by Massimo Gaggi
For the first time, the employees of the sales giant vote for a “union”. Here’s what happened
At the start of the pandemic on March 30, 2020, Chris Smalls, an employee at Amazon’s major fulfillment center on Staten Island outside of New York City, was fired while organizing protests and even a walkout to urge the company to take action against workers to protect against possible infections better effectively. The young African American also didn’t take it well because, to justify the suspension of employment, the sales giant of Jeff Bezos, America’s secondlargest employer with almost a million employees, accused the coronavirus epidemic: Smalls of violating distancing rules by telling workers, which he wanted to organize, came too close.
Integrating unions into companies has always been very difficult in an America that has never allowed much room for worker representatives, particularly in the private sector, partly because the laws give companies free reign to discourage proselytism. Across the commercial world, American workers have no significant representation. Attempts by the more organized unions with the economic resources to resist protracted strikes to break into Amazon also failed. But Chris didn’t give up: He started his union, the ALU (Amazon Labor Union), from scratch, crowdsourcing with donations he received on the GoFundMe platform, began proselytizing and organizing protests (even before Bezos’ residency in Washington where you leave a guillotine at the door) and yesterday, exactly two years into his struggle, he won: Staten Island voted to create a union bureau. the first time this is happening at Amazon and one of the first ever in the US retail world
The most significant precedent is Starbucks, the network of 9,000 bars controlled by Howard Schultz, which despite its progressive ideas has always opposed union entry into its company. Four months ago, employees at one of his stores the one in Elmhood Village on the outskirts of Buffalo voted (19 in favor, 8 against) to join a union for the first time. Two more polls in Buffalo stores ended in a union rejection and a contentious result: a dispute that will be settled in court. Now a hundred other Starbucks stores have asked to vote.
The years of the pandemic, with employees feeling more at risk of contagion, heightened workers’ union sensitivity, but Amazon wasn’t looking: It raised wages to at least $15 an hour, provided insurance (modest) health benefits to most workers and granted some other benefits (such as a minimum paid vacation). However, workers continued to complain about harsh conditions, grueling shifts and poor virus protection. And it remained very difficult for labor organizations to enter a factory or warehouse: in the same hours as the Staten Island vote, the struggle to organize the Fulfillment Center in Bessemer, Alabama, ended with no certain outcome. In the large plant with 5,000 employees, which opened in March 2020, there was a vote a year ago and a clear majority of employees (1,798 compared to 738) had spoken out against unions entering the company. The unions denounced that the vote was distorted by the company’s intimidation and threats against employees, who are 85% African American. The NLRB, the Labor Department’s union relations agency, recognized the validity of the appeal and ordered a rerun of the vote, also expressed on March 31. The no to union again outnumbered the s, but only marginally (993 to 875), and most notably there are 416 contested ballots: it is up to the judges to decide how many and which are considered valid. The outcome of this fight will therefore be decided in court.
No doubt, however, in Staten Island, where only 67 votes were cast: of the 8,325 eligible voters, 3,654 voted for the union and 2,131 against. Chris won it despite the Amazon campaign, which covered Staten Island with posters in English and Spanish, and the antiunion seminars all employees were required to attend.
April 2, 2022 (Modified April 2, 2022 | 11:38)
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