<story><title>Employees at Amazon&apos;s New NYC Warehouse Launch Unionization Push</title><url>https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-12-12/employees-at-amazon-s-new-nyc-warehouse-launch-unionization-push</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>nimbius</author><text>to the employees at Amazon trying to unionize:  good luck...this is a hard hard road in the US.&lt;p&gt;I worked for a large automotive repair chain briefly in 2007 that eventually unionized after 3 years.  working conditions were absolutely miserable and unsafe.  The garage pit for oil changes caught fire twice in a year due to lack of maintenance from management.  At some point our oil heating system burst before christmas and we were all made to work with no heat over new years.  we habitually hired anyone with a pulse and paid the price in OSHA violations until our insurance dropped us.  the last straw was when someone lost half their foot under a jerry-rigged lift that management wouldnt fix for a year.&lt;p&gt;Once we did get a union, management closed the shop and chained the doors.  six of our long-timers and a very nice local doctor got together and bought the property from the franchise owner out of bankruptcy.  The Local 701 chipped in and helped re-brand the shop and even replaced the aging air compressors.</text></comment>
<story><title>Employees at Amazon&apos;s New NYC Warehouse Launch Unionization Push</title><url>https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-12-12/employees-at-amazon-s-new-nyc-warehouse-launch-unionization-push</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>Rainymood</author><text>My gripe with the American unionization debacle is that it&amp;#x27;s a self-fulfilling prophecy, you&amp;#x27;re the pillars keeping the problem standing. It&amp;#x27;s the same with tipping. If everyone suddenly stopped tipping, then people would not have enough wages to meet their obligations. This results in people not being able to pay rent etc., however, this also leads to a walk-out of the servers that don&amp;#x27;t want to work for under minimum wage anymore. The problem is that people that are tipping and servers that are encouraging the tipping are keeping the problem alive.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s the same thing with unionization, unionization is beneficial for workers, yet everyone keeps undercutting each other to stay afloat and meet their obligations. Because people can not properly cooperate and work together you are stuck in this bad equilibrium where companies have so much power over you.&lt;p&gt;That being said, this exploitation of the working class has lead to a lot of technological innovation  coming from the USA, let&amp;#x27;s not forget that. Of course, this has lead to a huge inequality and divide in social class and wealth.&lt;p&gt;So that concludes my rant basically. Your attitude towards these kind of problems is complex, but completely human and understandable. No complex question has a simple answer ... but I think that this is a step in the right direction.&lt;p&gt;I want to conclude that I&amp;#x27;m a European, so if you feel like I completely missed the mark, please feel free to open a dialogue with me!</text></comment>