[HN Gopher] Amazon Makes It Harder for Disabled Employees to Wor...
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       Amazon Makes It Harder for Disabled Employees to Work from Home
        
       Author : belter
       Score  : 120 points
       Date   : 2024-11-13 21:16 UTC (1 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.bloomberg.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.bloomberg.com)
        
       | no_wizard wrote:
       | For a company that is supposedly data driven like Amazon likes to
       | tout, they have zero data that RTO would provide the benefits
       | they claim[0]. They even admitted as much[1].
       | 
       | I wouldn't be shocked if one day some leaked memos or emails come
       | to light that prove it was all about control and/or backdoor
       | layoffs, despite their PR spin that it isn't (what competent
       | company leader would openly admit this?)
       | 
       | [0]: https://arstechnica.com/tech-
       | policy/2024/10/over-500-amazon-...
       | 
       | [1]: https://fortune.com/2023/09/05/amazon-andy-jassy-return-
       | to-o...
        
         | changoplatanero wrote:
         | How would you even gather data to support this? You can't a/b
         | test company culture.
        
           | no_wizard wrote:
           | Sure you can. Why can't you?
           | 
           | Its lack of imagination and inability for upper management
           | leadership to even consider that the way they "always done
           | things" may no longer be the best way, and they need to
           | evolve with the times.
           | 
           | For instance, find a group of teams that work on a similar
           | function, have some of the teams RTO, and have some WFH, and
           | see if there is any tangible difference in the results and
           | what they are.
           | 
           | Thats off the top of my head. Never mind that there are
           | actually more scientific approaches that can be used than
           | what I've suggested, and there are researchers that are
           | clamoring to do this as well.
        
             | changoplatanero wrote:
             | > For instance, find a group of teams that work on a
             | similar function, have some of the teams RTO, and have some
             | WFH, and see if there is any tangible difference in the
             | results and what they are.
             | 
             | I'm not sure I buy this. In my mind the downsides to
             | permanent working from home are these intangible things
             | like team cohesion, speed of onboarding, effective cross
             | functional collaboration, etc. Some of these issues
             | wouldn't manifest themselves in a measurable way until more
             | than a year later.
        
               | no_wizard wrote:
               | Firstly, there are better more scientific ways than I
               | what I proposed at thinking about it for maybe 30
               | seconds.
               | 
               | Secondly, you're saying this
               | 
               | >In my mind...
               | 
               | There's still no objective metric being cited?
               | 
               | >the downsides to permanent working from home are these
               | intangible things like team cohesion, speed of
               | onboarding, effective cross functional collaboration,
               | etc.
               | 
               | But we can prove these things can work well remotely. If
               | they didn't, remote only companies would have such a
               | higher bar to clear and that would be proven already.
               | Gitlab did great in their IPO, and they're 100% remote.
               | Zapier has grown strong and steady, 100% remote, Deel has
               | grown quickly since 2019, also 100% remote etc.
               | 
               | Clearly none of these businesses have issues
               | collaborating.
               | 
               | >Some of these issues wouldn't manifest themselves in a
               | measurable way until more than a year later.
               | 
               | So measure it as long as it takes. 1-2 years is a blip
               | comparatively, and lots of companies already have
               | internal data they could use to make this determination:
               | look at employee performance and satisfaction rates
               | _before_ they worked from home and compare it to _after_
               | they worked from home. Lots and lots of people worked at
               | the same place before WFH became far more common, and
               | after it became far more common. I imagine this is true
               | at Amazon as anywhere else it would be.
               | 
               | What I find entirely humorous about this is its
               | executives that want hybrid / RTO by a large margin, and
               | comparatively few employees want hybrid / RTO and prefer
               | working from home.
               | 
               | Do you think this would even be a conversation if it was
               | the inverse?
        
               | ghaff wrote:
               | It depends a lot.
               | 
               | I've worked with people in person quite a lot--some of
               | which admittedly pre-dated current communication
               | technologies. And some of which was certainly augmented
               | by a fair number of face to face meetings that sort of
               | fell off the table between COVID and tech budget cuts.
               | 
               | But I'd say that, in general, some amount of meeting
               | people locally (including going into an office if people
               | you work with are actually there) is beneficial.
        
           | legitster wrote:
           | Even if you did, you couldn't do a proper A/B test without
           | forcing at least _some_ people into the office.
        
             | ouddv wrote:
             | There were some teams that never stopped coming to the
             | office, due to sensitive aspects of their work.
             | 
             | And there's a boatload of data from centralized project
             | management and ticketing systems, as well as centralized
             | source repositories.
             | 
             | The data was absolutely available for data-driven
             | arguments.
        
               | regularfry wrote:
               | Unfortunately you'd probably have to discount the teams
               | that never switched to WFH. The same reasons that likely
               | drove that decision would mean they're unlikely to be
               | good comparators to teams that had a choice.
        
           | xyst wrote:
           | Let's just ignore the quarterly employee feedback, historical
           | performance records of employees before, during, and after
           | COVID-19 lockdowns, business performance before, during ,
           | after COVID-19 lockdowns; and rates of attrition in across
           | organizations and teams...
           | 
           | There is plenty of data to support why forced RTO makes no
           | sense.
        
             | thrw42A8N wrote:
             | How are you so sure this data is favorable to remote work?
        
           | kevingadd wrote:
           | I feel like the 4 day work week experiments at various
           | companies suggest you could do control/treatment tests for
           | RTO too.
           | 
           | https://www.npr.org/2024/02/27/1234271434/4-day-workweek-
           | suc...
           | 
           | https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/nov/04/microsoft.
           | ..
        
           | ouddv wrote:
           | There were countless natural experiments available from teams
           | that had differing levels of in-person attendance; as well as
           | teams that either were or were not colocated, and teams that
           | took steps (or didn't) to align their in-person appearances.
           | 
           | After all, there _were_ teams that never pivoted to WFH.
        
           | andreygrehov wrote:
           | https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd/issues/2024/09/wor.
           | ..
        
           | PittleyDunkin wrote:
           | If any corporation has done this, it's Amazon. I suspect they
           | just don't give a damn about the needs of employees beyond
           | how it impacts revenue.
        
         | roughly wrote:
         | Open office floor plans are sufficient evidence that "data
         | driven" is bullshit when it comes to management, corporate
         | aesthetics, and cost saving. Obviously there's no data to back
         | RTO.
        
         | meta_x_ai wrote:
         | Unless you can spin an alternate universe, some complex-dynamic
         | things like corporate culture can't be data driven.
         | 
         | A classic example is this
         | https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/12/10/the-friendship...
         | 
         | How will you design an experiment that would create a world
         | where Jeff Dean WFH just solved the problem and 'completed his
         | Task' and Google was just a search engine with a $10B market
         | cap due to scaling issues or a huge operations cost.
         | 
         | Today Google is $2.5T marketcap and you can bet a significant
         | portion of it came from the work culture created in the office.
         | 
         | No amount of Social Science can ever capture the tail events
         | that has massive upside like tech companies.
         | 
         | Even if 180,000 employees are unhappy, but the 20 who are happy
         | create the next Amazon revolution can change the trajectory of
         | Amazon that can't be measurable
         | 
         | Edit : Butthurt HNers downvoting a perfectly logical argument.
         | Then they expect leaders to listen to them
        
           | gagik_co wrote:
           | Online interactions aren't any less complex, they're just
           | different. Newer generations are more online and less fan of
           | an idea of an "office culture". This all seems based on the
           | idea that just because something happened before, the only
           | way to reproduce it is to replicate its setup. Times have
           | changed & people have changed since. Office work will
           | continue to exist but some magical "work culture" isn't just
           | thanks to the office. And 20 people can change trajectory but
           | they're absolutely nothing without the 180k to stir the boat.
        
             | meta_x_ai wrote:
             | Do you have data to prove that? If not, then leaders have
             | every right to go with their gut instincts.
             | 
             | Give me an example of a company that is immensely
             | successful (massive growth) like say OpenAI that are fully
             | remote
        
               | ElevenLathe wrote:
               | You're arguing on capital's terms. The company isn't
               | _owed_ massive growth. They are _allowed_ to have it _if_
               | labor is willing to work under the conditions they
               | provide and _if_ the state continues to allow their
               | incorporation and its related benefits (and they get
               | lucky, presumably).
        
               | gagik_co wrote:
               | Massive growth is your arbitrarily chosen definition of
               | success. Companies that have grown massively required a
               | less competitive environment and the time to do so (with
               | many being founded before fully remote was as common)
               | and/or took a ton of funding (with oldschool investors
               | who obviously see in-office expansion as the
               | needed/natural sign of growth). There are plenty of
               | profitable and growing companies that are fully remote,
               | whether that's "successful" is just how you want to see
               | it.
        
               | no_wizard wrote:
               | Firstly, do you have any data that proves that it isn't
               | true? You haven't made any data driven assertion here
               | either.
               | 
               | Secondly, what is 'massive'? Like, adoption curve growth
               | for many remote first companies is huge, like Zapier, but
               | I digress, that is a very subjective thing.
               | 
               | Gitlab has been day one remote.
               | 
               | Zapier
               | 
               | Deel
               | 
               | Posthog
               | 
               | Others have transitioned to be fully remote, like
               | GitHub[0] and GitHub has had a second wave of massive
               | growth around the same time and its continued to this
               | day.
               | 
               | [0]: https://techcrunch.com/2023/02/09/github-lays-
               | off-10-and-goe...
        
             | v1ne wrote:
             | How do you recreate the rich interaction that you have when
             | you meet somebody face to face, when you have to use (a)
             | Amazon's crappy Zoom clone (forgot the name, they forced
             | their applicants to use it, too. It's horrible and couldn't
             | even cope with my German keyboard layout) or (b) some text-
             | based messaging?
             | 
             | Even if you replace (a) with a proper video chat solution,
             | it's a much, much narrower channel than real interaction
             | between people where people perceive all these tiny non-
             | verbal signals like changes in posture, gestures, mimics,
             | breathing, and you can actually point a colleague to
             | something with your finger, all in real-time.
             | 
             | So, no, from my perspective, online interactions are very
             | sad and simple, compared to real-world interactions.
             | 
             | I work in a low-latency field, maybe I'm more sensitive to
             | latency. But I find all those narrow communication channels
             | a nuisance. I find it frustrating to have to rely on a
             | variety of tools to achieve collaboration: Chat, video
             | chat, digital whiteboard, code sharing. There is so much
             | friction, at least in my workplace, to switch between those
             | tools or to combine them. This can surely be improved, but
             | there are things that naturally can't disappear, like
             | latency.
             | 
             | Honestly, I'm dreaming of a place where people have to work
             | from the office again. So I can have a Kanban board with
             | paper cards on a board again, for everyone to see, touch,
             | and write on.
        
             | anal_reactor wrote:
             | > Online interactions aren't any less complex, they're just
             | different.
             | 
             | Exactly why I spend days on chatrooms instead of going out
             | and making friends.
        
           | abeppu wrote:
           | While it's true that there are things that cannot be directly
           | measured with data , that point cuts in both directions.
           | Perhaps some rare and critical person who is happy in the RTO
           | environment will create something of extraordinary value --
           | but also someone rare and critical could leave because of the
           | RTO environment. So if you don't have _data_ to suggest that
           | the effect is stronger in one direction than the other, it 's
           | not a great argument for any particular policy.
        
           | no_wizard wrote:
           | There are multiple errors in the logic here, but the biggest
           | one is you're trying to prove causation with correlation (and
           | implicitly at that). Which to iterate my understanding, its
           | this:
           | 
           | Google was founded and everyone worked in an office together,
           | Google is a $2.5T marketcap company, therefore Google's work
           | culture could only be created, fostered and maintained in an
           | office setting and therefore Google is successful because
           | they all worked an in office together.
           | 
           | You can't actually prove the assertion that being in office
           | makes the difference here at all. For instance, the article
           | you linked t talks about the way two friends _collaborated_.
           | The backdrop _happens to be an office_ , but the _office
           | setting itself_ is not what made the collaboration
           | successful. Merely, the fact they shared so much and worked
           | collaboratively so closely is what let them to be successful,
           | but nowhere in the article does it say  "well we could only
           | do this if we were in person with one another". The office is
           | the backdrop to the story, its not the reason it happened.
           | 
           | Also, you're throwing an entire field under the bus that our
           | entire industry definitely builds on, which is business &
           | management theory (aka social science), but if we couldn't
           | use social science to make informed decisions, why do so many
           | startup founders read things like 'Zero To One'? (which is a
           | book form of the notes that Blake Masters took while Peter
           | Thiel was teaching CS183 at Stanford University in Spring
           | 2012)
        
             | changoplatanero wrote:
             | > You can't actually prove the assertion that being in
             | office makes the difference here at all
             | 
             | That was the point that they were trying to make. You can't
             | prove such a thing with data one way or another, i.e. it's
             | not possible to a/b test company culture.
        
               | no_wizard wrote:
               | Again correlation != causation.
               | 
               | All they said is you can't test it because 'it already
               | happened in an office therefore its bound to office
               | culture'. I am stating that they can't prove _that_
               | assertion and it thereby _does not prove_ it can 't be
               | A/B tested.
               | 
               | It absolutely can, there are entire fields of study and
               | companies that exist simply to facilitate changes and
               | measurements in company culture[0]
               | 
               | [0]: A random example of this:
               | https://harver.com/blog/cultural-transformation/
        
           | metabagel wrote:
           | > A classic example is this
           | https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/12/10/the-
           | friendship...
           | 
           | It would be nice if you would post a short summary of the
           | article, since it seems to form the basis of your argument.
        
         | tpurves wrote:
         | They'll have plenty of data to support the primary motivation:
         | that enforcing arbitrary RTO policies will absolutely aid in
         | generating staff turnover and voluntary attrition without
         | having to payout severance costs. The policy gives them less
         | direct control over who they lose, but I'm sure the data also
         | points to any critical replacement employees being willing to
         | work for less on average. That's the data they are looking at.
        
           | regularfry wrote:
           | I wouldn't be surprised if it's even more straightforward
           | than that. They've got some very expensive office space
           | that's extremely under-utilised, and they're probably at risk
           | of the rent getting raised on a lot of it unless they can
           | increase footfall.
        
             | ghaff wrote:
             | If you have way-underutilized office space that you can
             | sell or not renew leases on, you can shed it like a former
             | employer was doing when I left. Otherwise, there's
             | basically no value in how many or few people are filling
             | the space unless they're actually delivering some business
             | value to the entity paying for the lease.
        
             | nateglims wrote:
             | I think it's even more basic: they think it will be just
             | like it used to be before 2020.
        
             | neilv wrote:
             | > _they 're probably at risk of the rent getting raised on
             | a lot of it unless they can increase footfall._
             | 
             | Raised, because the property owner has other investments
             | that are affected by the presence of people, such as nearby
             | restaurants and stores?
             | 
             | Or is a valuation of the office property itself affected by
             | how many people are physically in the building or area?
        
           | heavyset_go wrote:
           | Agree with this, but do want to let employees know that if
           | this happens to them, that changes in working conditions can
           | be considered constructive dismissal even if you quit.
        
         | ChumpGPT wrote:
         | 1000's of H1B's from India will work, sleep, and live at AMZN
         | 24x7x365. Most folks are competing with this and it is
         | happening across the industry.
         | 
         | Junk away...
        
           | alephnerd wrote:
           | No need to be racist when you could have just said that it's
           | a competitive hiring market.
        
         | flappyeagle wrote:
         | There's absolutely no way that Amazon employees are more
         | efficient at home.
         | 
         | Nothing about the company's organizational structure or
         | resources are set up to be optimized for this.
         | 
         | It's like asking someone to play tennis, but you gave them a
         | baseball bat.
        
       | SpicyLemonZest wrote:
       | I dunno. I don't _like_ the idea of companies holding
       | inquisitions on just how disabled people are, but if we 're going
       | to hold the expansive view of disabilities the article takes for
       | granted it seems inevitable. When someone claims that they're
       | unable to work in an office because they're suffering from a
       | stress disorder, it's reasonable to have some followup questions
       | about how they manage the disorder on other occasions that call
       | for them to leave home.
        
         | kevingadd wrote:
         | I would assume stress disorders is a blanket that includes
         | things like bipolar disorder, which has real proven sometimes-
         | catastrophic health impacts
         | 
         | PTSD is serious too.
        
         | zeroonetwothree wrote:
         | It's unfortunate for people that have legit disabilities that
         | the system is abused in this way :(
        
           | no_wizard wrote:
           | I think the worry around any of the system being abused is
           | louder than the actual instances of abuse.
           | 
           | I'm sure it happens, but people get all up in arms about the
           | potential for abuse without even looking at how often it
           | might even happen to begin with.
        
             | mathgeek wrote:
             | One needs only look at the recent political weaponization
             | of the small number of transgender kids playing sports to
             | see another example of a small number of instances being
             | generalized for outrage. Doesn't make the needs less
             | important, but it does happen.
        
         | no_wizard wrote:
         | Have you ever asked for a disability accommodation from a US
         | employer?
         | 
         | Its already very common that such accommodation requests get
         | filed with associated medical paperwork from a medical
         | professional outlining why the accommodation is what the person
         | needs. That alone should be more than enough[0]
         | 
         | Secondly, why don't we simply trust adults to make decisions
         | about how to manage their conditions, especially if there is no
         | demonstrable issue with how they work with their team and their
         | work is up to standard.
         | 
         | [0]: Its been some time since I haven't simply produced such
         | paperwork to go along with a request, but if you don't produce
         | it upfront if I recall correctly employers reserve the right to
         | ask for more information, which typically boils down to getting
         | associated paperwork from a medical professional
        
           | adamredwoods wrote:
           | I have, complete with medical details, and doctor approval. I
           | was "denied" because I was told to use Federal Medical Leave.
        
             | no_wizard wrote:
             | I'm not a lawyer, but I'd recommend you consult an attorney
             | about it. That does sound like a possible violation
        
           | aliston wrote:
           | You can find a medical professional to basically claim
           | anything these days. I could go into specifics, but there's a
           | whole industry of ethically questionable doctors that can
           | help you take advantage of well-intentioned accommodation
           | policies with a subjective diagnosis. While I agree there are
           | cases of serious stress disorders, there are also a bunch of
           | people claiming a disorder for personal benefit.
        
             | no_wizard wrote:
             | See my other comment on this very thing.
             | 
             | I suspect strongly that the people worrying about it being
             | abused outnumber the actual instances of it being abused. I
             | don't think there is rampant unchecked fraud.
        
             | olyjohn wrote:
             | Only you rich fuckers can get in with those shady doctors.
             | 
             | There's abuse of every system. So should we just quit doing
             | anything?
        
               | finnh wrote:
               | Opioid epidemic disagrees that only the rich can get
               | shady Rx written.
        
               | mitthrowaway2 wrote:
               | The opioid epidemic where the pharma companies were the
               | ones paying to bribe the doctors?
               | 
               | I don't think pet-food companies will be paying doctors
               | to approve support animals, so probably most of this will
               | have to come from the patients themselves.
        
         | danudey wrote:
         | > someone claims that they're unable to work in an office
         | because they're suffering from a stress disorder, it's
         | reasonable to have some followup questions about how they
         | manage the disorder on other occasions that call for them to
         | leave home.
         | 
         | No it's not. It makes no sense to say "oh, you can't commute to
         | work and then home again five times a week? so how do you get
         | groceries?" because those are two completely separate things in
         | completely separate environments.
         | 
         | It's none of Amazon's business how people manage their
         | disabilities outside of work. The only thing that matters is
         | what the most effective way of managing their disabilities is
         | _inside_ of work. Amazon is not your doctor, and if your doctor
         | says that this is the most effective way for you to manage
         | things while being productive then they need to accept that the
         | doctor knows what they 're doing.
        
           | benced wrote:
           | This falls apart the second you realize it's trivial to find
           | a doctor who will say or do literally whatever you want if
           | you pay the right amount.
        
             | no_wizard wrote:
             | Actual instances of disability accommodation being abused
             | aren't exactly rampant.
             | 
             | Part of which is that people face lots of stigma around
             | disabilities still, but also the need to have some
             | historical and diagnoses paperwork is a barrier that I
             | suspect lots of people don't want to go through.
             | 
             | Frankly, I don't believe its rampant to begin with, and I
             | can't find any real evidence that supports that people are
             | widely abusing these accommodation requests.
        
               | Workaccount2 wrote:
               | The jackasses that bring their "support dog" shopping
               | with them are pretty rampant. People abuse the fuck out
               | of the support dog program. I even know two people with
               | "support dogs" who straight up admit they did it because
               | they want to take their dogs out with them.
        
               | rincebrain wrote:
               | My personal experience in the two years or so has lead me
               | to conclude that a lot of employers have started wanting
               | medical paperwork for much more inane cases than they
               | historically did, and in response, a lot of medical
               | providers have started saying "no" to such requests,
               | since they (pretty reasonably, to me) don't want to be in
               | the business of saying "yeah they were sneezing for 3
               | days maybe don't make them come in", or such inane
               | things.
               | 
               | Of course, this screws over people with problems who
               | could get such paperwork before but didn't need to, as
               | well as people who existed in the gap where they didn't
               | need that before so now if they try to report it, they're
               | going to get questions about "why don't you have a paper
               | trail of this?", as well as "you didn't seem sick".
               | 
               | Because, shockingly, if you tell people, directly or
               | indirectly, that you prefer the people who don't have an
               | illness, they will learn to cover it up real well, or
               | they get fired or quit when everyone but them gets
               | promoted.
        
               | quickthrowman wrote:
               | > Actual instances of disability accommodation being
               | abused aren't exactly rampant.
               | 
               | Check out pictures or videos of 'people in wheelchairs'
               | at Southwest Airline gates who sit in a wheelchair simply
               | for priority boarding.
               | 
               | Also, security blanket animals, I forgot the actual term
               | they use but that's what they are.
        
             | olyjohn wrote:
             | That's bullshit and just shows you have no clue what you're
             | talking about. Regular people who don't live in some rich
             | people's bubble can't even get a PCP without waiting weeks
             | or months. And fuck off if you need to see a specialist
             | with anything, there's another 3 months. Not to mention
             | mental health specialists won't write you shit if you don't
             | have an established relationship with them.
        
             | rincebrain wrote:
             | I don't think it does, actually.
             | 
             | Let's say, hypothetically, that someone gets this benefit
             | who has no health condition that anyone will admit exists
             | without being paid a bribe.
             | 
             | Are you arguing that you're taking something from the
             | company by them allowing this?
             | 
             | You rapidly run into a similar problem to one many means-
             | testing programs for benefits in the US do - it becomes far
             | more expensive to do the testing than it would to just give
             | people the benefit if they ask for it, even if many more
             | people asked for it.
             | 
             | And if some core job requirement makes WFH an actual
             | nonstarter (e.g. if you're being paid to move packages in a
             | warehouse, you generally can't do that from your bed), then
             | it doesn't matter if your doctor says you can't do it, they
             | can still fire you for not meeting a core requirement of
             | your job that they can't just work around.
        
           | michaelt wrote:
           | Eh, it's reasonable for an employer to ask _some_ follow-up
           | questions.
           | 
           | If a guy asks for a special chair because they've got an
           | injury? I probably ought to check whether they're OK standing
           | for long periods, whether they're OK with carrying heavy
           | things, whether they're able to self-evacuate in a fire, etc.
        
         | olyjohn wrote:
         | Well fuck it. If someone breaks an arm, and needs some time
         | off, maybe we can have an inquisition on them too. They do have
         | two arms after all. They can probably still get their work done
         | with just one. What about people taking sick leave? I mean, you
         | aren't dying, you can still flip open your laptop and type. No
         | reason to be staying home for that. Better quiz them and see
         | how sick they really were. Not vomiting up blood? Probably just
         | slacking.
         | 
         | What do you even need vacation time for? Why don't you just
         | work 7 days a week. It's just typing on a keyboard. You still
         | have 4 hours a day of free time. Oh, your mental health might
         | suffer if you work 7 days a week? Maybe don't be such a pussy,
         | they're paying you the big bucks after all.
         | 
         | I guess mental health disorders are less valid somehow. Even
         | though all we do all day is mental work, sitting on a computer
         | and typing. Must have something to do with the fact that you
         | can't see it.
         | 
         | It just gets tiring filling out forms, explaining shit over and
         | over to people, and telling clueless HR people and execs my
         | whole personal life that they won't even understand anyways.
         | It's fucked up. My doctor wrote me a diagnosis, go fuck
         | yourself if you want any more information. There is nothing
         | more the employer needs to know.
        
       | adamredwoods wrote:
       | Sadly, zero repercussions. Who will sue them? Individuals cannot,
       | the process of law is long and requires substantial money.
       | Government is difficult enough to get involved, and will soon
       | lack resources to intervene or impose fines.
        
         | perihelions wrote:
         | I'm not sure if that's the right take: the Americans with
         | Disabilities Act is maybe the most plaintiff-friendly tort law
         | in the US. There's whole law firms specializing in finding
         | viable plaintiffs to take on contingency (i.e at no cost).
        
           | some_furry wrote:
           | That might matter if it weren't for forced arbitration
           | clauses.
        
           | lthornberry wrote:
           | There are tort firms doing that in every area of tort law.
           | ADA cases are not easy wins and don't often produce
           | significant awards.
        
             | no_wizard wrote:
             | Amazon is big enough that they might even be able to get a
             | class action lawsuit going, to be honest. If enough people
             | started coming forward about disability discrimination.
        
       | karaterobot wrote:
       | > "We continue to believe that the advantages of being together
       | in the office are significant."
       | 
       | I presume that's _believe_ in the sense of faith, rather than
       | _believe_ in the sense of drawing reasonable conclusions from
       | evidence. In other words, what are those advantages, and how do
       | you know they exist at all, let alone their significance? As I
       | recall, Amazon did pretty good during Work From Home, so why not
       | start with the hypothesis that WFH is actually good for Amazon,
       | then try disproving that with evidence.
       | 
       | If their Return to Office plan is itself a secret experiment to
       | do just that, I apologize for jumping to the conclusion that they
       | are making decisions under a combination of the sunk cost fallacy
       | with respect to their commercial real estate, and the insane
       | impulse to satisfy their management layer, while simultaneously
       | shrinking their overall workforce size.
        
       | jmyeet wrote:
       | RTO is nothing to do with efficiency. It's about suppressing
       | wages.
       | 
       | People who quit over RTO are cheaper than severance. You then
       | distribute their work to the remaining employees who work harder
       | for the same money. Layoffs and departures help keep wages down
       | because the employees there are in fear of losing their job.
       | 
       | If disabled employees are more likely to quit because of RTO,
       | that's a win for Amazon because those people are harder to fire
       | or layoff, being a protected class.
       | 
       | The tides have shifted in tech. It's no longer a seller's market.
       | Now that it's a buyer's (employer's) market, you're seeing the
       | true colors of these companies. You are a cost. They will do
       | everything to pay you less and/or get you to work more. To
       | extract more profits.
       | 
       | Nobody should be surprised by this.
        
         | gotoeleven wrote:
         | Ohh the dastardliness of a mutually agreed upon contract!
        
       | alfalfasprout wrote:
       | At this point, Amazon doesn't care about bad press. I wouldn't be
       | surprised to see a headline that they kill puppies.
       | 
       | Nor do they care about their labor in the slightest. Amazon has
       | earned their reputation as a bottom of the barrel meatgrinder for
       | people looking to work at a larger tech company.
        
         | 0xbadcafebee wrote:
         | _" Amazon to reduce carbon emissions by shrinking excess puppy
         | headcount (Washington Post)"_
        
       | 0xbadcafebee wrote:
       | I just don't understand why Amazon hates its employees so much.
       | These are the people making you billions and billions of dollars.
       | And their jobs very clearly do not _require_ them to work in an
       | office, nor does it sap productivity, as years of experience and
       | multiple studies confirm. And people could previously work in the
       | office _if they wanted to_ , so it's not like anyone was
       | alienated before.
       | 
       | It's like the execs are just sadists. There's no upside.
        
         | doitLP wrote:
         | It takes a certain kind of person to rise to the top of a
         | company like this. almost every single person here above L8 has
         | been here for at least a decade or more.
        
         | bitmasher9 wrote:
         | Employees are a resource to extract the value from in the most
         | cost efficient method possible.
        
       | cebert wrote:
       | Is this what striving to be the world's best employer looks like?
        
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