Amazon doesn't 'employ' drivers, but hired firms to prevent them from unionizing

https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjv3yp/amazon-says-it-doesnt-employ-drivers-but-records-show-it-hired-firms-to-prevent-them-from-unionizing

by rntn • 3 years ago

381 403 3 years ago

vice.com

bfeynman• 3 years ago

This behavior of legal loopholes to discount workers should be made illegal. The definition of sub-contractor has got to change and/or have laws/policies in place that actually make sense in a sub contractor relationship. These are shell companies that spin up and exclusively deliver for amazon, they aren't gig workers delivering when they want, they have strict quotas.

unyttigfjelltol• 3 years ago

The solution is to enforce the laws we have, not feign powerlessness every time some crackerjack claims to have identified a profitable loophole.

dclowd9901• 3 years ago

Absolutely. The courts are supposed to be the last vestige of common sense. It’s judges dropping the ball here by letting high power lawyers steamroll their courtrooms with this nonsense.

taeric3• 3 years ago

I'd also be happy with better base level care for everyone. Would start requiring more taxes on corporations, largely because that is where the money is siphoning to. But would be far more efficient than the current efforts we do where every time a new rule is made, bypasses are found.

themagician• 3 years ago

Often what happens is delay, delay, delay, appeal, delay… and then you are “too big to fail” and everyone has to “think of all the jobs that will be lost”.

deelowe4• 3 years ago

This is why the US uses the common law system. Laws are written and the courts then interpret them. The courts should be telling these yahoos that these actions are against the intent of the law.

romafirst3• 3 years ago

Completely. There are lots of laws already on the books but there is nobody actually enforcing them. Everyone from Uber to door dash to Amazon are profitably evading their responsibilities to their employees by miss categorizing them as contractors.

This is bad for the employees, bad for society and bad for competitor companies who are playing by the rules.

The solution is fairly obvious. Invest in bodies to proactively enforce the laws we already have.

stale2002• 3 years ago

This stuff follows the law though. Its not illegal, not even close.

Not even sure how you would go about making it illegal. What, paying money to another company is illegal? You can't contract out work? It doesn't make any sense.

scoofy• 3 years ago

I think the real issue is the political problem that most people like the exploitation that is happening. When ride-sharing laws were changed in California to protect hired drivers, the counter ballot initiative passed easily.

fallingknife2• 3 years ago

These aren't contractors like Uber drivers. They are corporations that are contractors of Amazon, and the drivers are employees of those companies. How would this possibly be a legal issue?

fouc• 3 years ago

The fact that the employees of the contractor companies ultimately work for only one company - Amazon - that means they should be treated like employees of Amazon.

This is the same situation when independent contractors have only one client.

Analemma_2• 3 years ago

Because courts are supposed to see through flimsy fictions like this. These companies are not in an ordinary vendor/customer relationship: they are controlled completely by Amazon, they do not and cannot serve customers other than Amazon, their conditions and working hours are set by Amazon, etc. They are Amazon subsidiaries in all but name, and their treatment by the law should reflect that.

patmorgan239• 3 years ago

They are companies who's employees wear Amazon uniforms, drive Amazon branded vans, deliver packages only for Amazon, Amazon determines the routes and performance metrics for the employees, Amazon can dismiss the employees without waiting for approval from the companies management.

These employees are Amazon employees in all but name.

tiahura3• 3 years ago

"Shell company" isn't a legal term and has varying definitions, but generally is a company that only exists on paper and doesn't do anything. These companies deliver products for Amazon.

Make sense to whom? People that have no experience with running a business and hiring subcontractors?

polygamous_bat2• 3 years ago

If you have a single product that kills people, you aren't legally allowed to put all your liabilities and none of your assets into another (non-shell, by your definition) company to get out of your liabilities. [0] What's happening here is quite similar.

[0] See, for example, the J&J case, which was an even more generous form of the same.

nitwit0053• 3 years ago

These companies deliver products for Amazon.

Amazon is essentially claiming this is not the case. These are independent companies that delivery for anyone.

If Amazon were to directly run the firms, then they would be Amazon employees, which is what they're attempting to avoid.

Of course, you may notice these companies only ever deliver for Amazon, use Amazon software, etc. There is a lot of pretend going on.

kova123• 3 years ago

This is a pretty slippery slope you are getting on. Hiring a subcontractor is common business practice for many purposes. What you are proposing will essentially make anybody a criminal, because there's always a way to second guess one's intentions.

What your point is however illustrating is how wrong the union legislation is. It's essentially forcing free people into organization they didn't choose. I'm not questioning the usefulness of trade unions in old days of industrialization, but now those just became cancers that suck out resources from businesses and consumers

mschuster913• 3 years ago

Hiring a subcontractor is common business practice for many purposes.

It's common and (sort of) fine if the subcontractor has many different clients. Like a cleaning service or whatever who works for a ton of separate companies all needing to have their floors mopped.

But if the "subcontractor" only has one client? That reeks of escaping union or other labor agreements, illegal liability shielding, questionably legal tax / social security evasion schemes or other unethical behavior.

qbasic_forever2• 3 years ago

You don't need laws to enforce this change or behavior, you just need the Amazon drivers to show solidarity and unionize. They can demand (and get!) far more change than the government will ever legislate. The threat of a strike and labor action is far scarier to Amazon than nosey lawmakers that can just be silenced with enough campaign donations.

mschuster913• 3 years ago

You don't need laws to enforce this change or behavior, you just need the Amazon drivers to show solidarity and unionize. They can demand (and get!) far more change than the government will ever legislate.

The problem is, with jobs that do not require more than a driver's license and the ability to read names you are a fungible cog in the giant machinery of Amazon. It's a job that virtually everyone with a half working body can do: no need for special training, certifications, not even language - here in Germany, it's been reported that the Amazon phone app their delivery people use has like at least half a dozen languages.

Fine, you go on strike with your colleagues? Your official employer won't pay as he can't because Amazon pays shit, barely enough to keep the lights on. You keep striking. Amazon will just terminate your employer's contract. Your employer shuts down. Amazon finds someone else willing to start up a "delivery company", and that person finds another bunch of people desperate to make a pittance.

rootusrootus4• 3 years ago

It would be interesting to try and make that work. It sounds like basically you'd define a monopsony as effectively an employer relationship, rather than a contractual one. But there are lots of regular everyday businesses that work together in a monopsony relationship. Should we force all of them to consolidate into a single business entity? Or does this only happen for larger companies? Or only gig-style companies?

varispeed• 3 years ago

It's not going to happen because of existence of corporations like Infosys that do exactly that, except with IT workers.

edit: In the UK, we done worst of both worlds - exempted big corporations and "sub-contractors" can still be hired, but they don't have any employment rights.

nitwit0053• 3 years ago

The real fix is to stop tying various benefits to employment, so there'd be no need to worry about who is full time or part time, or who they work for.

Unfortunately, changing most of those programs is political suicide, particularly anything health care related.

esalman• 3 years ago

It's political suicide for Republicans. Left leaning Democrats like Bernie are all for it.

nicechianti• 3 years ago

and fix immigration so there are fewer illegals reaping those benefits

m463• 3 years ago

That might help with health insurance, but what about worker safety, or reasonable hours, resting, etc?

Dr_Birdbrain• 3 years ago

The thing is, I see a huge difference between high-end health plans (for example, at places like Meta, which include IVF coverage) and middle-of-the-road plans (like my employer provides) and bare-minimum plans (like MediCal).

Which plan would we be talking about for government coverage? I assume barebones plans.

In that case, it still matters who you work for, because some employers still provide much better coverage.

fma• 3 years ago

Yep...This isn't really new to anyone that has any exposure to the business world that deals with actual good/services. Amazon had some program where they'd give a loan to business operator money to lease trucks, buy uniforms, etc and you get routes. The terms work out such that you make a certain amount money, almost guaranteed. To them, it's a form of insurance.

You deliver their goods. They track your performance. It's your business, but from a distance, they control everything. They have zero liability for what happens...it's not their company, their employees. But they can "union bust" by cancelling your contract. If a truck driver makes Amazon look bad, they will pressure you to fire them...even it's not their employee.

supertrope2• 3 years ago

If a truck driver makes Amazon look bad, they will pressure you to fire them...even it's not their employee.

This right here should get Amazon.com classified as a joint employer. A franchise model is suppose to delegate HR decisions to the local owner.

AtlasBarfed• 3 years ago

Something like:

- laborers presumably have social security numbers

- if a laborer is working in the premises of a company (and a van is definitely that) WITH THE MARKETING, then you have a direct line between the worker and the company using its labor.

- if a laborer is working on a company's premises, it must report that labor for the hours.

- if the total labor for a company exceeds a "full time" trigger, then it triggers all that employment law about "full time employees" or "part time employees".

- you can have a cutoff amount for lucrative consulting that this doesn't apply to. So if your bill rate is like 100+/hr, you can be exempt from the tracking.

Basically, companies are going to utilize corporate law, limited liability, shell company obfuscation, and supplier relationships to obfuscate full time vs part time vs employee vs "contractor". This isn't really that new. Use the social security number system to break through this. Of course it relies on reporting and compliance, but there's numerous examples of big bad hammers that can be employed, especially if it tracks back to a big bad company like Amazon.

But the real issue is that government oversight of corporations is basically nonexistent except where the regulatory capture is valuable. The SEC and FTC are total jokes, the mortgage crisis showed that in plain view. So even if I come up with some good tieback mechanism, it won't work.

... unless there is a consortium of companies that will push it against Amazon, which I'm surprised hasn't happened. Everyone seems to be competing with Amazon in the marketplace, which at this point they are now monopolized. Walmart / Bestbuy / Target don't seem to be fighting in government regulation yet which is what they need to do. Likewise Azure and GCP aren't fighting AWS in antitrust either.

But I think at some point it will happen.

seanmcdirmid8• 3 years ago

The real fix is to just stop tying benefit requirements to who the employer is and what the employee's full time status is. A lot of these problems go away with just universal healthcare, and providing benefits beyond pay via society rather than via companies.

Ekaros• 3 years ago

Why not mandate things like healthcare no matter how many hours someone is employed. It might hurt some, but if these companies can not survive without workers, they will hire full time. And if they can not afford they don't deserve to exist.

ROTMetro3• 3 years ago

We have socialized healthcare in the USA, we just deliver it at the emergency room, the worst possible place. The more we get people to realize that we already have this the more we can reduce the resistance to expanding it in a sane way. America 100% has socialized medicine. Go to the emergency room and you will be treated.

alberth• 3 years ago

” This behavior of legal loopholes to discount workers should be made illegal.”

It comes down to priorities.

In the US at least, regulators are very pro jobs & job creation.

People employed contributor to society in many ways (eg purchase goods, taxes, lower crime, etc).

Which means, US wants to make it easy for someone to create a company so they can hire a people.

Now if the business that’s created to employee people is a subcontractor for a Mega Corp, the US regulators don’t care. Because again, it comes down to priorities - which is pro job creation.

Note: I’m not anti-unions. I’m just trying to depict it comes down to what’s highest priorities for regulators. And pro job creation / making it easy to create a company, is pretty high on this list.

pluto_modadic• 3 years ago

"pro jobs" here meaning... not pro workers...

jerojero• 3 years ago

Pretty sure this has been solved in other countries by allowing sectorial unions (so in this case all delivery drivers would be in one union and they negotiate collectively regardless of the particular business they work for).

But I don't think these kind of laws can really pass in the USA, the political will is just not there.

faeriechangling• 3 years ago

The very system of contractors vs part time vs full time getting different levels of benefits is designed to avail employers of paying their employees benefit. The end to the loophole is simply ending these arbitrary classifications and it won’t happen without a serious fight because why would employers give up their right to hire employees at a discount? The modern day purpose of the system is to allow employers to misclassify their employees for the purpose of stealing their wages.

wilg• 3 years ago

I’d entertain a policy proposal that does this without too much damage to the ability to flexibly hire for part time and contract and freelance type work.

up2isomorphism• 3 years ago

Just buy from the physical store. Otherwise at the end of day you will choose a online retailer that successfully prevents unionization because it is more efficient and cheaper.

wildrhythms2• 3 years ago

Workers are the physical store are also subject to these same issues. Consumer side activism doesn't work.

cyanydeez• 3 years ago

Unfortunately "subcontractor" is politically equivalent to "small business owner". You have a whole class of people who think they're being pandered to by tax incentives and other programs.

oneTbrain23• 3 years ago

Thesw workers already agreed to Amazon employment contract. If they are not happy they can quit and join high paying programming jobs by Apple or Meta...assuming they can code. Instead, they wish to renegade on their employment contracts and blackmail Amazon (which indirect jack our price) via a cartel known as union. Union tactics are usually very straightforward....we want more....in exchange we dont go on strike to renegade on your employment contract because we too lazy to learn to code to get paid better so easier to just blackmail you. And that is how America lose out to China.

saagarjha2• 3 years ago

Why do you think the answer to labor issues it to get everyone to learn how to code?

patmorgan239• 3 years ago

IIRC there are provisions in the NLRA that address situations like this. If Amazon primarily directs the activities of the workers, not the contractor company, if Amazon can dismiss individual employees then they're consider a kind of joint employer and can still be unionized against.

anotherhue• 3 years ago

Good thing we pay so much tax to the government to address things like this.

oldjim69• 3 years ago

Nothing shows the power of unions more than the lengths companies go to fight them.

In a Union there is Strength.

jvmfjvfjvf3• 3 years ago

What strength do they have? Unions routinely cause jobs to be eliminated and offshored.

tyree731• 3 years ago

Would Amazon drivers unionizing cause Amazon to offshore drivers?

If Amazon drivers unionizing would cause Amazon to eliminate drivers, does that suggest unions lack strength, or that unions have strength that Amazon fears?

otikik2• 3 years ago

Yes, it's the unions, not the execs.

tech_ken3• 3 years ago

Well no, it's literally the employers who move their capital to regimes which allow more exploitative working arrangements to boost their profit margin. That they are so unwilling to accept a reduce share of the company's net income that they will pick up their toys and move to Bangladesh just indicates that we need to be more aggressive against capital mobility.

akomtu• 3 years ago

For unions, workers are the profit center. For corporations, workers are the expense.

dimator• 3 years ago

Blaming the unions for corporate greed (going offshore for cheaper labor) is utterly hilarious.

epivosism4• 3 years ago

This sounds like just the opposite of a capitalist monopoly from the other side. Why would I want any party to control the way a market works? You'll get stagnation both ways. see many historical examples where both monopolies and unions refused change and were overturned, leading to failures. i.e. Detroit

I want a functioning competitive market where workers and firms compete and have to adjust and innovate to fit what people want. Neither side should be able to lock down and define the way things must work.

wpietri2• 3 years ago

Nothing shows the power of capitalist monopolies more than the lengths unions go to fight them. Oh wait

You say this as if it's some clever proof, but I'd say it's literally correct. It's why all sorts of people in all sorts of countries fight capitalist monopolies.

And, I should add, for all sorts of reasons. I believe strongly in the power of markets. They're incredible optimization machines. Which is why I'm also for strong markets. Monopolies are just as anti-market as the most ardent communist. People who believe in free enterprise should all fight monopolistic behavior.

tech_ken3• 3 years ago

But the problem is that the labor "market" has many weird inefficiencies not found in the usual "buyer X selling widget Y" model of the free market. For example, the poorer you are the less elasticity you have in your labor "product"; by the mere necessity of paying rent and buying food you have to accept virtually any offer that comes your way. On the other hand, employers often negotiate from a position of substantial strength because of their deep capital reserves. I'd consider this a market distortion, and a harmful one at that. Labor laws and unions provide counterbalance which is important to ensuring a healthy labor market.

adfskghnmionio2• 3 years ago

A capitalist monopoly is a conspiracy in favor of the firm. Unions are a conspiracy in favor of the people.

jenkstom2• 3 years ago

Unions are just another corporation. They balance the corporation that owns the assets. Nobody is locking anything down, they're just signing contracts. This is healthy for competition, not stifling.

barbariangrunge• 3 years ago

The main way people compete, outside of vampire-FAANG, is by a willingness to work for lower wages

There's a massive power imbalance, a lack of alternative employers, but employers all have a huge number of potential employees, so we end up with zero real wage growth in the last 50 years or more while profitability is soaring

And if you don't like unions, I hope you're looking forward to the age discrimination in your future as you, instead of gainins security as you age, lose all your job prospets in tech

bluedino• 3 years ago

I'm always amazed at the stark differences between UPS drivers, and Amazon drivers.

UPS trucks are always clean. They follow the rules of the road. The drivers wear neat uniforms, they walk on the sidewalks, they're polite, they're just professionals held to a higher standard.

Then there are Amazon drivers. They park blocking half the road, music blasting, the vans usually look like they haven't been washed in a month, most of the time it's not even an Amazon marked van, it's just some generic white rental. The drivers often don't have Amazon clothing, maybe just a hi-viz vest, they walk through your grass and plants, lazily toss a package on the porch and walk away.

Reminds me of fast food employee who simply hands your meal out the window, no greeting, no thank you, no smile...

jxf3• 3 years ago

You get what you pay for. UPS drivers are unionized, and Amazon's aren't.

jvmfjvfjvf3• 3 years ago

FedEx delivery drivers aren't unionized.

tiahura3• 3 years ago

Why would I want to pay for somebody else’s clean trucks and neat uniforms? Sounds like a scam to me.

tekla• 3 years ago

Wait, UPS fucking sucks though. Amazon drivers make a attempt to hide packages, UPS tosses it 10 feet over the gate and mark it delivered in person.

NikolaNovak• 3 years ago

Fair enough, but I wonder how much areas and personal experiences matter.

My experience with UPS over last 2 decades, as a receiving individual, has been dismal (condos in Toronto and now house in satellite residential community). I understand they optimize toward businesses, and I'm sure as a business their procedures are streamlined and efficient, but as a resident receiving package, it's awful. Majority of packages don't get delivered when I'm in the house eagerly expecting a package. Sour attitudes when I do. Amazon delivery on the other hand is always with a smile and a wave - and it gets here every.single.time.

But I recognize it's a personal / individual experience. I don't know what a broader picture is.

Aunche• 3 years ago

My experience with UPS has been similarly poor. For two addresses in different states, whenever UPS sent me a package that required my signature, they simply forge it and mark it as delivered. They don't even bother to ring the doorbell.

ocdtrekkie• 3 years ago

It is also likely, as pointed out here, an employer difference: You may regionally be seeing Amazon drivers from different employers who add different expectations beyond Amazon's.

datavirtue3• 3 years ago

Dude, they all suck. I wish they would stop shipping or accepting shipments that are in retail boxes or obviously improperly packed.

I get heavy packages that are blown open and missing half the contents constantly. They throw it on the porch and run.

Amazon has caused the market to shift this way with their cheap ass practics and skewed incentives and garbage customer service.

Oh..AC unit was shipped in a retail box meant for the shelf in a big box store? AC unit is dented on all four corners? Better break out your hammer because the process to send it back and get a new damaged one is gonna cost you. The sellers game the system and so does Amazon.

jtreminio• 3 years ago

music blasting

Far be it from me to say a driver can't listen to music while they are at work.

the vans usually look like they haven't been washed in a month

Good. Washing work vehicles so that they are always sparkling seems like a waste of resources.

Reminds me of fast food employee who simply hands your meal out the window, no greeting, no thank you, no smile

This is such a weird American fixation. Here, take my money and hand me my burger and receipt, there's no need for a conversation or a fake smile. You don't care how my day is going, I don't really care about yours. Let's keep this transaction professional and solely focused on this exchange of money for burger.

aaomidi• 3 years ago

I can not stand people who love setting weird standards on others.

Music? They didn’t say hello to you when giving you your delivery?

Why on earth do you care.

glimshe• 3 years ago

Gosh, whenever you find the world you want to live in, please let me know because I don't want to live there.

I'll keep the smile and the clean trucks, thank you. A lot of good manners are "fake" and simply a social convention that people follow even if feeling miserable inside - "Good Morning", "Excuse me", "Thank you" etc.

In a world filled with hostility, disease, death and danger, good manners and social conventions such as cleanliness help signal safety.

BaseballPhysics10• 3 years ago

This is such a weird American fixation. Here, take my money and hand me my burger and receipt, there's no need for a conversation or a fake smile. You don't care how my day is going, I don't really care about yours. Let's keep this transaction professional and solely focused on this exchange of money for burger.

As a Canadian cousin over here, if you can't tell the difference between a smile/a polite "Hi, how can I help you?"/a "have a nice day", and an actual conversation involving smalltalk, then you clearly don't know about what you're criticising.

In our part of the world, is there a social/cultural difference in expectations of the interaction with people around us, including workers in the service industry?

Yes, absolutely.

Is there something "weird" about that? No, absolutely not, and you can put down the superiority complex.

somehnguy• 3 years ago

I don't think anyone has a problem with the workers listening to music while they drive around. But I can hear the Amazon truck's music from the opposite side of the block, which is a little excessive.

Honestly it doesn't bother me all that much, just saying there is a stark difference between them and FedEx/UPS/USPS when coming through my neighborhood.

gopher_space• 3 years ago

I care how your day is going and it sounds rough. Coffee is on the house.

It’s definitely a regional thing. You’re an asshole if you don’t engage with people in Seattle, for example.

Always weird to hear people calling it “fake” friendliness because nobody here feels that way.

marcus0x62• 3 years ago

Far be it from me to say a driver can't listen to music while they are at work.

I have no problem with anyone listening to music while they work.

I just don’t want to be forced to listen to their music while they are parked across the street from my house that I’m inside.

bena2• 3 years ago

I'm like 50/50 here.

Listen to music, but not so loud as to be unaware of your surroundings.

Washing a vehicle is about more than aesthetics. Dirt, salt, asphalt, etc, can damage the vehicle itself. Delivery vans also get a lot of miles on them. It doesn't need to "sparkle", but if you've got a month's worth of dirt and grime on the truck, it's not great either.

I don't need a whole song and dance with transactions either. But silence doesn't work either. Enough words to conduct the transaction and acknowledge it is over.

passwordoops• 3 years ago

Weird how a conversation that should be about the richest corporations shirking their responsibilities to employees is hijacked by someone complaining about fake smiles instead

mcpackieh5• 3 years ago

Far be it from me to say a driver can't listen to music while they are at work.

If they're listening at a volume where it isn't noticed by / bothering other people, then there's no problem. Otherwise, it's noise pollution. Trucks are too loud as it is, we don't need even more noise thrown into the mix. Whether it's people playing music through their phone speakers on a city bus, or a guy reving his unmuffled motorcycle at 4:30 in the morning every day, or somebody blasting heavy bass music through their car or truck speakers when they slowly cruise through through your neighborhood, it's all assholish behavior.

RHSeeger• 3 years ago

> Reminds me of fast food employee who simply hands your meal out the window, no greeting, no thank you, no smile
This is such a weird American fixation.

You appear to be confusing

They are doing their job like they don't care about doing it well... like the fast food employee that doesn't try to make your experience enjoyable by saying "hi" and maybe "have a nice day"

and

They didn't talk to me, I'm upset

As applied to the delivery person, it's things like putting the package to the side of the garage door instead of right in front of it (where you'll drive over it if you don't notice it)... and putting it under an obvious overhang if it's raining. The little things, that show you care about doing a good job; they matter.

barbazoo3• 3 years ago

It's not fun buying garbage one doesn't need from a horrible company unless everyone along the chain suffers. Are they really suffering unless they drive in silence?! /s

jedberg• 3 years ago

Good. Washing work vehicles so that they are always sparkling seems like a waste of resources.

The point of the clean truck is that it shows the delivery company it willing to lose money to maintain their equipment. It means they are probably also willing to lose money to care for your package better.

It's the same reason Lexus requires their mechanics to wear white lab coats. To show you that they are willing to spend money to take care of your stuff.

ska• 3 years ago

Washing work vehicles so that they are always sparkling seems like a waste of resources.

Washing them is a "canary in the coal mine". You don't need them sparkling obviously, but they need regular maintenance. And with a fleet under heavy use, that's often measured in weeks, not months.

datavirtue3• 3 years ago

I've witnessed the music blasting. It is a nuisance and easily a violation of any towns' ordinance. If their exhaust was that loud the vehicle would be down until it is repaired. Both are equally embarrassing to the company.

dang• 3 years ago

Please keep nationalistic flamebait off this site. It leads to nationalistic flamewar, which we neither need nor want here.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

KronisLV• 3 years ago

This is such a weird American fixation. Here, take my money and hand me my burger and receipt, there's no need for a conversation or a fake smile. You don't care how my day is going, I don't really care about yours. Let's keep this transaction professional and solely focused on this exchange of money for burger.

Here's something anecdotal: as someone from Eastern Europe, I was looking at reviews on Google for a few local dental clinics, to better decide where to sign up for my vaguely-twice-a-year dental hygiene appointment. What I noticed was that most of the places across the board in the center of the capital had around 3 star ratings. I looked into it and while there were generally good reviews of the service quality, almost all of the negative feedback had to deal with the attitude of the reception staff.

People complained about the receptionists not being too interested in small talk, just telling them where to go, urging them to move on, or being terse and presumably uncaring in their responses. Same for cloak room staff. Now there were also complaints which could impact the service itself (professionals not wanting to walk the client through the steps needed for a checkup or whatever, for other procedures), but in general I got the vibe that people expected to be pampered/encouraged more.

And then I noticed that a sizeable amount of the negative feedback came from foreign folks, who might not necessarily be used to some of the cultural and "to the point" interactions that you sometimes get over here. I found that interesting, though it's not like the people here are not nice at all, it's just that you might not always be that way to complete strangers and just be reasonably polite instead. Or maybe most of the staff just didn't care, I can't read minds of course.

So yeah, cultures differ, sometimes quite a bit! I remember going on vacation to a country with a higher population density and getting used to people standing in what I'd assume is my "personal space" without batting an eye took some getting used to, hah.

imacomputertoo2• 3 years ago

It might be an American thing, but I'm fine with that. Keeping it professional means having a professional attitude - smiling and being courteous. At least it does in America.

game_the0ry2• 3 years ago

One time, I had amazon delivery driver show up and they just threw my package at the door. Literally, just chucked at my door and I heard the thud in my home office.

macinjosh3• 3 years ago

They were beta testing a new SNS feature.

Tempest1981• 3 years ago

Around here, UPS and FedEx are equally noisy. And the Amazon trucks are brand new Rivian EVs. Pretty clean so far. FedEx drives the fastest.

Zigurd• 3 years ago

I wish this were not true, but on multiple deliveries I have had UPS falsify a delivery attempt and status. Amazon drivers have never done that.

This has to be a systemic problem with UPS selling service level agreements they can't actually meet. There is no way that UPS's tracking system don't know this is happening.

kova123• 3 years ago

Just another day UPS was supposed to deliver an item with signature. I needed the item. I was waiting for driver, but even if I wasn't, my whole family was at home. Looked outside, bam! UPS label "sorry we missed you" on the door.

whalesalad5• 3 years ago

Here in Detroit the Amazon drivers are pretty great. I would say they are no different than UPS. Always in uniforms. I also see them about 10x as often, so there is a bigger sample size. Once in a while someone will be blasting music, but tbh I would probably be doing the same if I were in their shoes.

FedEx drivers are hands down the worst.

josefresco• 3 years ago

"lazily toss a package on the porch and walk away"

I tried to help an Amazon driver by taking the package from him at the edge of my driveway. He stopped me, told me he had to take a photo of it sitting on my property first. He was very serious about this. I doubt this behavior is from these contracted drivers unless the photo requirement is new and your experience is not.

rootusrootus4• 3 years ago

Same here, just last week. He politely told me that he could hand it to me, but then I'd need to sign for it. If he put it on the front step, he could just take a picture.

I opted to just let him continue his normal routine. Undoubtedly faster than doing a one-off signature because I happened to be standing out in front of my house.

rincebrain2• 3 years ago

I think the requirement is basically only in areas that have high rates of people complaining about things not turning up, and even then, Amazon doesn't really seem to care.

For a while, my home had very poor labeling of its address on the building, and getting anything delivered was always a crapshoot of drivers giving up and just picking a random location to leave it instead. They would happily take photos of them having left it at a home that was not mine, not remotely mistakable for mine, and Amazon didn't treat that any differently from the cases where there were no photos at all.

pc864• 3 years ago

It's very driver dependent. Sometimes I'll get the super professional, uniformed delivery driver driving a marked van who seems to actually care about doing a good job at his job. Other times it'll be the guy in jeans and a t-shirt who throws the package on to the porch from 8 feet away before going back to their nearly broken down white rental van. Both get the picture before leaving though.

My guess is this is just a difference in contracting companies and not anything specific to how Amazon contracts the work out in the first place.

Steltek• 3 years ago

This comment and sibling comments read like bizarro world for me. I've never seen anything close to this level of attention to detail.

I've had my packaged signed for by "mailbox". This is practically the default message for me.

I've been on vacation and seen "Handed directly to a resident". Which would be more disturbing if I didn't already know the whole system was broken. In this case, the package was sitting on the front steps.

(Edit: These are all Amazon branded van deliveries, fwiw).

coldtea5• 3 years ago

Reminds me of fast food employee who simply hands your meal out the window, no greeting, no thank you, no smile...

They aren't even putting on a little dance for each customer, to celebrate the wonderful minimum-wage soul-crushing git they got!

macinjosh3• 3 years ago

There is a middle ground of basic social interaction between failing to acknowledge a party in a transaction and being forced to do an impromptu dance for them.

In the case of Cold Stone Creamery though I agree, those kids should not have to sing for tips.

Lolaccount• 3 years ago

... throws packages through our open windows instead of ringing the doorbell ...

Your comment rings true.

ncr100• 3 years ago

Amazon Corporate has NO love from me. The employees seem to me to be pressured to be sociopathic:

A few days ago in Seattle I was threatened by an Amazon driver - I was walking my small dog across a large two-lane street in my neighborhood and an Amazon driver (wearing the vest) driving a White Honda Fit floored-it, revved his engine at me, gave me the middle finger, and drove into the opposing lane of traffic.

Bizarre.

altairprime4• 3 years ago

I regularly hear music in UPS vans, and they always seem to be happy that they have music. Their vans are dirt brown which does notably reduce the cleaning burden.y apartment complex regularly has one road out front blocked all day long by private delivery cars, commercial delivery drivers of every sort, police cars, and people double-parked to use the ATM. UPS and Amazon show up at different times, and stay for the same length of time.

However, you’re still seeing something valid, but I want to call it out plainly: Amazon contracts delivery to the lowest bidder in each region, exactly the same as FedEx Ground (formerly RPS) does. The variability you describe in Amazon drivers and vans stems directly from Amazon trying to be “hands off” enough to not get them all labeled employees; whereas UPS just employs them, with a resulting degree of consistency in appearances and behavior that Amazon cannot match.

But .. music? They all listen to music.

rootusrootus4• 3 years ago

I suspect this is very regional. My Amazon deliveries come in a marked van, clean enough, with a uniformed driver. They have been just as personable as the UPS & FedEx drivers, they don't walk through my lawn, they all deliver packages to my doorstep just the same. But the Amazon guy does take a quick picture. Can't really just toss it and walk away.

Reminds me of fast food employee who simply hands your meal out the window, no greeting, no thank you, no smile...

That's a sad place for sure. I don't eat a lot of fast food, but our closest restaurants are usually courteous. But that might also be partly how I address them. I decided many years ago that common courtesy just made the whole world a nicer place, whether in person or driving down the road. Even if you start out forcing it, as your mood improves so will the moods of the people you interact with, and it spreads. Bad attitude also spreads. So I don't choose that.

adra• 3 years ago

I think even the "outside consultants" can use the Amazon marked vehicles, probably getting them leased cheaply just to as a further f-u to employment law. Just don't hurt yourself on the job, because nobody's there for you when it happens.

deviantbit• 3 years ago

I've not had the same experience w/ UPS drivers. I had a lawsuit with UPS for them hitting my gate. They're in such a hurry they can't let it finish opening. After 6 years they finally paid the $14k to replace it. I'm still trying to get them to pay the attorney fees that were awarded.

Amazon drivers stop, wait for it to open, and drive down the drive at a reasonable speed. Amazon takes a picture after they have left the items.

stronglikedan• 3 years ago

It must vary from area to area. In my area, you could swap "UPS" and "Amazon" in your story and it would fit. (Minus the music blasting - neither do that around here- and both wear identifying clothing.)

I always cringe a little when I get a UPS shipment notification, and I try my best to be home for it, for the best chance of success.

renewiltord• 3 years ago

Interesting how you can rehabilitate your image by just the existence of someone else that people want to hate. On the Internet, now:

- UPS is now apparently the height of professionalism

- Zuckerberg is the hero fighting off Elon Musk

- Microsoft are the good guys reining in OpenAI

Of course, this doesn't really match the common brand view. Really goes to show how Internet commenters are not representative.

bena2• 3 years ago

As to UPS. It is weird. Now, I mostly don't pay attention to which service I'm getting stuff from. Mostly because I don't have the option most of the time, I'm getting it from the service the seller is using.

A while back, I did notice that USPS was by far the best option in the area I was in. They were often faster and had fewer problems. Now, it's pretty much all the same. I never have any major issues with any of them.

Regarding the Zuckerberg/Musk thing, I think it's just mostly an artifact of it being completely fucking bizarre. Two middle-aged billionaires are about to throw down in a fucking cage match. I believe people are mostly rooting for Zuckerberg because he seems to be able to actually fight whereas Musk has strong "street fight/smarts" vibes. The kind of guy who says he doesn't have "conventional" training, but is secretly really competent because of reasons.

barbazoo3• 3 years ago

Then there are Amazon drivers. They park blocking half the road, music blasting, the vans usually look like they haven't been washed in a month, most of the time it's not even an Amazon marked van, it's just some generic white rental. The drivers often don't have Amazon clothing, maybe just a hi-viz vest, they walk through your grass and plants, lazily toss a package on the porch and walk away.

I despise the company as much as the next person but let's stick with the truth and acknowledge that this doesn't seem to be universally true. At least not in my neck of the woods.

nwah1• 3 years ago

I see drivers from UPS and FedEx speeding through my neighborhood in huge trucks, hip hop music blasting, and see the drivers carelessly toss packages on doorsteps. While children are around.

Amazon trucks at least are smaller.

axus• 3 years ago

My experience in the US with Amazon drivers is sometimes similar, except for walking through the plants. I don't think the professionalism is necessary to receive my package on time and in good condition.

When I've been outside and received the package directly, I never felt any disrespect in either direction.

How many other countries have Amazon drivers? Is it the same there?

Zetice4• 3 years ago

Reminds me of fast food employee who simply hands your meal out the window, no greeting, no thank you, no smile...

For some reason this disturbs me, like something an NPC in a cyberpunk dystopia masquerade ball level would say, to underscore how little they think of the people who serve them...

Jochim• 3 years ago

Reminds me of fast food employee who simply hands your meal out the window, no greeting, no thank you, no smile...

Do you expect them to do so? Are you ensuring that they're paid and treated well enough to do so?

spaceman_2020• 3 years ago

Always amazing when it takes “disruptive” Silicon Valley businesses so much legal wrangling just to turn (barely) a profit (not including AWS).

inemesitaffia• 3 years ago

Amazon is in WA, not the valley

blackoil• 3 years ago

That's true for all such jobs be janitor, cleaner or cook in almost all the companies including the government.

linuxftw• 3 years ago

Yes, they don't want to pay actual employees because their costs would be higher. But, they're also likely taking R&D tax credits, and having a 1099 makes the accounting much easier for them.

They make an update to the routing software, or anything, roll it out, 'measure', boom R&D tax credit. This is a boon to their bottom line.

whalesalad5• 3 years ago

Is this a theory, or proven? It makes a LOT of sense to do what Amazon is doing here. Why would you want to have a ton of depreciating vehicles on your balance sheet? Why would you want the maintenance burden? No need to worry about all the regional differences with vehicle/transport law - you allow people who are based in that region to do it (better).

One could also argue this is good for the economy, in that there are hundreds of small business popping up all over the country to become these service partners.

Unions aside this feels like a smart business move so I don't understand the hate here.

mdgrech23• 3 years ago

it probably is good for Amazons bottom line but all of this just results in greater wealth disparity. since you're on you probably make a good living in tech but don't think that makes you immune to replacement. likewise having a bunch of people in neighboring cities who can't afford housing or groceries is going to have repercussions in your daily life as well.

rootusrootus4• 3 years ago

Is it really a smart business move from an economic point of view? Aside from some regional differences in vehicle/transport law (which I bet are not as different as you'd expect, a lot of this is federalized), this should cost Amazon more, not less. The scale works to their advantage. Having subcontractors is strictly more expensive since there's an extra layer of profit.

whalesalad5• 3 years ago

which I bet are not as different as you'd expect, a lot of this is federalized

I've lived in 5 different states over the course of my life. The operating environment varies substantially. Local ordinances vary greatly. Fuel costs. Climate (vehicles in Phoenix are not exposed to rust, salt, etc while here in Michigan they are). Local labor laws, unemployment costs, insurance costs and restrictions. It's literally completely different in every state.

Businesses love to subcontract, particularly when it is outside their core competency. It's a line item on the expenses.

If unions did not exist I would posit that they would still operate this way.

LatteLazy2• 3 years ago

"outsource anything that doesn't make the beer taste better" as Jeff Bezos put it.

Buttons8403• 3 years ago

there are hundreds of small business popping up all over the country to become these service partners [of one company]

Sounds like a monopoly to me.

whalesalad5• 3 years ago

a monopoly implies domination and zero competition. where do you get that sense?

anigbrowl2• 3 years ago

Why would you want to have a ton of depreciating vehicles on your balance sheet? Why would you want the maintenance burden? No need to worry about all the regional differences with vehicle/transport law [...]

Why did Amazon build its own delivery fleet in the first place? Unless you were strenuously against that idea from the outset, the answer is that even with the costs it was probably cheaper than buying the service from other corporations.

itake• 3 years ago

Fuel, tolls, and ongoing maintenance paid for by Amazon

https://freightpartner.amazon.com/marketing/opportunity

I think Amazon still owns the trucks and pays for their maintenance.

mtmail• 3 years ago

In Germany Amazon uses subcontractors for deliveries. Those are only allowed to have a maximum of 25 (can't remember the exact number) of drivers. That's a strategy to prevent any one subcontractor to become too powerful or merge with others.

jillesvangurp• 3 years ago

I live in Germany. I'm pretty sure DHL has more than 25 drivers ...

game_the0ry2• 3 years ago

The lengths that American businesses go to avoid the cost of labor is beyond stupid.

Henry Ford paid his employees well, bc he treated his employees as an investment, not as a line-item cost on an excel spreadsheet, and new that higher wages would mean a more prosperous middle class that would buy more model Ts. [1]

The US economy has become extractive in nature - extracting as much value from the resources available (humans included) rather than betting on growth and optimism. This has been the case since 2008, its like c-suite managers are emotionally scarred, and it trickles down to lower level managers, training them to adopt this broken mentality.

No wonder quality of life is declining in America over time.

[1] https://www.npr.org/2014/01/27/267145552/the-middle-class-to...

whalesalad5• 3 years ago

Henry Ford did not give a shit about his workers. That’s just the fairy tale. They absolutely were a line item on a spreadsheet. Once in a while business goals and societal/human/worker goals align - but that is just serendipity.

Our economy (extraction) has been like this since day one lol.

JoeAltmaier• 3 years ago

That doesn't conflict with 'employee as an investment'.

It's all about enlightened self-interest. Henry Ford had some idea how that might work, and campaigned for it e.g. the 5-day work week.

XTHK• 3 years ago

If Henry Ford really believed all that, then why was he such a union-buster?

legitster4• 3 years ago

Ford's famous pay was actually tied to a crazy and intrusive set of requirements that employees were to adhere to. Most employees were not part of the program.

To the extent that Ford helped propel the middle class, it was his ruthless and often illogical chase to the lowest possible cost.

notyourwork5• 3 years ago

What I’ve gathered from reading this thread is experience varies widely. One thread, Amazon sucks. Another, UPS is horrible. Another justifies it based on unionization and someone counters with highlighting FedEx’s lack of Union.

What gives? Well, I guess world wide companies have a spectrum of quality and your mileage varies based on too many factors to generalize.

Analemma_2• 3 years ago

It's the same thing with cloud providers: don't bother using HN comments trying to figure out which one to use. "AWS is terrible, use Azure", "No, Azure is terrible, use GCP", "No, GCP is terrible, use AWS". Zero useful information. This is why you don't use anecdotes as data, which is a lesson people remember until they don't.

legitster4• 3 years ago

I'm always confused by the framing of these articles. Are companies supposed to help unions form against them? If they supported unionization efforts, why not just save everyone the time and money and listen to employee demands without one?

It's like, you can love your wife as much as anyone, but you are not expected to help her get her own divorce attorney.

Yeah, companies are going to be against unionizing. That's the point of unionizing. That's the bar you have to reach.

giraffe_lady• 3 years ago

Like calling up the pinkertons and paying them millions is just the inevitable reflex of any fully evolved corporation lmao. Natural as breathing is for you and me.

adfskghnmionio2• 3 years ago

The government is compelled to argue against itself at trial. Manufacturers are compelled to inspect their own products. Banks are compelled to limit the money they lend out. Employers are compelled to allow unionization.

If we never compelled people to do something they didn't want to do, we would have no need for laws.

Besides, Amazon is allowed to fight unionization. The problem is using dishonest or abusive means to combat it. That means no classifying employees as contractors, no Pinkertons, and no Two Minutes Hate.

Draiken5• 3 years ago

That's such a bad analogy. Unions are only really brought up when people are being mistreated, underpaid, overworked, etc. People don't unionize when their needs are met (even if they should).

Your analogy doesn't work even if you also include the fact that the husband has been abusing his wife as much as possible without getting caught. What they are doing is making an active effort to make sure the wife can't get to an attorney at all.

I truly don't understand how so many can side with this abstract concept of a profit-seeking machine over human needs.

Poor Amazon might have to reduce their profits by 0.00001% to allow workers to pee while driving!

max51• 3 years ago

I think you are the one not understanding the situation. As you point out, amazon is a "profit-seeking machine". It makes perfect sense that they would not want unions. The wife-beating husband also is not going to want his wife to meet with a divorce attorneys and is certainly not going to take the initiative of hiring one for her.

legitster4• 3 years ago

Uhh, that's kind of my point exactly. If a husband is beating his wife, expecting him pay for her to have an attorney is such a weird expectation to have. If I am a loving husband, I can just stop beating my wife.

If Amazon can improve their working conditions, either willfully or through the enforcement of labor laws, whether or not they are anti-labor is kind of irrelevant.

anigbrowl2• 3 years ago

Are companies supposed to help unions form against them?

You're framing it as an inherently adversarial relationship. Owners of a company are allowed to coordinate, and do so by voting their shares to select directors and officers. Workers should be similarly free to organize in pursuit of their interests. In many cases, the interests of shareholders and labor will coincide because the workers understand a lot of things about the business that the shareholders (and indeed management in many cases) do not.

FireBeyond6• 3 years ago

Help? No. Be prevented from actively hindering? Absolutely.

paulpauper• 3 years ago

companies have been doing this forever. google for example hires staffing firms for this reason.

tomohawk• 3 years ago

They can unionize the firm they work for. However, if they unionize, then the union needs to work with the business to ensure they remain competitive with the other firms offering the service. However, unions don't appear to be terribly interested in a business remaining competitive.

88913527• 3 years ago

I'd be willing to accept a 0.25% less return annually on the S&P index if workers had meaningfully better existences. It might even increase returns if workers could be more productive by having dignified lives. This is the best way to frame thinking about things in our current macroeconomic environment.

ryandrake• 3 years ago

Unfortunately, the vast majority of investors are not willing to accept anything less than "the highest possible returns legally achievable". Therefore,, everything that can legally be thrown under the bus in exchange for profit eventually gets thrown under the bus. Including workers' pay and conditions, product quality, customer service, customer privacy and security, every manageable cost. The minute one company realizes they can cut some good thing to provide a higher return, all companies will (and eventually must, due to competition) cut that thing. It's an inevitable race to the bottom.

icedistilled• 3 years ago

"the vast majority of investors are not willing to accept anything less than "the highest possible returns legally achievable""

One important correction because they definitely aren't getting the highest return by those antics

Fixed: "the vast majority of investors are not willing to accept anything but the highest expected return when only considering easily quantified first order short term effects"

That's an important distinction that should not be left out.

LatteLazy2• 3 years ago

.25% is nothing. That's the problem.

mdasen• 3 years ago

I think the issue is that it might not be a small difference. Most companies don't make that much money on a profit per employee basis.

https://i.imgur.com/SF6RGxX.png

Amazon makes $21,000/employee per year and that's just the direct employees, not including all the subcontracted stuff like this. Walmart makes $6,000/employee per year.

Walmart might be an easier example to pick on because they have fewer subcontracted employees and they're on a more stable basis (rather than trying to take over the world like Amazon).

https://www.wolframalpha.com/input?i=wmt+profit+per+employee

From 2012 to 2021, Walmart has ranged from $3,000-8,000 in profit per employee per year. The average hourly wage for for frontline workers at Walmart is $17.50 or around $35,000/year. If Walmart were to increase salaries by $3,500/year (a 10% raise for frontline workers and substantially less for many workers), it would decrease profits by more than half.

So many people think that margins are way better than they are. Whether it's a 10% increase in salaries or a 10% reduction in workload, companies are often operating on thin margins.

You're not talking about accepting a 0.25% less return. You're probably talking about accepting 6-10% less return - unless we start talking about redistribution.

Let's say that Walmart gives their frontline workers a 10% raise and reduces the pay of their knowledge workers to compensate (and for the moment let's say that those knowledge workers can't quit and move to a different job). Then we've potentially created a situation where we've materially made workers lives better.

Are you willing to accept a lower salary for yourself to pay workers better? That's not a rhetorical question. I think many people would be. Living in a good society is important. In fact, many people basically vote for this through expanded government programs. They vote to reduce their income to make things better for workers who make less money than they do.

How can we practically implement what you want in a way that can actually exist? Well, we can increase the minimum wage. Yes, increasing the minimum wage can create some unemployment, but there's a decent amount of economic research showing the impact is smaller than we used to believe and we're also in a period of record employment. Things like this can also cause some inflationary pressure in certain sectors, but it doesn't have to be across the board since, for example, there aren't a lot of software engineers making minimum wage.

Of course, some of this goes back to power. In the Walmart example, I said we'd assume that the knowledge workers couldn't quit for a new job basically to protest the redistribution of wages from them to lower paid workers. Well, one of the issues we have is that many knowledge workers have the power to get higher wages. A problem to overcome is that many knowledge workers would likely argue that if things at Walmart are getting more expensive to pay the higher minimum wage (aka, some inflation is happening), then they should get paid more. At that point, the inflation can be more general. If everyone earns 10% more, then no one has actually earned 10% more. If only some people get the 10% raise, then they actually have a larger share of the pie.

But the problem is that there isn't an easy solution like "if only companies would give up 2% of their profits to their workers we'd be in a workers' paradise!" Yea, we'd all be willing to accept a 0.25% less annual return IF workers had meaningfully better existences. However, your proposal is more like giving Walmart workers a $150 bonus. That isn't nothing, but I don't think you'd say that's a meaningfully better existence with a more dignified life. The problem is that your 0.25% less return just doesn't mean much in a lot of cases.

edmundsauto• 3 years ago

This assumes there isn't a situation where worker output is static. I think there's an argument that treating workers better would increase their job satisfaction and overall attitude. When workers are happier, they are better at their jobs - this could nudge up sales and margins.

My hypothesis as to why companies don't do this is 1) smart ones ARE doing this (see FAANG), 2) it's harder to measure whereas cost savings are a great way to focus on short term.

banannaise• 3 years ago

Amazon makes $21,000/employee per year and that's just the direct employees, not including all the subcontracted stuff like this. Walmart makes $6,000/employee per year.

Workers who are paid and treated better will be healthier both physically and mentally, and will be happier to come to work. That will improve their productivity. It's not zero-sum.

They will also have more money to spend at places such as their employer, although that results in a Tragedy of the Commons scenario. Each individual business gets back only a fraction of that increased buying power.

(Yes, yes, inflation, etc., etc.)

AlbertCory12• 3 years ago

News flash: being a sullen jerk does not make you feel better. On the contrary, it kills any chance of receiving good vibes from anyone that might, just might brighten your day fora second.

barbazoo3• 3 years ago

Strive to be Earth’s Best Employer
Leaders work every day to create a safer, more productive, higher performing, more diverse, and more just work environment. They lead with empathy, have fun at work, and make it easy for others to have fun. Leaders ask themselves: Are my fellow employees growing? Are they empowered? Are they ready for what’s next? Leaders have a vision for and commitment to their employees’ personal success, whether that be at Amazon or elsewhere.

CobrastanJorji• 3 years ago

Right, but see, that leadership principle is only relevant to employees, and the leaders decided that these people are not employees.

What's that thing where you come up with a metric to measure success but then people over-optimize on the metric itself rather than actual success?

feedsmgmt• 3 years ago

Around here they use multiple different local companies and make them compete against one another. And there's no guarantee of contract renewal so they can just keep dropping whoever costs more. It ends up being super toxic for the employees and the service quality reflects that. I stopped using Amazon.

Tokkemon• 3 years ago

FedEx does the same thing. This is pretty standard in the shipping industry.

sharts4• 3 years ago

And yet folks still proudly flex that they work at a company like this.

Amazon doesn't 'employ' drivers, but hired firms to prevent them from unionizing

Related Stories