Amazon insists that it doesn’t employ drivers directly, as the company has a habit of hiring outside companies and so-called contractors to deliver its packages. But it looks like Amazon acknowledges that drivers are, indeed, its employees whenever these workers threaten to unionize, according to Vice, and the company continues to spend millions on anti-union efforts, which specifically refer to Amazon’s “drivers” in filings sent to the U.S. Department of Labor.
The tech giant spent a total of $14.2 million on anti-union consulting throughout its operations and warehouses in 2022, and a small portion of that formally recognizes drivers as the target of union-busting. Vice looked at filings and reports that say $160,595 went to two consulting firms for whom “drivers” were the target group. The consulting agencies cite the “teamsters” as the union in question, and other related filings disclose that the firms were hired to discourage drivers from joining the Teamsters — the largest union in America.
The filings also show that this anti-union activity is carried out by consulting agencies that are themselves third-party companies; this puts some distance between Amazon and union-busting directly. It also creates a web of contractors and subcontractors that are then busting unions (or quashing talk thereof) that involve other contractors and subcontractors. As if Amazon could push away these groups and put a legal buffer that would hold up to legal scrutiny.
Amazon is now in a bit of a bind, because how can the company exercise any power over (or spend any money on) workers that don’t belong to the company? Per FOLLOW US ON GOOGLE NEWS