'I'm not a robot': Amazon workers condemn unsafe, grueling conditions at warehouse

Oh, what's a little exploitation when it comes to commerce and amassing great wealth, huh? Isn't it a privilege to be ground down to your bones for the sake of the bigger Bezos...ah, I mean picture? How can we expect the respect of human needs and proper working conditions to be helpful to the all important bottom-line?

You see, this is progress! It's futuristic. We have high technology and modern views and next day delivery. However, here at Amazon we retain an important, high-efficiency, soul crushing labor model as well and it is historically tried and true. Our services are progressive and icons of fast-paced, technological advancements and our workforce functions on a Neo-Feudal basis that hearkens back to conditions that fully exploited their potential while constantly reminding them that they are expendable and, other than fulfilling our needs, meaningless really. At Amazon, we know there is always somebody to take your place, so feel free to move on, and maybe order a tent from us if you plan to be homeless after this gig, because it's the future.

We plan to continue to bring you the best that the exploitation of the human condition can offer as we continue to expand our domination of the retail world! Someday, you will work for us. Have you considered being a Prime Member, yet?

Employees under pressure to work faster call on retail giant to improve conditions – and take their complaints seriously

Rina Cummings has worked three 12-hour shifts every week at Amazon’s gargantuan New York City warehouse, called JFK8, on Staten Island since it first began operations in late 2018. As a sorter on the outbound ship dock, her job is to inspect and scan a mandated rate of 1,800 Amazon packages an hour – 30 per minute – that are sent through a chute and transported on a conveyor belt before leaving the facility for delivery.

Workers such as Cummings helped Amazon achieve its best ever Christmas this year. Faster shipping drove Amazon’s revenues to $87bn for fourth quarter of 2019, adding another $12.8bn to founder Jeff Bezos’s $128.9bn fortune. Amazon has just signed a deal to take another 450,000 sq ft of warehouse space on the island to speed delivery to its New York-area consumers.

But while New York customers, and Amazon’s shareholders, may be happy, some workers are not. In November, as the holiday rush got into full swing, Cummings was one of 600 workers at the Amazon warehouse who signed and delivered a petition to management calling on Amazon to improve working conditions.

The petition called on Amazon to consolidate workers’ two 15-minute breaks into a 30-minute one. Workers say it can take up to 15 minutes just to walk to and from the warehouse break room. Workers also called for Amazon to provide more reliable public transit services to the warehouse. They also called attention to reports of high injury rates at the facility there, which were found to be three times the national average for warehouses, based on the company’s injury reports to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).