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If everyone had a college education it would not create more white collar and professional class jobs. The same amount of people would be unemployed or underemployed. Even today you will find a great many people with college degrees working in menial jobs. These people often lack the social skills or connections to advance into higher level employment even though they posses the degree to do so. Over educating the population is not the answer, it’s expensive and ineffective. Educating the right people for the right jobs is the answer. Those with the drive, potential and intelligence to achieve a high level career need a good college education. Some people need a good vocational training program. Some struggle just to finish high school. The world still must find a place for those with only a basic education. Tossing them out like trash by replacing them with robots will not end well.
The idea that the future has no place for the “regular joe” is a dangerous one. If this idea that robots will replace all blue collar workers one becomes reality we will be looking at half the population being unemployed. Those people will then proceed to tear the country apart. It is not reasonable to assume that they will peacefully go live in their shanty towns while robots replace them.
There are lots of selling platforms besides Amazon now. Some require you sell locally and some offer a shipping option. I network with a lot of people who put products out there on multiple platforms at the same time and they get good results from them. So you can still do what you did before elsewhere. And I only brought up my FBA business because another person claimed I get nothing from Amazon so why should I care what is going on there.
I do have compassion for people but when they get concessions and keep demanding more and more there is a point where its just ridiculous. It seems like nothing will appease these people.That was my point. I have a relative that just began her teaching career and her starting pay is in the same range as these Amazon workers. And she has a degree with teaching credentials.
I have had a few employees like these workers over the years that you cannot never please. And in the case of these fulfillment workers there will be a point when its more cost effective to automate their job. I am just pointing out the obvious. And like I have said a few times I really believe this is a union power play and they are just using these workers.
Yes, there are other selling platforms that do not get the foot traffic that Amazon did. I moved to those and never could even sell a fourth of what I sold on Amazon. The supply sources I used to have dried up anyway over the years, so I had trouble keeping it going. Finally, I just accepted that I didn't have the money to keep it going, but had I kept selling during those years until the supply dried up I would've been a lot better off. I had perfect seller feedback and never once ripped off a customer. I had done nothing wrong to be put out of business the way I was at the time. Amazon had absolutely no respect for my ability to please my customers on their site and threw me off like I was trash. There had never been one complaint made against me in all the years I sold on there. That should have showed I was a good seller, but they didn't care. I was kicked off the same as a seller who had ripped people off. I was considered in the same category to them as someone like that.
The ACA doesn't cap them at 29 hours a week, greedy employers being unwilling to provide health insurance to full time employees does. And you can thank labour laws for 16 hour shifts not being the norm...laws that only happened because working people actually fought for them rather than meekly bending over for their employer and hoping they find a new job paying 2 cents more per hour during the limited time they had to job hunt.
Regarding the bolded... how did that turn out during the Industrial Revolution and in third world countries nowadays?
Without unions or laws, workers will ALWAYS be at a fundamental disadvantage when it comes to negotiations. There will always be more people who need to pay bills to survive than there will be companies.
Private sector union workers down from 20% to about 10% from 1985-2015.
I'd suspect most of that is due to off-shoring.
It's all about supply and demand. Companies can move jobs to non-union areas, areas with little or no environmental controls, or rely on illegal labor etc. etc.
Public sector is still close to 40% union, public at 10%.
I'm actually pro-private union, not so much pro-public union due to the gross abuses I've seen in some of Americas large cities which are run like oligarchies.
Yes, the democrats built a 29hour "escape hatch" into ACA for companies to get out of offering healthcare....which pushes these workers that make little into highly subsidized plans which means everyone else like you and me got to pay that bill and not the employer.
They are getting $16-$20 per hour now. Show me the money as they say.
They are getting at least $16/hour and Amazon is pledging to reduce pay to $15 and that isn't enough to warrant strikes? Those with $20/hour losing $5/hour should cause someone to get upset.
Get real. In most areas of the country, $15/hour is not a living wage. Period. Adjusted for inflation, the minimum wage should be around $23-25/hour. Amazon could easily pay its workers $25/hour, offer low-cost health care coverage, and a month's vacation every year--and Jeff Bezos would still be a billionaire.
A sad day for the nation when its citizens lick the boots of oligarchs, and even applaud when those same boots crush the neck of fellow American workers. Didn't used to be that way.
I used to sell on Amazon years ago. I got put out of that business because Amazon changed a policy and started requiring the merchandise to be obtained a certain way that costs a significant amount of money that I could never obtain. I was a smaller level seller. It.
I don't think this amazon thread is really about sellers. Sellers don't need to go on a "wage strike" because they aren't paid actual wages by Amazon. This is more about the half a million Amazon employees, many of whom are managers, truck drivers, ware house workers...
Who says it has to be white collar ? Plenty of jobs in the trades which are short on workers cause "everyone wants to be a white collar worker" only they don't have the smarts for it.
Get real. In most areas of the country, $15/hour is not a living wage. Period. Adjusted for inflation, the minimum wage should be around $23-25/hour. .
Since I've worked for Amazon, I think I have enough input to say that I don't believe the minimum wage should be $25 an hour. I didn't get paid that and didn't feel entitled to that, since I wasn't doing highly skilled work. I think $15 an hour is just fine. Sure, in places like Hawaii and California, it might not go far. But for most of Americans, $15 an hour is fair pay for the types of jobs that many amazon workers do. They also get 401K (for both part time and full time workers) and if full time, health benefits, discounts, etc. This is not a bad or unfair business.
If all businesses were forced to pay workers $25 an hour, that would be a nightmare. Some places would go out of business, others would have massive lay-offs or outsource like crazy. We don't need a $25 an hour minimum wage.
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