The issue with blaming contractors in this case is that they can't afford to lose the job. It probably pays well enough but their options are 1. get fired because they couldn't meet target deadlines, 2. pee in a bottle and risk getting caught.
Given those two options, it's no surprise they pick option 2. Amazon knows this yet they continue to set unrealistic targets.
How do you know they are setting “unrealistic targets”? What if only some employees pee in bottles because they’re bad at their job/unproductive? Why would it be Amazon’s fault if a driver who’s falling behind uses this as a hack to appear productive when they really should just get a different job?
We have reports from the workers stating so. We also have a denial from Amazon saying they don't have workers peeing in bottles. Seems that denial hasn't held up too well.
We have anecdotal reports from a few workers saying so. We also have leaked documents saying that Amazon does not allow peeing in bottles as policy. If a random employee does not follow the policy and pees in a bottle, that seems like the employee's fault. If the employee is doing so to make up lost time so they can appear more productive, it seems like that's an issue of under performance that they're hiding by peeing in a bottle. Either way, it isn't clear to me that this is either widespread among Amazon's employees or the fault of the company instead of the individual.
As for the denial - I am unclear on if they're talking about employees as a separate group from their drivers (who may be contractors according to other comments here?). Either way, I think it's reasonable for a company to make such a statement if peeing in a bottle is not a standard practice that is allowed by their policy and if it is only done rarely or by very few people (not reflective of general practice). If the delivery targets are such that most drivers have to do this, I might think differently, but so far I haven't seen evidence of this.
> it seems like that's an issue of under performance that they're hiding by peeing in a bottle.
It seems equally as likely that it is an issue of over-expecting what a worker can reasonably perform. Why is under performance the more likely scenario in your mind?
>it isn't clear to me that this is either widespread
If this were the only occurrence of "Amazon Contractor" and some combination of "pee", "bottle", "no time for bathroom breaks", etc. I would be more inclined to take the route of "a few bad workers". However, these stories have consistently made news since at least 2018.
Additional factors, which not conclusive themselves, that lead me to doubt the Amazon narrative include such things like 74% of respondents to a survey conducted by Organise reporting that they avoid using the washroom for fear of missing targets[1] - indicating that perhaps at least some fault lies with Amazon for setting unrealistic and unnecessarily burdensome targets.
> It seems equally as likely that it is an issue of over-expecting what a worker can reasonably perform. Why is under performance the more likely scenario in your mind?
If other employees can meet the quota but you can't, why would you assume that the quota is wrong? Maybe it's the wrong job for you.
> I would be more inclined to take the route of "a few bad workers". However, these stories have consistently made news since at least 2018
Perhaps it has something to do with the attempts to unionize?
> like 74% of respondents to a survey conducted by Organise reporting that they avoid using the washroom for fear
Is there a cost for saying that? If this didn't rise to the level of fear, but only apprehension, would they be censured for overreaching rhetoric? If not, how trustworthy is it? And it still leaves 25% comfortably hitting quota showing that the quota itself is fine.
Given those two options, it's no surprise they pick option 2. Amazon knows this yet they continue to set unrealistic targets.