NEW YORK — Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has opened a Senate investigation into Amazon’s warehouse security practices, the most recent in a sequence of probes he’s initiated towards massive firms in his function as chairman of a committee that oversees well being and labor points.
Sanders, who has run for president twice and spent a political lifetime preventing firms and monied pursuits over insurance policies that he believes damage the working class, despatched a letter to Amazon CEO Andy Jassy on Tuesday accusing the e-commerce large of “egregious health and safety violations.”
“The company’s quest for profits at all costs has led to unsafe physical environments, intense pressure to work at unsustainable rates, and inadequate medical attention for tens of thousands of Amazon workers every year,” Sanders, who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, wrote within the letter.
The 81-year-old progressive senator additionally accused the corporate, which operates an unlimited community of warehouses throughout the nation, of failing to undertake “adequate worker protections” due to a company tradition that treats staff as disposable.
Amazon spokesperson Steve Kelly stated the corporate has obtained Sanders’ letter and is within the early phases of reviewing it.
“We take the safety and health of our employees very seriously,” Kelly stated. “There will always be ways to improve, but we’re proud of the progress we’ve made which includes a 23% reduction in recordable injuries across our U.S. operations since 2019.”
Kelly additionally famous the corporate has invested greater than $1 billion into security initiatives within the final 4 years and can proceed investing on this space.
Injuries at Amazon have sometimes been greater in contrast with its friends within the trade, which critics and labor security consultants blame on the corporate’s fast-paced warehouses that observe productiveness and permit clients to get their packages rapidly. Labor teams have seized on the difficulty in an effort to arrange staff, a few of which has borne fruit however hasn’t led to an enormous wave of unionization.
In his letter, Sanders pointed to citations Amazon has obtained from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration for office security violations, which the corporate says it has appealed. He additionally identified one other investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York into what that workplace known as “possible fraudulent conduct” by Amazon designed to cover accidents from OSHA and others.
According to the corporate, accidents throughout its U.S. operations – which embody decrease again accidents, strains and sprains – took a slight dip final yr – clocking in at 6.7% per 200,000 working hours. But these figures had been nonetheless greater in comparison with 2020.
In his letter, Sanders additionally cited a report from a coalition of three labor unions, which stated severe accidents at Amazon had been greater than double the remainder of the warehouse sector final yr. Amazon disputes among the findings.
“There will always be ways for our critics to splice data to suit their narrative, but the fact is, we’ve made progress and our numbers clearly show it,” Kelly stated.
The investigation into Amazon follows an analogous probe from the Senate committee into Starbucks and pharmaceutical large Moderna. As a part of the Amazon investigation, the committee is asking Amazon staff to submit tales about their time on the firm by way of a web site. The committee says the submissions will stay confidential.
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