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Comment by AlwaysRock | Hacker News Reader

> I get it, a lot of people hate Amazon and that perfectly ok, but why can't we be happy when companies do nice things?

I don't think you get it. If someone took a big shit on my lawn every morning and refused to stop or clean it up but I found out they were paying for some kids college I'd still their they were a giant asshole.

Amazon is doing far worse in the world than shitting on my lawn and isnt doing this out of the goodness of their heart. They are doing it for good pr and because its hard to hire workers like these long term without dangling long term benefits over their heads.

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>I don't think you get it. If someone took a big shit on my lawn every morning and refused to stop or clean it up but I found out they were paying for some kids college I'd still their they were a giant asshole.

But many people here aren't simply expressing their discontent at amazon in general, they're expressing their discontent at amazon for doing this specific action. You can think amazon is doing a good thing here, but still think that amazon is a bad company. Thinking "amazon is a bad company therefore everything they do is bad" is the wrong attitude to have here.

Yes, because instead of just paying higher wages and letting individuals decide what they'd like to spend their money on, they have this PR stunt. Amazon gets some free marketing, another tax write off, and they can use this as evidence that workers don't need protection from their constant scheming. They can continue to exploit their workforce to the maximum extent of the law while they lobby to get more worker rights removed because their workers can potentially jump through a few dozen hoops and get a college degree. Amazon will absolutely use this empty posturing to try and cover up their dismal labor record.

"Why should our workers be allowed to take bathroom breaks or even think about forming a union? We gave them free college*!"

*Some conditions apply

What, specifically, should Amazon do to make you truly happy with them?

How much pay is enough? How many benefits are enough? I am genuinely curious.

They could start by ceasing their union busting efforts.

Last year they posted a job looking for a senior intelligence analyst to gather info on "sensitive topics that are highly confidential, including labor organizing threats against the company." Later that day they claimed they had made a mistake in describing the job.[1]

There is no single answer on what pay and benefits should be, or how well they should treat their workers. That's the whole point of unions: they provide collective bargaining where employees can decide how much their local area can reasonably support.

That's why organized labor is a threat to them. Their business model depends on squeezing wages and benefits, which is exactly what they did when they bought Whole Foods. They removed medical benefits for part time employees[2], and have recently cut paid breaks from 15 to 10 minutes, which now includes the time it takes to walk to and from the break room.[3]

[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/01/amazon-seeks-intelligence-an...

[2] https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2019/09/14/amazon-whole...

[3] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/whole-foods-cuts-some-workers-p...

They also increased the pay of all Whole Foods workers which according to the ones I’ve talked to they all really liked.

'The Illinois-based worker explained that once the $15 minimum wage was enacted, part-time employee hours at their store were cut from an average of 30 to 21 hours a week, and full-time employees saw average hours reduced from 37.5 hours to 34.5 hours. The worker provided schedules from 1 November to the end of January 2019, showing hours for workers in their department significantly decreased as the department’s percentage of the entire store labor budget stayed relatively the same.

“We just have to work faster to meet the same goals in less time,” the worker said.'

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/mar/06/whole-foods-...

Please clarify how Amazon is shitting on your lawn every morning. What specifically does Amazon do to target you to your detriment. Are you upset by their carbon footprint? Do you work for Amazon?

I just don't see the logical progression here. Amazon can still be an asshole and also be doing something positive. Elon Musk is widely known for being an asshole yet most people would say that SpaceX and Tesla are net positives. So it's clear that life isn't so black and white where an entity can only assume one role at a time (Good/Evil). Instead, we all partake in good and evil activities in the micro.

And if the bottom line drives a business then what does it matter if PR drives this decision so long as its a positive move? Why do people have this obsession with purely altruistic acts that don't exist?

But you can at least admit that it's better than them not doing it?

That is an impossible feat for ideological partisans to undertake.

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