Comment on Amazon Says It Doesn't 'Employ' Drivers, But Records Show It Hired Firms to Prevent Them From Unionizing

• DrZoidberg@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  I’ve had Amazon packages delivered by some dude wearing basketball shorts and a t-shirt driving a random Toyota Corolla. It’s like they use Uber for delivery.

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  • buckykat@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    Anything to keep the union out

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  • Nhickz@lemmy.one ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    Thats an amazon flex driver , its like a much more strict uber eats , they only hire so many flex drivers , but it works similar to uber , pick your hours , they normaly have a route between 1-3 hours , around 25-100 packages , used to be more , but they lowered it . Amazon has delivery service providers for the main vans , they are “self made companies” . Amazon provides the initial cash to start them , normaly charges them for the vans , and has nearly all controle over them . They live in a legal gray area , most have few enough “employees” to skirt large business laws .

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  • Nommer@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    They do. I have a friend that makes some side cash delivering for them in his personal vehicle.

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• _finger_@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  Then it should be even easier to unionize

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  • irotsoma@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

    Can’t unionize a workplace when you’re the owner and only employee. That’s how the law treats “independent contractors”.

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    • Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      I kinda don’t like how unions are a legal thing… Why are they not just a a private club, where people collectively agree to not take shit conditions anymore? Why can’t all independent contractors go on strike tomorrow?

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      • irotsoma@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

        Because employers have the power. Without the legally protected status as a union you have no legal right to protest the conditions of your job. You have no right to refuse to work under dangerous conditions. And employers are free to retaliate against workers for even talking about unions or talking about reporting the dangerous conditions. How are you going to get people together who are all desperate for money and get them all to agree to go on strike and then get other people to not come in and take the jobs. One way used to be to call them scabs, make everyone else hate them through propaganda campaigns, and hire the Mafia to beat them up until they quit and no one else would take the jobs. It wasn’t until the NLRA that unions were protected.

        But conservatives have turned anti-worker now due to their reliance on corporate donations among other things. And they have spent decades making unions look bad, saying they’re just criminal organizations, and calling them communism. So not enough people are going to feel sorry for the striking worker or hate on the scabs enough to pressure the companies to give in to demands.

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    • nsfw_alt_2023@lemmynsfw.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      National Taxi Workers’ Alliance says hello

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      • irotsoma@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

        Taxi workers are no longer considered independent contractors.

        Independent contractors aren’t covered by the NLRA. So they don’t have the right to have a union and a company is not required to deal with a union and can retaliate against independent contractors for even discussing being in a union.

        Now what is considered to be an independent contractor has varied over time. Generally when conservatives are in office, the definition expands to exclude more people from protection. And more liberal presidents put in more liberal heads of the NLRB that are more likely to shrink the definition.

        There were several factors that led to the taxi workers alliance creation and becoming recognized as a union. One of the biggest ones is that they used the medallion system and other similar laws to their advantage in that if enough of the medallion owners were refusing to work, then they couldn’t just hire new workers. There aren’t exclusivity laws like that in very many other industries, including delivery services, to use to put pressure on employers.

        And it took like 20 years to be recognized as a union when the NLRB declared that taxi workers are employees and not independent contractors in 2015.

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    • VindictiveJudge@startrek.website ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

      Counter their bullshit with your own. “We’re not a union, we’re a guild.”

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• Earthwormjim91@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

  Usually not independent contractors. Amazon has contracts with other regional companies to do local deliveries and drivers are employees of these smaller companies.

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