It is a major defeat for American trade unionists. The attempt to create the first union at Amazon in a warehouse in Alabama, in the southeast of the United States, failed Friday, April 9. A majority of employees who took part in the ballot voted against this initiative.
Around 5 p.m. French time, more than half of the 3,215 ballots received at the Bessemer plant had a negative vote: 1,798 employees had voted against the creation of a union, against 738 in favor. Just over 5,800 employees were called upon to vote, but attendance was only 55%. These figures confirm the defeat of supporters of unionization and the victory of the e-commerce giant, which had campaigned against the movement.
“Our system is broken and Amazon has benefited greatly”, said Thursday Stuart Appelbaum, president of RWDSU, the distribution union that employees of the Bessemer warehouse wanted to join. “We will call on the Federal Labor Law Agency to hold Amazon to account for its illegal and shocking behavior during the campaign”, he warned.
Hellish cadences
Bessemer’s movement took on a national dimension. He has seen backing against union workers – artists, Democratic and Republican parliamentarians, and even President Joe Biden – and Amazon, whose businesses flourished during the pandemic.
The Seattle group and the RWDSU clashed online. On the ground, Amazon has been making its case against unionization with texts, posters and weekly briefings in the warehouse for months, as unionists canvassed employees at the entrance to the warehouse. warehouse day and night.
Union workers complain of hellish pace, lack of time to go to the toilet or to eat, the lack of security protections (especially against Covid-19) and insufficient wages in relation to the work requested.
For its part, Amazon defends itself by recalling that wages start at $ 15 an hour (more than double the minimum wage in Alabama) and that it provides social benefits, such as health coverage. The group ensures that its employees have the necessary breaks.
Amazon, the second largest employer in the United States with 800,000 employees, is regularly criticized on the front of social and environmental responsibilities by associations and some of its employees.
Another case tarnished its image this week: the agency responsible for labor law in the United States, the NLRB, estimated, after an investigation, that the layoffs of two computer designers, who had criticized the online commerce giant , were indeed retaliatory measures on the part of the company.
