Nearly half of Amazon’s warehouse workers are injured during its Prime Day savings event, a Senate committee’s investigation found.
On Monday, one day before this year’s two-day sale began on July 16, the chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, Democratic Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, published a report claiming the company’s warehouses are “especially unsafe” during the event and that “the company knows it.”
The report states Amazon’s total injury rate — which includes those the company isn’t required to disclose to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration — during its 2019 Prime Day event was “just under” 45 injuries per 100 workers, according to Amazon’s internal data. And when counting only those that are required to be disclosed to OSHA, the rate was more than 10 injuries per 100 workers, which is more than twice the industry average, the report states.
These injuries include everything from bruises and superficial cuts to torn rotator cuffs and concussions, the latter of which Sanders alleged is more often underreported. He also claims Amazon’s history of underrecording serious injuries means the true number sustained on the job is likely higher.
The committee chair claims in the report that these issues are compounded by Amazon’s warehouses being “regularly understaffed” during peak seasons, like Prime Day and the holidays. This, Sanders alleged, leads to longer hours and an increased likelihood of ignoring safety guidelines, “endangering workers who have to manage increased volume without increased support.”
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During Prime Day last year, Amazon made $12.7 billion in sales over two days. Sanders said this “incredible revenue” makes the company’s injury rates “especially egregious” alongside “the resources it has available to make its warehouses safe for workers.”
“The incredibly dangerous working conditions at Amazon revealed in this investigation are a perfect example of the type of corporate greed that the American people are sick and tired of,” Sanders said. “Despite making $36 billion in profits last year and providing its CEO with over $275 million in compensation over the past three years, Amazon continues to treat its workers as disposable and with complete contempt for their safety and wellbeing. That is unacceptable and that has got to change.”
The interim report comes as part of the committee’s ongoing investigation into Amazon’s warehouse safety practices and is the first time, according to Sanders, that the company’s internal data on warehouse injury rates has been made public.
In a statement to Scripps News, Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel said the data used in the report from years ago doesn’t reflect the “reality of Amazon safety today.” Since 2019, Nantel said the company has made significant progress in reducing its recordable injury rate by 28%, and reduced its lost time incident rate, which refers to injuries that make an employee miss at least one day of work, by 75%.
Nantel said Amazon has cooperated in the investigation so far and that the report “ignores our progress and paints a one-sided, false narrative using only a fraction of the information we’ve provided.” For example, Amazon’s spokesperson said the report “draws sweeping and inaccurate conclusions based on unverified anecdotes,” including that it wasn’t adequately staffed for busy shopping periods.
“This is just not true, as we carefully plan and staff up for major events, ensure that we have excess capacity across our network, and design our network so that orders are automatically routed to sites that can handle unexpected spikes in volume,” Nantel told Scripps News.
The report comes after OSHA cited three Amazon warehouses last year for putting their employees at serious risk of injury. And last month, California fined the company $5.9 million based on accusations that two of its facilities violated Warehouse Quota Law.
