I Don't See How This is Legal

In their latest bit of union busting, an Amazon "Union Avoidance Official" said told workers in their Staten Island warehouse that if they voted for a union, Amazon would make things worse. 

Specifically, he suggested that Amazon would cut wages to the minimum wage if they voted for a union, which is a violation of section 8(a) of the National Labor Relations act, which states that employers may not "Threaten employees with adverse consequences, such as closing the workplace, loss of benefits, or more onerous working conditions, if they support a union, engage in union activity, or select a union to represent them."

This is a clear violation, and likely a very common one.

It would be less common if they frog marched people who did this out of their offices in handcuffs:

An Amazon union avoidance official told employees at JFK8, Amazon’s largest New York City warehouse, that if they unionize, certain workers could see their salaries reduced to minimum wage, or that negotiations could start with minimum wage as a baseline, according to leaked audio from the mandatory anti-union meeting that took place Wednesday and was obtained by Motherboard.

When describing the collective bargaining process, the union buster explains to workers that “The negotiation phase of the process is called collective bargaining, and in the negotiation, there are no guarantees … you can end up with better, the same, or worse than you already have.”

An employee interrupts and asks, “So wait, you’re saying we could end up with worse. What does that mean?”

“There are no guarantees as to what would happen, right? … We can’t make any promises things will get better or stay the same. They could get worse. We can’t promise what’s going to happen. Amazon can’t promise you that they’re going to walk into negotiations and that the negotiations will start from the same [pay and benefits workers have already],” the union avoidance official says. “They could start from minimum wage, for instance. I don’t think that will happen, but it’s a possibility.”

“So you’re saying that Amazon’s gonna say…” the worker responds.

“I just said I’m not saying that,” the Amazon official said.

“So why put that out there?” the worker says.

Because they know that, even if they walk it back, they have poisoned the well.  

This is illegal as hell, and we should be arresting people who do this.