Amazon.com destroying good products

This 2013 video from Germany says about itself:

Amazon worker Matthias: “We are humans, not robots”

Matthias is working for Amazon in Leipzig, Germany. In his shifts he walks round about 30km. The hand-held scanner he is working with controls every step he takes, monitors the efficiency of his work. Amazon prices are low, as are the wages for the workers. That is why Matthias and his colleagues are fighting for a labour agreement.

Translated from Dutch NOS TV today:

‘Amazon destroys massively return shipments in Germany’

Internet shop corporation Amazon destroys massively returned products and even new products in Germany. This is shown by research by the television program Frontal 21 of the German broadcaster ZDF and by the German magazine WirtschaftsWoche. The German Environment Ministry speaks of a scandal.

Journalists had access to internal documents and photographs of the shop floor. They also spoke with staff from the American web shop giant. This shows that all kinds of goods are being destroyed on a large scale in the German distribution centers of Amazon. The company also offers third-party vendors to have their products destroyed, as stated in internal documents.

This concerns all kinds of products: from refrigerators and dishwashers to mattresses and furniture. An Amazon employee tells the journalists that she throws away tens of thousands of euros every day. And that while a lot of products that are thrown away, still function perfectly or are even new. Why that happens is not clear. …

Maybe because working to give these products a useful new life would damage the profits of Amazon boss Jeff Bezos, the richest man in the world?

Amazon annually sells an amount of 15 billion dollars in Germany.

In German politics, there were angry reactions to the conclusions of ZDF and WirtschaftsWoche. According to the secretary of state of the Ministry of Environment, this is a huge scandal. “We consume a lot in this world, with all the problems which that causes. Such a way of working does not fit in with what should happen today. I am convinced that many people are shocked and do not accept this.” The environmental organization Greenpeace is also angry and wants a law to be passed against this type of practice.

‘Amazon workers treated like in Asian sweatshops’: here.

A comprehensive new report released Sunday by the New York-based labor rights watchdog China Labor Watch (CLW) has shed new light on the barbaric and illegal practices that Amazon employs to boost its profits by driving down production costs on the backs of factory workers at the company’s electronics assembly plants in China: here.

Shoppers can purchase Amazon.com merchandise displaying symbols of white supremacy, despite the site’s policy against selling products that promote hatred, according to a new report from two watchdog groups: here.

As Jeff Bezos’ wealth reaches $150 billion. By Will Morrow and Genevieve Leigh. 17 July 2018. Thousands of Amazon workers in Spain, Germany, and Poland are engaged in coordinated strike action meant to coincide with Amazon “Prime Day”, the company’s invented one-and-half-day shopping holiday: here.

USA: Earlier this week, United Parcel Service workers voted by 93 percent to authorize the Teamsters union to call a strike when the five-year labor agreement covering more 230,000 drivers, warehouse and other workers at UPS hubs and air cargo operations across the US expires on July 31. UPS Freight workers, including over-the-road and city truck drivers and associated workers, voted by 91 percent to strike: here.