I'm amazed at how much the idea of pissing into a bottle offended the sensibilities of journalists. Given a choice between pissing in bottles or having the time saved as a longer lunch break, I'd guess most would chose the lunch break. The never ending screw turning cost optimization is the problem, but using that example lands really flat.
> The never ending screw turning cost optimization is the problem, but using that example lands really flat.
I worked in logistics (elsewhere) for a decade, and quit when conditions shifted to incentivize smoking meth and pissing in jugs. It's abusive and just fucking gross.
I assume you aren't pissing in jugs to save time for longer lunch breaks. Why not?
Nobody pisses in jugs unless they're forced to. The example only falls flat because Bezos escaped the gravity well in his dick-rocket and it's really fucking hard to hurl bottles of piss into space with a sling.
See my comment below. I'm talking about delivery drivers. You might be talking about fulfillment centers.
I disagree that nobody would voluntarily choose to pee in a bottle in the context of driving a delivery vehicle. But I do agree that the behavior in the context of being in a building that has a bathroom is a sign that something is horribly wrong.
Why do people have to make choices of how to spend their time? Because there is a finite amount of time in any given period, and most activities are mutually exclusive.
No, why are they forced to make this specific choice? Why would they need to deduct time from their lunch break in order to use the bathroom? Using the bathroom and eating lunch are not normally mutually exclusive activities, unless there is a third party enforcing such an exclusion.
Sorry, we might be talking past one another. When I hear about peeing in bottles, I think of the delivery drivers. This is the obvious place bottles would get used, and in my recollection this was most of the reporting on the pee bottles. I believe there was also reporting on workers in the brick and mortar fulfillment center using bottles to meet their quotas, which is perhaps what you are talking about.
For delivery routes, there's no simple solution for bathroom access (unless you want to talk about installing some step up from a "bottle" in all the vans). Meaning a driver will inevitably have to choose to spend time not delivering packages to leave the van and use an indoor bathroom.
If you are talking about the workers at the fulfillment centers, I do agree that is indefensible. That human need should be entirely owned by the business. If it takes workers too long to walk to the bathroom, or if Amazon insists on using time with security lines and whatnot, that's entirely on Amazon.
(Also to each their own, but using the bathroom and eating lunch are definitely mutually exclusive activities for me)
