The brutal business practices of Amazon | Hacker News Reader

The brutal business practices of Amazon

vanityfair.com

140 pointsmakerdiety67 comments

The writer Rob K. Henderson has covered the hypocrisy of the upper and upper-middle classes in several of his pieces on what he calls "luxury beliefs". The case of Amazon def. fits into a similar theme.

You can broach the topic with uppercrust folks (without even really trying) of whether supporting Walmart by shopping there is conscionable or not, and you'll get one set of responses/reactions. Meanwhile, it's nowhere near socially unacceptable to talk about all the stuff you order from Amazon, despite Amazon appearing to be by and large worse in its compensation/treatment of its employees and its effect on the economy and the environment—all things that aspiring bougie types ostensibly profess to rank highly in their meditations when it comes to Walmart.

That seems to reason. Unless you buy all your stuff at Walmart online, you have to go in and see the people working and their working conditions.

Amazon, you only see the checkout page. It makes it much easier to ignore the problems.

Shopping in Whole Foods is shopping at Amazon, where you also have to go in and see the people working and their working conditions.

I think Amazon is actually among the best compensated of the "shit jobs" out there, but it is about the shittiest (certainly it's the pissiest; I've seen the bottle bombs their drivers like to leave since they don't really accommodate bathroom breaks).

I don't even really find much hypocrisy amongst the upper class here; they'll outright say that these are shit jobs not intended to provide a living wage; certainly not something you can raise a family on. Probably said as, "those people should have gone to school".

The Walmart distribution center built around where I grew up was not known as a hub of shit jobs. It was a source of envy. Amazon warehouse worker pay, in contrast, lags behind Walmart by several dollars per hour and offset several years. And that's assuming you're actually hired by the company directly, rather indirectly as a second class worker brought in through the timeless scam involving contractors employed by staffing agencies.

I work for staffing agencies at I like it. Please do not assume everyone wants a traditional 9-5 job.

Total anecdote but had the opportunity to chat at length with an Amazon warehouse worker (in the UK) over the holidays. They said it’s hard work but they got various perks, decent pay, they didn’t even want to be a supervisor which they had been offered, and liked it.

Would I want the job? Hell no. But this is an intelligent person who is doing this because they have no other option.

The UK has social safety nets that Americans don't get when they have a job. Amazon isn't allowed to play the same game in countries with worker protections.

I can certainly believe there are issues for Amazon workers in the US that don’t apply in the UK to the same degree. Although Amazon does seem to have various heath insurance plans for US workers. I assume workers have to pay some amount in as is the case with most jobs, including white collar ones, in the US.

Amazon management has to routinely come up with contingency plans after having burnt through/burned out the local available workforce. I have never heard of any other company ROUTINELY has that issue.

Working through a staffing agency or not and working "a traditional 9–5 job" or not are two totally separate subjects.

Didn't Walmart get caught locking people inside their facilities?

https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna4146540

What's your point? Because _my_ point is that if you think about Walmart and however bad you know (or heard) that it is, Amazon is worse than that.

Amazon does not have a physical whip yet, but they do have a mental whip of tracking every minute of every day you do at work, and ranking you among all the others working there.

Amazon warehouse jobs are so bad the company has to have contingency plans for when they have burned through the entire available labor force. Walmart does not have to have such plans.

Those kinds of people don’t shop at Walmart because they perceive themselves as being in a higher social class than the “people of Walmart.” I don’t think they care much about the compensation of the employees.

Right. The key word in my comment was "ostensibly".

I care about worker’s rights but there is only so much I can do. The Clinton administration refused to include a requirement on standards of employment in order to benefit from free trade with the U.S. Walmart did a lot of harm while it grew to its current size. That memory is still fresh. The damage caused by Amazon is more opaque but it is a loathsome company.

What is needed are standards of employment that all companies should be forced to adhere to.

The notion of luxury beliefs isn’t just about plain old hypocrisy (though of course there’s plenty of that) — I think it’s more about beliefs one can only hold because of one’s position of privilege.

The usual example given is ‘defund the police’. If you’re rich enough to hire your own security or otherwise live safely in a world without police, you can advocate for this and win social points for doing so. Meanwhile, the actual consequences of such an idea, were it to be implemented, would be catastrophic. Unlimited immigration/open borders is another one: if you’re relatively poor, your ability to make a living (among other things) is potentially threatened by this. If you’re rich, you needn’t worry. You can live in your fancy neighbourhood far detached from the consequences of such policies, so you can freely hold such positions and even frown upon those who don’t.

Luxury beliefs are just like tangible luxuries [*] — you have them not because you want them or really believe in them, but because they signal to others that you’re of a certain class. Poor people can’t have them, so they’re desirable as status indicators.

[*] OK — some ‘luxuries’ are worth it and aren’t just for showing off. But I’m talking about the ones that are.

"Defund the police" doesn't mean what you think it means here.

It doesn't mean removing all funds from the police as the name implies. It actually means reallocating funds from the police to trained professionals for appropriate situations. Like having a government division that hires psychologist / mental health workers to respond to mental wellness checks. Having mental health / homelessness services workers respond to calls about vagrants. So instead of getting a boot to the teeth or death as seen in the news, those at risk groups and people get the directed help and support they need.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defund_the_police

I'm not sure this distinction matters much to most people, though. People hear "defund the police" and draw their own conclusions as to what that means, and it's not a far leap to go from "defund the police" to "welp, guess they want to tie the hands of cops and take away all of their funding so they can't do their jobs"

I think what your saying is that people are drawing the wrong conclusion when they hear 'defund the police'. But, if they knew what was really meant they may actually support it. So the distinction actually matters a lot.

Like if they heard that it meant sending trained mental health professionals to deal with a mental health crisis called into 911 instead of just sending some cops who may very well just shoot them, that might change their minds about it.

No, what we are hearing is that a group for some reason chose a horrible catch phrase that they now say does not mean what the phrase specifically, on it's face, means, and that the group now wants to tell everyone it's not them it's us.

Edit: I think the USA needs to completely change how we approach mental health. My grandfather spent his life cruisading for that. Allowing the catch phrase to distract from that point to the extent that the catch phrase is now pretty much a central focus shows that 'defend the police' very much is a problem.

You are right.

But, let's complete the idea to make it bulletproof.

Regardless of moving goalposts due to changing definitions, the luxury belief still remains:

Reallocate (vs defund) police still moves funds around. Funds are not infinite.

- Less police means more crime. This means fewer personnel to combat crime. Crime strikes directly at the poorest.

- Less police means more mental care. This means more personnel and facilities to combat mental cases. This had been tried already, with no meaningful decrease in mental problems.

>This had been tried already, with no meaningful decrease in mental problems

Has it?

> Allowing the catch phrase to distract

It isn't a good catchphrase, I fully agree. But the reason its been derailed is because there are people actively derailing it and deliberately misleading its meaning. They fight any plan that would diminish the authority and power of police. That's the problem here.

It hasn't been derailed, it's been off the rails from the get go. I don't know who came up with that slogan, but it was designed to fail.

They correctly understood it to mean abolish the police. As was made very clear by those who created the statement as they carried it the BLM riots in 2020

Fair enough. I've heard 'abolish the police' and 'all cops are bastards' (whatever that means) too, so such a sentiment definitely exists. Either way, those usually espousing such things don't seem to have much of a concrete plan in mind (and don't have to, because offering concrete solutions isn't the purpose of such rhetoric).

> According to the New York Times, the slogan and movement failed to result in any meaningful policy change. This was attributed to the slogan having no clear definition of its goals.

(from the Wikipedia page you linked to)

"Yes, We Mean Literally Abolish the Police"

-- New York Times, 6/12/2020, https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/12/opinion/sunday/floyd-abol...

> I've heard [...] 'all cops are bastards' (whatever that means) too

Is that an honest question?

Usually it asserts that police institutions operate similar to organized crime, where some level of bad acts (e.g. perjury, evidence tampering, abuse of power) are a de-facto requirement of continued membership. Thus the corollary that anyone who survived there long-enough to be "a cop" must have become "a bastard" to do so.

Compare to: "All mafia members are bastards."

Such systems are self-sustaining because each cohort has the dilemma of defending itself against being denounced by the next. Forcing incoming members to commit the same crimes means they are "stuck in the same boat" , changing incentives from "reveal their crime" to "hide our crime."

To add to your point: sometimes people point to the videos catching cops abusing their power and say “it’s just a few bad apples.” They’ve been saying it for decades. It turns out that is correct as the full saying is “a few bad apples spoil the bunch”. Police departments don’t get rid of the bad apples, the bunch is spoiled and rotten. So far gone that the few good cops who join and speak up are railroaded out. Look at the Los Angeles CA police where there are different gangs within the police department.

This is certainly not the case for the NPO BLM groups that clarified they want to abolish the police.

That's a thoroughly sensible proposition. However, right there in the Wikipedia article you post:

> some ["Defund the Police" advocates] seek modest reductions, while others argue for full divestment as a step toward the abolition of contemporary police services.

"Defund the Police" is my nomination for the worst political slogan of the 21st century (so far). It contains such multitudes that it's become a Rorschach test for both users and hearers. I wish the reformers (like yourself - whom I fully support) and the abolitionists (I think they're wack jobs) would decide to march under different banners.

This feels like the equivalent of mansplaining on this topic, with a heavy dose of gaslighting for bad measure. We were all around for the 2020 riot period, wherein what it means explicitly was made clear over and over and over again.

It's also one of the most idiotic slogans in history.

Any slogan that requires a paragraph or Wikipedia article to explain what it "really means" is public relations malpractice.

And I'm coming from the side were I agree with much of the actual policy proposals behind it.

It boggles the mind of who came up with the line and thought, yes this is a political winner.

Sorry rant over.

It came out of the BLM riots, and very much meant complete police abolishment. All the long winded after the fact redefinitions was just people wrapped up in it stepping in to save face. Since at this point they're linked to it and know it looks bad now that they've had a second to step back and think about it

That doesn't seem to be universally true, and there were much louder, more extreme voices who meant it very literally.

"Yes, We Mean Literally Abolish the Police"

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/12/opinion/sunday/floyd-abol...

> Luxury beliefs [...] they signal to others that you’re of a certain class

I suppose we need a different term for "norms which mainly exist because our civilization is doing well enough."

For example, "killing everyone in a conquered village is bad", or "don't eat fallen foes as food", etc.

> The usual example given is ‘defund the police’.

> live safely in a world without police

That is not at all what the ‘defund the police’ is about. I know the tagline is confusing.

What it really means is to fund the various necessary services instead of only the police. So if someone is in need of mental health help, you send a mental health professional instead of the SWAT team.

As with most political soundbites, what it "really means" depends on who you ask.

>What it really means

That's not really true. Certainly that's what it really means for some people. But for other people it means "yes, we literally mean defund the police" or else some version of "all cops are bastards." I'm just just saying that there are some odd opinions on the fringe, but rather this movement never managed to clearly define or unify its message.

Traditional business value comes from some innovation, and a lot of execution/logistics delivering the innovation. Logistics for product companies being manufacturing, and sales/delivery.

But now most small product companies have outsourced production on the "input" side, and outsourced logistics on the "output" side.

Which leaves harsher more direct competition for their innovation core, since that is a fraction of the original business and more easily copied.

High componentization of any economy ratches up competitive pressure exponentially, whether it was Amazon, or a collection of service companies offloading the downstream logistics.

But since Amazon is protecting itself by doing the opposite, by de-componentizing, i.e. preferencing and tying different sales and delivery logistics services to each other, that centralized leverage is going to squeeze small product companies even more.

Especially those that don't have a unique manufacturing process, unique branding, or some other differentiating moat.

https://archive.ph/vTO3D

How does Amazon operate in countries outside the US. Does Amazon apply the same anti-competitive business practices? Is the workplace equally cut-throat? Just curious.

Whatever happened with the "false or perjurious" testimony at the beginning of the article? Nothing?

> Dana Mattioli reveals how the company systematically stifles criticism, squeezes out competitors, and even pits its own employees against one another. “People tend not to last,” she says, “because it’s very aggressive and it can be bruising.”

Wow! Wait till she does an investigation of professional sports!

> Wow! Wait till she does an investigation of professional sports!

At least those are union jobs.

I was Amazon for quite some time, and also outside of Amazon trying to compete against them. The company is both decentralized and has a culture of delivering. While that sometimes has unintended consequences, the people there are quite aware that they can sometimes be an elephant in a china shop. There are practices in place to rein that in. Nonetheless, investigations like this book hardly ever give a balanced view.

What sort of investigations provide a balanced view, then?

The ones that don't give him moral injury for working at Amazon, presumably?

That's not exactly the most generous interpretation of that comment.

Please do assuming that the original poster is acting in bad faith. I have seen a lot of reporting about disfavored organizations, and it is often unfair. I do not know if this reporter has done a good job or not but I have seen a fair number of anti-Amazon articles which basically attack Amazon for being successful.

The other problem with the article is it does not point out some obvious problems Amazon has. First, Amazon is expensive, and people can and do go else ware. Second, Amazon's retail side is mediocre. Amazon's retail web page is basically a product search engine. Outside of search, Amazon does very little work to help people find products they are interested in. Amazon also does almost no curation. This is why it is often hard to distinguish between good non-fiction books and books which spread disinformation. Third, a lot of Amazon initiatives have failed. Examples include Alexa (a giant money pit), the Fire Phone, Amazon's video game division (over a billion and basically only produced 1 moderate hit), Prime Video (a mediocre streaming competitor), etc. I have also heard Amazon has been destroying Twitch.

My main point is, the article paints Amazon as an unstoppable machine when in fact it is very fallible. It does some great things (AWS), some good things (Kindle), some OK things, and sometimes some very bad things.

I was sure you were going to get to the counterfeit and substandard goods problem, but you cited plenty of things in your comment, so I'll just add it.

Amazon's retail market is absolutely lousy with counterfeit goods, as well as products blindly imported from China (usually) which don't meet the standards required by regulation for such goods. This regularly causes injury, especially due to electrical fires, and Amazon has not been held to account for any of these practices.

Try heading to a street corner and selling counterfeit products: it's a crime, you'll be charged accordingly. Amazon has gotten away with this for more than a decade.

Amazon’s search is terrible. They used to have Udi Manber, who literally wrote the book on Search, so it’s got to be deliberate.

Amazon employee here, seven years at the company so far. This is my personal opinion only:

I don't know that there are many articles I've read about Amazon that have a balanced view. I will say that many people who are anti-Amazon have this picture of Amazon as being more ruthless (and smarter) than it actually is.

For example, an Amazon seller can make the claim that Amazon used it's access to marketplace data to research info about their product sales and then compete with them. But as an insider I believe the reality is probably far more stupid: a seller who had their product "copied" by Amazon was likely just a middleman who was using a factory in China to make their product. The middleman is basically just extracting value from being a middleman. But most Chinese factories produce extra product on the side. Once they setup the toolchain and processes for building your product why not keep the assembly lines running a bit longer and produce a few thousand more copies of your product? Or maybe the factory keeps a big stockpile of the rejected product that was slightly bad quality, so they couldn't send it to the original middleman. And if you are this Chinese factory then why not sell this extra product (mixing in the lower quality rejects) directly to Amazon for Amazon to list as an Amazon Basic? The factory can make more money by cutting out the middleman, and some ignorant Amazon product acquisition worker will buy that stuff, not even realizing it is what it is. No "sensitive business information" needed. So "Amazon copied my product as an Amazon Basic" is probably way more dumb than it sounds.

Or the "Amazon copied my product idea or roadmap" claim from the article. Do you realize how many ideas there are floating around in Amazon when you have >1 million employees? Any idea you can come up with has already been suggested dozens of times by Amazon employees and was probably also requested by Amazon's own customers via support a couple thousand times. The only question is whether that idea is worth building now versus worth building later. And as it turns out when there is real demand for an idea there tends to be multiple people who start building that idea at the same time. In fact sometimes there are multiple teams within Amazon who start trying to build the same thing at the same time, and they didn't even know about each other. Often one team fails to build it while another team succeeds. The duplicated effort eventually gets sorted out, but it happens a lot.

This is the type of scenario that happens time and time again. It's fun to write a click attracting story about Amazon as this big brutal force when the reality is most likely much dumber than it seems.

As a former employee of a 100K+ person company, I've had these exact thoughts several times. I worked in acquisitions, and constantly was finding out that we were reinventing (or rebuying) the wheel internally in independent departments.

Amazon is the only company I know of that has to have contingency plans for blowing through the available local workforce, their treatment of people is that bad. I have been at the very bottom of society, and everyone chose to work somewhere else than an Amazon warehouse, including the local refuse recycling plant sorting putrid trash that paid less.

My friend worked at the Amazon warehouse in Scotland, it was hard work, but paid relatively well. He ris extremely hard worker. Exactly one time he got stomach flu, came in green barely standing and said he can't work. Was fired on spot.

Is that kind of thing legal in UK?

Protections are stronger once you work for some time (1.5y?). But he was immigrant and maybe could have fought it, but did not.

By "balanced view," do you mean the one where Amazon lawyers attempt to erode the ever-growing list of credible reports outlining Amazon engaging in and encouraging the tactics outlined in the article/book?

From what I can tell, the article is remarkably spot on.

It begs the question, without government contracts[1], where would Amazon actually be? Would Amazon be out of business? Hmm... Makes you wonder.

[1] https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/files/cow/imce/papers/20...

They file all sorts of forms for where their revenue comes from, they're very profitable without government help, it's an easily checkable fact.

That's actually a point of contention. Aside from AWS, how successful is Amazon actually?

Can I read this on Kindle?

There was a link to buy on Amazon, so I expect so.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com