FILE PHOTO: A box from Amazon.com is pictured on the porch of a house in Golden, Colorado July 23, 2008. REUTERS/Rick Wilking
BERLIN (Reuters) - The trade union Verdi has called for workers at six Amazon sites in Germany to go on strike from Sunday evening for four days in the latest attempt to try to force the U.S. e-commerce group to recognise collective bargaining agreements.
Verdi said the strikes at Amazon’s sites in Rheinberg, Werne, Koblenz, Leipzig and at two locations in Bad Hersfeld signalled an “unofficial start” to wage talks for the retail and mail order industry, which are due to begin in the next few weeks.
“Amazon is making a mint in the coronavirus crisis. For this reason alone, wage evasion must be stopped there,” said Verdi representative Orhan Akman.
Verdi is demanding a pay increase of 4.5% for workers in the retail and mail order industry.
“This must also be possible at Amazon this year,” Akman said.
Amazon has faced a long-running battle with unions in Germany over better pay and conditions for logistics workers, who have frequently staged strikes since 2013.
Germany is Amazon’s biggest market after the United States.
Amazon says it offers excellent pay and benefits. It has said during past calls for strikes over 90% of employees in the logistic centres worked as normal.
keks-dose on March 29th, 2021 at 07:55 UTC »
As someone who lives in Denmark I can tell you that unions fought for 37 hours work week, decent wages, parental leave, sick leave (when I'm sick, I call work and they say "get well soon" and I return when I'm well, I still get payed while I'm sick), sick leave when my kid is sick, two days a year for caring for my kid until my kid turns 7, 6th week of payed vacation, senior days for those who are older. When I'm pregnant I can't get fired. When I get fired there are rules the employer has to follow, like after a year of working I will be payed 3 months full salary after getting fired, it goes up to 9 months of salary, depending on your function and how long you've been working there. If I work overtime the overtime either gets payed or I can save it to go on vacation..... (that list goes for the field I work in).
I don't know why Americans are against such things. I know companies only care about money but why do workers don't care about themselves and their families?
McDonald's was against unionizing in Denmark for a long time. They said it would hurt their business. Finally workers unionized. Workers are happier, work faster and it only has been beneficial to McDonald's.
JanssenFromCanada on March 28th, 2021 at 21:40 UTC »
Yes please. EU pressure to enable unions in Amazon is a must, especially in this day and age.
itsnowayman on March 28th, 2021 at 20:57 UTC »
What kind of world do you want to live in? Where people who commit their working lives to an organization do or don't have a say about pay, health care, benefits and retirement. If Amazon wants to suffocate other business opportunities and own everything, then do you want them to determine your quality of life?