Sanders, Warren hit Amazon for ‘intolerable’ worker conditions in new letter to Bezos
The company, one of the world’s most valuable, has become a lightning rod for income inequality
A coalition of 15 U.S. senators, including Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, penned a letter to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos slamming the e-commerce behemoth’s record on worker safety and health.
In a public letter addressed on Friday, the senators said they were concerned about reports of bleak and dangerous conditions inside Amazon facilities.
The group of Democratic and independent lawmakers cited a November report, published by The Atlantic and Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting, which documented a high rate of serious injuries at some of the company’s 100 fulfillment centers nationwide, in some cases more than double the national average for the warehousing industry. Amazon said at the time that the injury rates are high because it’s aggressive about recording injuries and cautious about allowing injured workers to return before they’re ready.
“Any practice that puts profits before worker safety is unacceptable,” the group, led by Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., wrote. Both Sanders and Warren are competing in the Democratic presidential primary to unseat incumbent President Trump in November.
The call comes amid ongoing reports about dangerous conditions inside Amazon facilities. A separate report conducted by the National Employment Law Project published in January found that a “high-stress environment” inside the world’s largest online retailer has led to a mental health crisis among some employees, as well as pressure on injured workers to return to their job before they’re ready.
AMAZON PAID TAX RATE OF 1.2% ON $13B IN PROFITS LAST YEAR
“Amazon’s dismal safety record indicates a greater concern for profits than for your own workers’ safety and health,” the senators wrote. “We urge you to overhaul this profit-at-all costs culture at your company.”
In a statement on Monday, Amazon said that “nothing is more important” than the safety and well-being of its employees. It also extended an invitation to the senators to take a tour of its fulfillment centers.
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“OSHA is on the record as saying that underreporting of injuries is an industry-wide problem, and companies do this to keep their rates low — a former assistant secretary of OSHA estimated that 50 percent or more of severe injuries go unreported,” Amazon spokesperson Kelly Cheeseman said in a statement to Recode. “Amazon does the opposite; we take an aggressive stance on recording injuries no matter how big or small.”
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The letter, whose signatories also included Kamala Harris, D-Calif., Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., and Cory Booker, D-N.J., called on Bezos to impose several changes at his e-commerce empire, including reducing workers’ quotas and speed requirements; publicizing its record of serious injuries on the company’s website; and prohibit supervisors and managers from discrimination or retaliation when workers report injuries or safety concerns.
The company, one of the world’s most valuable, has become a lightning rod for income inequality, while simultaneously facing accusations that it has managed, repeatedly, to dodge paying its fair share in taxes. (Recent regulatory filings show that it paid $162 million in federal income taxes on $13.3 billion of U.S. pre-tax income, an effective rate of 1.2 percent). Warren has called for the break-up of Amazon, as well as other big tech companies in the country like Facebook and Google.
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In 2018, Sanders also introduced a bill, named the “Stop BEZOS Act”, which would have forced large employers, including Amazon, to cover the cost of food stamps given to employees. However, Amazon shortly thereafter announced that it would raise its minimum wage to $15 per hour.
The letter was published just days before The New York Times ran an op-ed from Jay Carney, a former White House press secretary for President Barack Obama and now Amazon’s senior vice president for global corporate affairs, titled “Why Bernie Sanders Praised Amazon.”
In the op-ed, Carney acknowledged that Amazon “deserves scrutiny,” but touted the company’s pay increase in 2018 and called on political leaders, including Sanders, to “follow our lead.”
“We also hope that, in examining what we already do, those critics at least acknowledge this: When it comes to creating jobs, raising wages, providing benefits and training employees for higher-paying jobs, Amazon is doing many good things — for the economy, and for American workers,” he wrote.
