Can it really take nearly 0.1% of the US workforce just to deliver online goods? And presumably that's an under-estimate, because it doesn't include most courier work.
I was sort of hoping that every item I order on amazon has only perhaps 30 seconds of human time going into it... Assuming I order 3 items/week, and am typical of US citizens, amazon ought to be able to serve everyone with 130k employees.
Edit: CNN says it takes a minute of human labor as of 2016 (https://money.cnn.com/2016/10/06/technology/amazon-warehouse...). And that's shelf to delivery truck, so there is plenty more in that process that it leaves out.
For example, sticking labels on a box could be entirely automated, with the only time use being 30 minutes to replace the printer once every million labels when it wears out.
Amazon is one of the most brutally efficient operations in world history. We read every week about workers afraid to take bathroom breaks, and according to the article here workers seem too busy to notice their coworkers dropping dead of heart attacks. The sentiment of us here at our keyboards saying "wow, I can't believe it takes more than 30 seconds to put my order in a box" seems really wrong.
Oh sweet summer child, no. Humans drive the truck to the FC, humans unload the truck and stack the pallets, humans move the pallets, humans unstack the pallets for the stowers, humans stow the goods, humans pick the goods, humans pack the goods, humans deliver the goods. Actual automation is limited only to what is cost-effective, and human labor is more cost effective than automation in most cases.
Which means you'll want 260k so you can make them all half-time and keep benefits to a minimum.
Also, keep in mind that there are truck drivers, vending supply stockers, safety specialists, IT folks, etc supporting the whole operation.