Democratic Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., on Thursday introduced new legislation to regulate the use of productivity quotas by warehouse employers such as Amazona tool that critics said encourages workers to work faster and without frequent breaks, putting them at higher risk of injury.
The bill, called the Warehouse Worker Protection Act, is the first attempt to police warehouse quotas at the federal level, after states like California, New York, Washington and Minnesota passed similar laws.
The legislation would require employers to be more transparent about workplace quotas and potential disciplinary consequences, and to provide workers with at least two business days’ notice of any changes to quotas or workplace surveillance.
It also seeks to ban companies from using “harmful quotas,” such as “nice work,” a metric often audited by Amazon to measure the time a worker isn’t scanning items while on the clock. Workers have argued that the leave policy makes working conditions more arduous and is used as a tool to monitor workers.
“Amazon has perfected a quantitative punishment system that pushes workers to their physical limits and beyond,” Markey, a member of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee’s Subcommittee on Employment, told a news conference. and Workplace Safety. announcing the bill.
“They set requirements for how many packages workers must scan without telling workers what those requirements are. Then they fire workers who fail to win their impossible game,” Markey added.
Amazon’s use of quotas in warehouse and delivery operations has been a frequent topic of discussion alongside broader scrutiny of frontline worker safety. The company, which is the second-largest private employer in the U.S., has said in the past that it does not use fixed quotas, but instead relies on “performance expectations” that factor in multiple indicators, such as how certain teams are doing at a location. performing. Claims that workers don’t get enough breaks are also disputed.
But some Amazon warehouse workers say the company’s productivity quotas are opaque and often determined by algorithms, and they face disciplinary action or termination for failing to meet them. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration issued citations against Amazon last year for exposing workers to safety hazards and pointed to its work pace as a driving factor.
OSHA and the U.S. Attorney’s Office are investigating conditions at several warehouses, while the U.S. Department of Justice is looking into whether Amazon is underreporting injuries. Amazon said it disputes the DOJ and OSHA’s allegations.
Wendy Taylor, a packer at an Amazon warehouse in Missouri, said during Markey’s press conference Thursday that she and others are “fighting for quota transparency.” Taylor said last March that she “tripped and fell on my face” over a pallet, but was told to return to work by medical staff. Her doctor later determined that she had torn her meniscus during the fall.
Taylor blamed Amazon’s “inhumane labor rates” for the injury and added, “Amazon workers provide same-day shipping, but we can’t even get the same-day care we deserve.”
I’M WATCHING: Amazon’s worker safety risks are under fire from regulators and the DOJ