Amazon prime day workers strikes

On Amazon prime day 2018 over 1500 workers across Spain went on strike to disrupt the company’s most busy sales period. Workers also disrupted services across Italy, Germany and Poland during the 36 hour busiest “prime” sale to fight back against exploitation and union oppression in the workplace.

“We do not accept that there are two types of workers doing the same work, with some working with lower wages and less rights than others” says the Amazon worker at San Fernando de Henares near Madrid, where over 80 percent of workers joined the picket line on Monday with Spain's largest union, the CCOO. The strike successfully blocked trucks from entering and leaving the warehouse and slowed down the delivery service.

In Germany ten Amazon warehouses went on strike on Tuesday with the public services union Ver.di, demanding negotiations for a collective agreement. In Poland workers with the anarcho-syndicalist union Inicjatywa Pracownicza resisted through a work “slow down” by making sure to comply with the health and safety standards that Amazon usually ignores.

Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezos’s net worth was boosted by another $2.25 billion on Monday alone, while his workers continue to slog away under brutal conditions. This year Amazon workers are striking more frequently than previously and are becoming bolder and more coordinated internationally, as we’ve seen this Amazon prime day.