to
| double-check their paychecks. Source: this happened to folks in
| a union I belonged to.
| blfr wrote:
| It's such a horrible company. Starting with the ugly website full
| of counterfeits and fake reviews all the way to grinding humans
| down in their warehouses, delivery service, while bilking
| subcontractors[1]. Somehow they managed to deliver the highlight
| reel of all the flaws of capitalism while never turning a profit.
|
| Complete with the faint defence offered by fans. "B-b-but their
| massively overpriced cloud service that looks good on my resume."
| Sad.
|
| "And I can save three minutes buying toiler paper that I then
| spend watching crap on their complimentary video service!"
| Pathetic.
|
| [1]
| https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/carolineodonovan/amazon...
| 0goel0 wrote:
| Counterfeits is what pushed me over the edge. I just could not
| trust that the product I'll get is what I paid for.
|
| Ended up cancelling my account and never looked back. Been
| shopping locally as much as possible since last summer
| djbebs wrote:
| Ive actually been doing the opposite and moving away from
| local/small suppliers into the amazon eco system.
|
| I had a terrible experience with small businesses and i will
| not be going back.
|
| I never had any trouble canceling or refunding any order on
| Amazon. I literally sent back for a replacement a drone 3
| times, and not once did they ever cause me any grief.
|
| But the first time i try to cancel an order that hadnt even
| been paid or shipped yet i get pushback?
|
| No. Bad customer service has to have consequences.
| leetcrew wrote:
| I agree. I understand that a small business can't compete
| with amazon on price _and_ service at the same time, and I
| don 't expect this. but it seems that most of them choose
| to match the price and make up the difference with terrible
| service/shipping. I would be happy to pay a bit more to
| support a small business, but I'm not gonna pay the same
| amount of money for an online retail experience that's
| worse in every other way.
| 0goel0 wrote:
| Exactly. I have never had issues with small businesses
| (not large chains). I bought a DAC from an audio store
| that was the wrong one and the other replaced it for free
| for me and gave me a free mini-lesson on it.
| leetcrew wrote:
| amazon has had a positive net profit for the last five years in
| a row.
|
| as for the shopping experience, I guess ymmv? amazon doesn't
| always have the cheapest price on things, but I've never
| received anything counterfeit. with one or two exceptions,
| everything I've bought there has met my expectations. and when
| it didn't, the refund hit my account the second the shipping
| label got scanned.
|
| especially this past year, AMZL has been the real killer
| feature for me. it's the only shipping service that
| consistently delivers my packages on time, which really
| shouldn't be hard when I live in an apartment building in a
| major city. sometimes they even deliver early! when ups/fedex
| moves my packages faster than expected, they just let them sit
| in the local distribution center until the guaranteed delivery
| date. I've given up on usps entirely, unless "soon" is an
| acceptable delivery date.
|
| most of their streaming stuff is crap, I'll give you that. but
| they picked up my all-time favorite TV show, the expanse. tbh,
| I'd pay $120/year just to keep that show running.
| hertzrat wrote:
| For 2-3 years or more, the reviews on Amazon for windows 10
| have said things like the below, despite the description
| saying "by Microsoft." One of these is an "Amazon's choice"
|
| > Did not activate. Microsoft support confirmed the key was
| already used multiple times.
|
| > THIS IS NOT FOR RESALE! single use. This is an OEM Copy
| that is given alongside existing systems so that way a user
| can upgrade their motherboard / hardware and still use the
| same code. it violates the TOS for the user to install / use
| it.
|
| > Bought this for a brand new computer build. Activation
| could not be performed as number is blocked by Microsoft. I
| contacted Microsoft customer support, my product key has been
| activated OVER 20 times and has been flagged for abuse!!?? I
| also have a "NEW" Windows 7 pro that will not activate that I
| bought off Amazon... guess what Microsoft said about it....
| not happy.
| jsilence wrote:
| While agreeing here on a wide basis it is also the company that
| helps me find and conveniently buy a lot of products I simply
| can not find at local brick and mortar shops and oftentimes
| also not online in any web shops. So yeah, I hate and use
| Amazon at the same time.
| throway-amzn555 wrote:
| Throwaway because I have written some of the software behind this
| program.
|
| The problem is that Amazon has set up a system where labor abuses
| are the only way to succeed, while keeping their hands clean.
|
| Amazon hires Delivery Service Providers (DSPs) on contracts.
| These contracts are for a specific number of 'routes' on a given
| day. They have a handful of DSPs for each delivery station, and
| they even help people start DSP companies by giving them loans
| for vans, access to better deals, etc. But the DSP is an
| independent company that can operate however it wants to, on
| paper.
|
| The DSPs then hire delivery drivers, each an independent
| contractor themselves typically. The drivers get a route of
| 200-ish packages and follow the step-by-step navigation Amazon's
| provided app tells them[0] to do. The drivers are supposed to
| work for up to 10 hours then bring back whatever is leftover.
|
| Problem: Amazon rewards the DSPs that have the fewest missed
| deliveries, pay them more per route. The DSPs that get the most
| pay are the ones who have learned how to get their drivers to
| work longer without complaint, take no breaks, keep driving, keep
| delivering. The ones who abuse.
|
| Amazon does not reward the abuses, they just reward the effects
| of the abuses. Amazon can say "We don't tolerate that", but they
| absolutely do. What they actually don't tolerate is DSPs whose
| drivers complain. Every DSP operator out there is telling their
| drivers: you keep your mouths shut or you're out.
|
| This isn't an accidental design. The people in charge of this
| program are sociopaths. And Amazon's senior leadership has
| rewarded these sociopaths for building this very low-cost
| delivery system. There's a Leadership Principle called "Deliver
| Results", but there isn't one called "Be Ethical".
|
| [0](And let's set aside the part about 'workers following step-
| by-step instructions Amazon gives them are somehow not actually
| employees', which is bullshit.)
| edoceo wrote:
| You are part of the problem
| Jochim wrote:
| This feels a bit flippant. There's nothing inherent to the
| software managing the process that leads to the exploitation
| of these workers. It's the unattainable metrics being set by
| management/business that's causing the issue.
| edoceo wrote:
| And heres a person that could act against exploitation and
| instead chooses to just follow orders.
|
| If you're not part of the solution then what are you?
| Jochim wrote:
| They aren't being ordered to do anything though. The
| system that was built isn't the thing setting the
| targets, the users are. We wouldn't argue that the
| creators of email are responsible for any exploitation
| that email has enabled and I don't think it's reasonable
| to argue that a developer for a delivery routing system
| is responsible for the incentive structure set up around
| that system after it has been built.
| edoceo wrote:
| That's a crap analogy and you know it. Email started as a
| federated, open system. This Amazon is closed, for
| profit.
|
| Everyone there is part of the problem and excuses their
| behavior with bullshit like "I'm only working on a small
| percentage of the exploitation". Is everyone so bad a
| maths now you've forgotten that 10 tenths makes a one?
| gameman144 wrote:
| That's definitely one world view, that people are
| responsible for how people use the things they create.
| Nothing wrong with it.
|
| I'd hold a different world view, in which individuals who
| have good intentions shouldn't be blamed for their work
| getting bastardized or leveraged in unethical ways.
|
| In this case, it seems totally reasonable that an
| engineer on this project would assume that their work
| would reward efficiency (which it does), and not be gamed
| to reward exploitation (which it apparently also does).
|
| Different strokes for different folks, I guess.
| MAGZine wrote:
| blaming the hammer manufacturer for $dastardlyConstruction.
|
| put another way, is the person who built tipping into
| instacart a bad person? or is it the person who decided to
| calculate pay as (baseRate - incomingTips) = actualWage the
| bad person?
| edoceo wrote:
| It's possible for both. We know amazon mistreats low wage
| workers. Then high wage workers build more on those
| exploitive systems and say "oh, it wasn't me".
|
| But, I also think folks who excuse this kind of thing are
| bad actors too.
|
| Or like down thread, trying to shift the blame to "the
| users" who are intentionally misled by advertising and the
| known information-imbalance that makes exploitive-
| capitalism work.
| yrgulation wrote:
| Thanks for sharing.
|
| "And Amazon's senior leadership has rewarded these sociopaths"
|
| I'm too small to make a dent, but rest assured, I am
| "rewarding" them back with my wallet. Never again shopping on
| Amazon. I simply can't justify saving a few PS knowing that the
| people delivering / manipulating what I buy are abused. I read
| quite frequently about the issue and unless we protest with our
| wallets this abuse will continue.
| superflit wrote:
| I saw myself buying more and more from EBAY.
|
| It is not perfect but mostly shipping is done by postal
| service that is ok for me and As Amazon there is no guarantee
| about products being genuine then E-bay is as good or more
| than amazon.
| mnd999 wrote:
| The trouble with that is the eBay sellers that are listing
| directly off Amazon (with a mark up obviously) and
| essentially ordering the goods from Amazon as gifts. They
| keep this quiet as it's cheaper to buy it yourself on
| Amazon directly. It's becoming harder and harder to avoid
| the de-facto monopoly that is Amazon on ethical grounds.
| hertzrat wrote:
| It turns out you can buy most things from nearby retail
| stores. Not everything, but I haven't needed to buy
| something online that often this year except niche or
| small publisher items
| juanani wrote:
| I had the same thing in mind when I ordered a gift
| recently, thought I'd see how Newegg matches up. I got my
| package 2 days later, the whole order had Amazon shipping
| slips/boxes, delivered by Amazon.
| ruined wrote:
| you should talk to a journalist
| throwaway13337 wrote:
| Interesting here.
|
| If I go to a market and look for the best quality for the best
| price, I suppose I'm encouraging sociopaths, too.
|
| There may be some argument for the scale of Amazon needing to
| take a deeper look. But requiring that a buyer of a good or
| service must know how the sausage is made would break our
| system.
|
| Instead, the vendors do need to be held accountable.
|
| For the record, I think these tech monopolies are a bad thing
| as a whole for the overall market but not because they're
| trying find the best deals on goods and services. More because
| they monopolize, and set the rules for the largest marketplaces
| which only governments should do.
| Const-me wrote:
| > requiring that a buyer of a good or service must know how
| the sausage is made would break our system
|
| In that particular case Amazon knows what's going on because
| they have engineered the system, buys services anyway.
|
| For purchases of some illegally obtained goods U.S. Code
| SS2315 is there since 1948, has not broken the system:
| https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2315
| crazygringo wrote:
| Yup. I have no knowledge of Amazon specifically, but I've seen
| this pattern repeatedly in companies that use contractors:
|
| "We don't tolerate any lawbreaking, but you need to fulfill
| these performance metrics (which can't be achieved except by
| lawbreaking)."
|
| I'm of the opinion that, as a general practice, this needs to
| be addressed by legislation. I don't know what the specific
| workable solution looks like, but essentially: if a company
| contracts work out that any reasonable person could determine
| would require violating laws or regulations to accomplish, that
| the company is held directly legally responsible for those
| violations.
|
| Whether it's delivery drivers speeding or illegally parking or
| not making minimum wage or _whatever_.
| URSpider94 wrote:
| I think part of the problem is that it's hard to quantify
| what a reasonable person can do in an hour. My fellow cross-
| country running teammates and I could form a delivery company
| and jog to and from every house. Or I might figure out that
| it's actually more effective to put two people in every truck
| and have one of them be sorting and dropping while the other
| one drives. The companies that make these kinds of
| innovations SHOULD be rewarded. It's not immediately obvious
| how to sort those from the ones who push their employees to
| just work longer shifts.
| crazygringo wrote:
| It's definitely not easy, but it's what companies _do_ all
| the time, and courts are pretty used to getting access to
| internal documents that model cost structures, as well as
| bringing in expert witnesses from the industry.
|
| But basically, any company (like Amazon) does cost modeling
| of every step involved in a process long before they decide
| whether to hire employees to do it, or contract it out. In
| fact, that's precisely how they can determine how much
| they're willing to pay to contract something out.
|
| So it's not really that hard for a court to demand that a
| company produce its modeling estimates, and then compare
| with the actual service provided, and show that the company
| either a) knew that corners would need to be cut illegally,
| or b) made negligent assumptions.
|
| Remember, I'm not talking about mom and pop shops who are
| all sharing a single huge contractor like UPS or FedEx. I'm
| talking about huge companies like Amazon or Uber who use a
| large number of subcontractors. They have entire teams of
| people who model this stuff. They know _exactly_ what they
| 're doing.
| marktangotango wrote:
| I looked into participating in the DSP program when it was
| announced; it was obvious at the time that it was a "buy
| yourself a job" type of situation, where an individual DSP
| provider would require a lot of volume/trucks/routes/employees
| to even make a living for themselves. What you describe makes
| complete sense.
| toast0 wrote:
| > The drivers get a route of 200-ish packages and follow the
| step-by-step navigation Amazon's provided app tells them[0] to
| do. The drivers are supposed to work for up to 10 hours then
| bring back whatever is leftover.
|
| I've heard that FedEx Express's system will forcibly go blank
| for the 30 minute mandated lunch break. Can't scan any
| packages, etc. Seems like something software that tells you
| what to do (and demands input) could also do. Might need
| followup effort to avoid gaming by spending some of lunch
| driving to the next stop, but still allowing driving to a
| restaurant.
| salawat wrote:
| Enter software optimizing routes chaining together restaurant
| stops for that extra competitive edge.
|
| At the end of the day, you've got to accept that just because
| you can write software to do $thing, doesn't mean you should.
| If you're going that far into the tails to innovate, there's
| probably something more fundamental you've missed.
| nolite wrote:
| From Fight Club:
|
| "A new car built by my company leaves somewhere traveling at 60
| mph. The rear differential locks up. The car crashes and burns
| with everyone trapped inside. Now, should we initiate a recall?
| Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the
| probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court
| settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the
| cost of a recall, we don't do one."
| ike0790 wrote:
| one of many great quotes from Fight Club.
| londons_explore wrote:
| People criticize this logic... But it's absolutely correct.
|
| If it doesn't come out with results you like, then the inputs
| are wrong. Specifically, settlement amounts are probably too
| low.
|
| People who claim all safety related issues should get a recall
| are just wrong. If there is a 1 in a billion chance my car
| explodes and kills me, then a recall should _not_ be done,
| because my chances of dying on the way to the dealer to have
| the repair done are higher.
| aeturnum wrote:
| I don't think it's correct and I don't think its correctness
| is objectively decidable.
|
| It's one thing when companies have unforeseen flaws that end
| up causing injury or death. No one is perfect and, while they
| should pay reasonable restitution in line with the level of
| their mistake, it seems fine overall.
|
| Other the other hand, knowingly producing a product that you
| are reasonably sure will unexpectedly[1] kill or hurt
| sometime should have _severe_ penalties. Those penalties
| should be imposed not through individual lawsuits (which are
| a poor tool for assuring the rights of whole classes of
| people - class action lawsuits not withstanding), but through
| prevailing regulatory action. To be honest I don 't think it
| would be going too far to, as a standard action, nationalize
| a company in that situation.
|
| We really, really do not want a situation where companies are
| choosing to kill their customers because they think they will
| come out ahead in the end. Think about it - are we happy that
| the leadership teams of the tobacco industry, or the oil
| industry, or the fiberglass industry were kept in place? How
| much better of a world would we be in if tobacco companies
| were at existential threat from their behavior? Where they
| needed to sell cigarettes like the USA sells guns (with the
| understanding they may kill)? I think we should seriously
| consider that standard of product safety.
|
| [1] Products like guns, which are intended to injure or
| destroy, are their own thing imo.
| hypersoar wrote:
| We shouldn't expect corporations to be so recklessly amoral.
| I'm all in favor of higher costs for doing shit like this,
| but the humans making the decisions bear moral responsibility
| for them. When they bury critical safety issues, they should
| be held accountable whether or not this particular financial
| calculus went their way.
|
| Are there serious "people who claim all safety-related issues
| should get a recall"? That's not the only other available
| position. Not every safety incident needs to lead to a
| recall, but that doesn't prevent good-faith judgements on
| whether or not one is necessary. The fact that we assume this
| won't happen demonstrates how catastrophically awry we've
| allowed the artificial construct of a corporation to run.
| guerrilla wrote:
| Imagine if we had the "Nutrition Facts" equivalent for
| failure rates (and supply chain while we're at it.) That'd
| be an interesting world.
| gruez wrote:
| 1. people will eventually tune them out, like with prop
| 65 warnings or the existing nutrition facts/calorie
| labeling
|
| 2. while it's easy to calculate what's the nutritional
| content in a food, estimating future failure rates isn't
| trivial and there's a lot of subjectivity involved.
| Companies will definitely be fudging the reliability
| numbers to get an edge. See for instance, the failure
| rates for hard drives. The annual failure rate on the
| spec sheets are around 0.3%, but empirical data by
| backblaze puts them anywhere from 0.3% to 12%. Therefore
| I'd expect these nutritional fact labels to be totally
| useless at best, and a waste of time/resources at worst.
| jfim wrote:
| Prop 65 warnings are pretty useless though, since they
| have very limited information that does not allow one to
| evaluate the risk incurred.
|
| Case in point, my first internship in California was in a
| building with a sign that said "This building contains
| chemicals known to the state of California to cause
| cancer and birth defects or other reproductive harm."
| What's in the building? Who knows. Could be really bad
| chemicals, or just someone who has a beer on their desk
| [0].
|
| It would be much better to have some information about
| the chemicals contained, how bad are the chemicals, and
| what is the expected effect of the chemicals at the
| concentration at which they're encountered.
|
| [0] https://oehha.ca.gov/chemicals/alcoholic-beverages-0
| ficklepickle wrote:
| Yes, they need some actionable information. I remember
| seeing my first one as 15 year old Canadian on vacation.
| My first thought was good thing I'm in Hawaii. My second
| thought was I can't do anything with this vague
| information.
|
| It was some green slime you put in your bike tires to
| prevent puncture leaks. I had never seen that before. I
| bought it and took it home with me, skillfully avoiding
| California so it didn't become carcinogenic.
| Qwertious wrote:
| >We shouldn't expect corporations to be so recklessly
| amoral.
|
| Either that, or we treat them like any other animal
| incapable of civility - we cage/muzzle them and don't
| provide them with any opportunity for responsibility.
| pnutjam wrote:
| His argument is pure straw, made up by him; not what is
| actually being argued by anyone.
| pnutjam wrote:
| Nice, you built a good argument against a nonsense issue. Now
| try the actual issue instead of a straw man.
| syshum wrote:
| Modern society has become incapable of proper Risk Analysis
|
| COVID has really highlighted this rather well. People do
| believe there should be zero risk, they will only accept risk
| when it has already been assimilated into their lives, but as
| a society we seem incapable of assimilating of new risk.
|
| I use to think we would get fully autonomous cars, but now I
| am pretty sure we will never see this technology on the
| public roadways, not because it is infeasible, but because it
| can never ELIMINATE all risk to human life, as such it will
| be rejected by society.
|
| Just like the "2 weeks to flatten the curve" transformed to
| "everyone self isolate until covid is no more" Automated
| driving is no longer about being "safer" in an objective way,
| it has to preventing all death, and if an automated car even
| causes one death then we must continue with human drivers, at
| least that is the view of many in society. We can not allow
| an algorithm to resolve a trolley problem, it is better a
| human do that.
|
| As a society, we have become very very very risk adverse.
| altcognito wrote:
| It was a specific US administration that said two weeks,
| whom employed the "right" experts to get this conclusion.
| They argued with him that it wasn't long enough,
| furthermore, without widespread PPE and compliance from the
| population, it was bound to fail. The curve did flatten
| even in spite of these difficulties.
|
| All that being said, you're absolutely right, we could have
| just accepted that life comes with risk and allowed
| millions within the US to die within a couple months.
| syshum wrote:
| >>The curve did flatten even in spite of these
| difficulties.
|
| yes it did, then the goal posts were moved, it was no
| longer about hospital resources it became about death
| rates, then when death rates did not support the lock
| down narrative it become about infection rates
|
| In reality (for many regions) it was always about
| political and economic control not public health
|
| >>we could have just accepted that life comes with risk
| and allowed millions within the US to die within a couple
| months.
|
| There are hundreds of different ways the pandemic could
| have been handled to believe the only 2 options where
| complete economic shutdown or death is moronic is in no
| way supported by the evidence, it sounds like you want
| have a fact based discussion but are leading off with
| emotional rhetoric, I am happy to debate facts, but I
| have no time or need for emotional responses or red
| herring fallacies
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| It's not even a question of risk. Every risk is a trade off
| against another one. Losing one life to an autonomous
| vehicle is unacceptable but losing ten to drunk drivers is
| fine? That's not a risk assessment at all. It's really
| politics masquerading as risk.
|
| As soon as autonomous vehicles are approved you're going to
| have driverless Amazon delivery trucks ejecting packages in
| your driveway and emailing you that they've arrived.
|
| All the truck drivers and their unions know that, so they
| do everything they can to inject fear mongering stories
| into the media every time there is a driverless car
| accident, because politics.
|
| And the media eats it up because it's clickbait. If they
| provided a reasoned risk assessment then the conclusion
| wouldn't be "fear for your lives" which wouldn't drive as
| much traffic.
| syshum wrote:
| >>As soon as autonomous vehicles are approved you're
| going to have driverless Amazon delivery trucks ejecting
| packages in your driveway and emailing you that they've
| arrived.
|
| That is unlikely, the population has a huge problem right
| now with package theft, even if it does not "cost" the
| customer anything when i order something I need the
| product it if stolen from me even if I get another one a
| few days later it makes me less likely to buy online for
| things. Amazon's market dominance is directly tied to 1-2
| days delivery times.
|
| Having a bunch of robots just toss packages 5 feet from
| the road might seem like a good idea to an MBA, but in
| reality it will make package delivery less reliable if I
| have to have 30% of my amazon packages redelivered
| because of theft, damange etc, amazon will lose its
| market share.
|
| Already they are losing in many way in price, i am often
| times finding things for lower prices than on amazon,
| largely because of their INSANE platform charges (i.e the
| 30% "fulfilled by amazon" surcharge)
|
| Amazon Retail business is still either break even or
| losing money, AWS supports the company. I am not sure
| they can withstand the hit that would come from fully
| autonomous package delivery.
|
| >All the truck drivers and their unions know that,
|
| I can assure you it is not Truck Drivers or the Truck
| Driver unions (which really have almost no power these
| days) that are at the heart of anti-automation reporting.
|
| Insurance and Local governments have alot more at stake,
| hell most local governments have huge amounts of revenue
| that come from parking and other road related fines that
| would disappear entirely with fully automated cars.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| > That is unlikely, the population has a huge problem
| right now with package theft
|
| You're making the case that it won't matter because the
| problem is already present.
|
| The human drivers already do this. How strong a case can
| you make that they won't be able to get away with
| something they already get away with?
|
| > Already they are losing in many way in price, i am
| often times finding things for lower prices than on
| amazon, largely because of their INSANE platform charges
| (i.e the 30% "fulfilled by amazon" surcharge)
|
| Complaint unrelated to driverless trucks.
|
| > Insurance and Local governments have alot more at
| stake, hell most local governments have huge amounts of
| revenue that come from parking and other road related
| fines that would disappear entirely with fully automated
| cars.
|
| By most accounts self-driving cars are going to reduce
| insurance liability because they don't drive drunk or
| text and drive or get tired or angry or distracted. But
| also, insurance companies don't really care about claims
| when they're predictable except to the extent that the
| corresponding premiums are so high they discourage people
| from buying insurance, which is a high bar when car
| insurance is required by law.
|
| And listing additional groups who have the incentive to
| throw shade on self-driving cars for underhanded
| political reasons rather than legitimate risks is just
| more to the point.
| pnutjam wrote:
| I've seen how software is developed. If we have automated
| systems doing the same thing, they will all make the same
| mistake. It will be astounding to see it happen, and
| disastrous.
| AnthonyMouse wrote:
| The existing non-driverless cars are already full of
| software.
| zeroonetwothree wrote:
| Doesn't take into account costs like bad publicity, effects on
| employee morale, etc
| davidgay wrote:
| In an analogous situation: how do you think a universal
| healthcare system should make spending and prioritisation
| decisions?
| iso1210 wrote:
| How does it in the US for those covered by universal
| healthcare?
| bonchicbongenre wrote:
| About this: I have a relation who works for a relatively large
| upstream auto part supplier. I asked him somewhat jokingly
| about this fight club scene, and he immediately and unabashedly
| told me he'd been involved in a number of such conversations.
| In retrospect, I can't understand why I was at all surprised:
| how else would the conversations go in a corporation (whose
| sole or primary incentive is by default monetary)?
|
| (To be clear, I'm not saying that I find this morally correct
| -- I'm not sure how I feel about that aspect, honestly, except
| icky at the surface level. I more means that it seems
| retrospectively to me that, well, of course that's how it would
| go, given the incentive structure)
| neilparikh wrote:
| > how else would the conversations go in a corporation (whose
| sole or primary incentive is by default monetary)
|
| This isn't really a corporate issue at all though. Given
| scarce resources (whether physical or human), we need to be
| able to allocate resources efficiently. A conversation along
| these lines happens in public health systems all the time:
| how much money should be spent on medical interventions?
| There, the concept of a QALY (Quality-adjusted life year) is
| used, and typically, a price limit is set per QALY. Then,
| only interventions below that threshold will be funded. The
| idea is that since the healthcare system has limited funds,
| it doesn't make sense to spend exorbitant amounts delivering
| marginal results for one patient.
|
| Now, one could argue this is simply a monetary issue, and if
| we didn't use money to measure these things, the issue would
| go away. The thing is, even if money isn't an issue
| (somehow), scarcity is still something we need to deal with.
| Developing and administrating medical interventions takes
| human labour, and spending a disproportionate amount of
| person hours on small gains is still an issue.
|
| This comment is probably a little rambling, but the TL;DR is
| that given scarce resources (whether that's money in a
| corporation, or chemists and doctors in a health system),
| doing calculations on human lives is necessary if we want to
| make sure we allocate resources effectively.
| [deleted]
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