US Senate Report Criticizes Amazon Work Environment
Worker Injury Data Manipulation and Ignoring Internal Safety Recommendations
The U.S. Senate revealed on the 16th (local time) that Amazon, the world's largest e-commerce company, manipulated data regarding injuries among warehouse workers and ignored internal safety improvement recommendations.
The U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, led by Senator Bernie Sanders (Vermont), announced in a report of about 160 pages that "Amazon regarded employee injuries as merely a business cost."
The investigation, which began in June 2023, collected seven years of injury data from Amazon workplaces and conducted interviews with more than 130 Amazon warehouse workers. According to the Associated Press, this was in response to a significant increase in injuries among Amazon warehouse workers since 2019. Amazon has been accused of overlooking worker injuries and operating a surveillance system that forces faster work speeds to maximize company profits.
The report pointed out that Amazon’s policies, especially productivity and quota targets, cause fatigue and repetitive stress, increasing the risk of worker injuries, and despite recording an injury rate about 30% higher than the industry average, the company manipulated statistics to conceal the fact that it was more dangerous than competitors.
In particular, the report claimed that Amazon conducted its own studies analyzing the causes of warehouse injuries in 2020 and 2021 and research on the effects of repetitive movements during shifts on musculoskeletal disorders. Based on these, it recommended giving warehouse workers more rest time, but the company did not accept these recommendations.
Senator Sanders strongly criticized in a statement, "The shocking and dangerous working conditions revealed in this 160-page report on Amazon warehouses are unacceptable," adding, "Amazon executives repeatedly chose to prioritize profits over worker health and safety by ignoring recommendations that could significantly reduce injuries. This is the kind of outrageous corporate greed that the American people are utterly exhausted by."
Amazon responded with a direct rebuttal. Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel said, "The claim that we deliberately underreport injuries is completely false," and criticized the report for "weaving together outdated documents and unverifiable anecdotes to create a bias that Senator Sanders and his associates have pursued over the past 18 months." She also pointed out that Amazon employs 800,000 frontline workers in the U.S. alone, and the 130 workers interviewed for the investigation represent only a very small fraction of the total workforce.
Meanwhile, the Amazon union, which recently joined the Teamsters union, has announced plans for a strike at the end of the year. The justification is to improve Amazon’s low wages and poor working conditions. Given the important year-end shopping season for e-commerce companies, if the strike occurs, Amazon is expected to face inevitable damage. On the same day, Amazon’s stock closed at $232.93, up 2.4% from the previous session on the New York Stock Exchange.
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