Brutal? Sounds like a regular blue collar job.<p>I worked as a sparkwatch at a plywood plant in high school. Basically, a welder’s assistant. This is what regular blue collar jobs look like. You work 12 hour shifts. The machinery is hot. There is constant dust in the air. You are on your feet the entire time. It’s 30ºC in the summer. It’s -20ºC in the winter.<p>People in Sillicon Valley and especially the press are just completely out of touch with how the rest of the world works and live.
I’m currently working at one of the largest Amazon delivery stations in the US and seeing as there probably aren’t too many low level FC associates hanging out around these parts I’d be happy to answer any questions anyone might have.<p>Keep in mind that I’m at a delivery station, this is a huge warehouse where we receive packages and sort them for delivery, and not one of the warehouses were products are packaged for shipment. Also, I just ended my night shift so I might fall asleep but I’ll be happy to return later to answer any questions.<p>Edit: I should add that I really enjoy working here but when I was first hired I was unemployed and homeless, and I’m currently semi-homeless, so I probably have an overly positive outlook on working here. I’ll try and not paint too rosy a picture though.
When an Amazon warehouse opened in my area relatively recently it seemed that many people were scrambling like crazy to try to get a job there. These seemed to be people who are poorly educated and low skilled but clearly the Amazon job represented a step up for them. I'm not saying that there aren't issues but clearly working for Amazon is still a better alternative than their other options. I personally know of someone who was basically skipping out on child support payments before starting work at Amazon and now is making the payments.
Is it just me or is Amazon turning out to be even more evil than Walmart ever was?<p>It's just cuz they're an "innovative" tech company, that we let them get away with it?
Setting aside how needlessly brutal some of this seems - these jobs aren't going to be around for long.<p>Amazon's really working hard on automating them away as well - the specific picking job described in the article is part of their well know Amazon Robotics Challenge:<p><a href="https://www.amazonrobotics.com/#/roboticschallenge" rel="nofollow">https://www.amazonrobotics.com/#/roboticschallenge</a>
You know what would be awesome? If tech was used to not just "revolutionize" how consumers get their products but also how employees were treated at these companies. So often it seems lately that tech giants are built in a super old fashioned way: on the backs of cheap labor.
This job sounds shitty but have you ever spoken to someone in a domestic role? A postal employee? A trucker? A janitor at your office building? Kitchen staff at a restaurant who do not even have time to take a piss without dropping the ball, let alone timed pee breaks? Lots of jobs are hard. Extremely hard. And often, jobs that are very very hard pay hardly anything. There is a two-way transaction happening here, though - you pick a job that you are qualified for, and you work at it in exchange for money. And if it's not worth the money to you, you find a different job that you're qualified for. As long as people are willing to do this job for this amount of money, it will probably not get better unfortunately. And as companies get bigger, they always morally regress to the mean. Instead of going after companies (playing whack-a-mole), I think empowering people to learn employable skills is a better investment.<p>Also I'm going to remember the fuss about Amazon when their warehouses are 100% robotic, and everyone is mad that it's not creating enough jobs.
<i>One asked: “Why are we not allowed to sit when it is quiet and not busy? We are human beings, not slaves and animals.”</i><p>That’s because Amazon would much rather have robots instead of human beings. In the meantime, it is falling back on humans, but still expecting them to behave as robots.
I recently started working as a associate full-time at a large warehouse in US. I have a college degree and have worked as a junior Front End Developer in the past but my work permit expires next year so I stopped looking for a "real" job. I can answer any questions you guys might have as I don't thing there are any warehouse associates to answer directly in this thread.
This is on countries like the US and the EU to set a world standard on how the employees should be treated. Everyone competes with everyone and make no mistake the wester europe is not some wonderland paradise where even your average joe is treated well. Western Europe makes hefty profits out of abusing Eastern European labour and markets.
Just had to chime in and say this was how it was when I worked in a Frito Lay warehouse. Lost 10lbs in my first week (probably water weight) because of the heat and labor required. Also same experience when working at Dixie warehouse. That is par for warehouse work.
<i>>>I found staff asleep on their feet, exhausted from toiling for up to 55 hours a week.</i><p>What's brutal is their salary, £8.2 an hour, but 55 hours in the busiest season is called brutal? Please.
<i>"My own story of how I became a human robot could not have been darker. Shifts began in the gloom at 7.30am and ended at 6pm, long after the sun had gone down."</i><p>Oh, heavens. That almost sounds like a high school teacher's schedule.<p><i>"Two half-hour breaks were the only time off my feet"</i><p>Kind of like working in a supermarket?<p><i>"toiling for up to 55 hours a week"</i><p>The horror??<p><i>"[the warehouse] is so vast that just walking to the toilet could take more than five minutes"</i><p>Ok, this is actually absurd, and I would expect against some kind of regulation. If they don't have adequate facilities how can they expect efficient work, anyway?