Panorama - Amazon: The truth behind the click

[zoco]

I'm glad they put that program on, I never would have guessed seasonal warehouse work for minimum wage was dull as tulipe.

Precisely - how is it any different from any of the Godawful factory production line jobs some of us may or may not have done in our misspent youth?

[Mich the Tester]

Precisely - how is it any different from any of the Godawful factory production line jobs some of us may or may not have done in our misspent youth?

I did a job in a big warehouse for a Dutch supermarket picking orders, then got a forklift license paid for by the temp agency and went up a pay grade and worked three nights a week while finishing studies. The main difference I see is the amount of propaganda being fired at the Amazon workers and the Taylorist targets they have to meet. We had to meet targets too, but it wasn't continually thrown at us and there weren't any sessions of throwing people out after the lunch break. The managementese crap written on the walls would drive me nutty. We did have a few laughs though, especially when a beginner forklift driver tipped a crate of blancmange off the top rack, about 12 metres up. Splat.

[DodgyAgent]

What is being said here? That these people would be better off without jobs at all? Or do we pay more for our goods so that they can pay better wages?

[minestrone]

What is being said here? That these people would be better off without jobs at all? Or do we pay more for our goods so that they can pay better wages?

Said here? It is a tulipe idea for a program.

[socialworker]

What is being said here? That these people would be better off without jobs at all? Or do we pay more for our goods so that they can pay better wages?

Stuff is cheaper than ever. Yes actually we can pay a bit moreto pay decent wages. Im probably one of the lowest paid people around here but I would pay more for things like dvd's . Ive heard this argument before and it is what allows care assistants looking after your granny to be paid crap wages, so that noone capable of doing a higher paid role will do care.

[Doggy Styles]

We seem to have a lot of snobs on here who don't appreciate that most people don't have our choices.

[eek]

Stuff is cheaper than ever. Yes actually we can pay a bit moreto pay decent wages. Im probably one of the lowest paid people around here but I would pay more for things like dvd's . Ive heard this argument before and it is what allows care assistants looking after your granny to be paid crap wages, so that noone capable of doing a higher paid role will do care.

Nope that was a race to the bottom where councils subcontracted care to third party agencies on the basis of lowest cost. That means those agencies have no choice but to take short cuts / abuse their workers to win the contract. resulting in a race to the bottom with 0 hour contracts and no payment for mileage or travel time between jobs....

Ironically most of the damage was done between 1997-2010 but people didn't notice....

[DodgyAgent]

Stuff is cheaper than ever. Yes actually we can pay a bit moreto pay decent wages. Im probably one of the lowest paid people around here but I would pay more for things like dvd's . Ive heard this argument before and it is what allows care assistants looking after your granny to be paid crap wages, so that noone capable of doing a higher paid role will do care.

I will accept fully your point, however in the case of warehouse workers these can be stepping points from which to move on to greater things (as to a lesser extent for care workers). I would wager that more people have moved into senior jobs at Tesco who have come from the warehouse floor than have come up through HR.

[vetran]

Stuff is cheaper than ever. Yes actually we can pay a bit moreto pay decent wages. Im probably one of the lowest paid people around here but I would pay more for things like dvd's . Ive heard this argument before and it is what allows care assistants looking after your granny to be paid crap wages, so that noone capable of doing a higher paid role will do care.

the point is that it always comes back to profit. The companies organising the care, supermarkets or even Amazon make good profit yet pay crud wages. Some employers treat even the low wage employees like robots to make a few more pence.

Then of course its all the 'customer's fault' that they want cheap goods. The Pound stores just demonstrated how much profit all the supermarkets were making on low value goods.

[DodgyAgent]

the point is that it always comes back to profit. The companies organising the care, supermarkets or even Amazon make good profit yet pay crud wages. Some employers treat even the low wage employees like robots to make a few more pence.

Then of course its all the 'customer's fault' that they want cheap goods. The Pound stores just demonstrated how much profit all the supermarkets were making on low value goods.

You will find everything comes down to profit. profit is not just about money. even the people on £6.00 per hour are working for profit.