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Amazon’s answer to delivery driver shortage: Pot smokers
- hughrr 5y agoI can’t wait for Amazon to deliver a van through my fence.
- paulie4542 5y agoOr some kids crossing a street.
- throwaway287391 5y agoIt's a good thing they screen applicants to make sure none of them have used alcohol in the last month. Imagine -- hiring someone who drinks alcohol for a driving job. The irresponsibility would be truly unthinkable.
- eurasiantiger 5y agoRationality has left the building.
- richrichardsson 5y agoWhy don't you want to think of the children?
- eurasiantiger 5y agoWhy don’t you want to think of the most realistic risks to children, but choose to perpetrate stereotypes and myths based on 19th century racist propaganda?
- nuclearnice1 5y agohttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Think_of_the_children
- eurasiantiger 5y agoI was continuing the facetiousness :/
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- tartoran 5y agoHow about not feeding children with junk food at school cafeterias? How about providing them with real education rather than learning to pass tests? How about not priming and bombarding children with advertising? The list goes on, there's a lot of work to do.
- sp332 5y agoThere's a difference between recreational use and driving under the influence.
- hughrr 5y agoI haven’t met someone who knows that yet.
- Horticulture 5y agoRight, because anybody who consumes cannabis must be doing it all the time and willing to drive under the influence.
- hughrr 5y agoSome do. The guy who left his car upside down in my front garden after rolling the car through my fence ended up being prosecuted for it.
- tartoran 5y agoGood. I'm not condoning driving while the influence but why should we put the occasional, the one puffer before going to bed or the responsible pot smoker in the same box with the irresponsible abusers?
- jack_riminton 5y agoSome of the comments are assuming that all those who smoke pot are irresponsible or unable to do a job if they do smoke pot (this includes people who may only smoke at weekends/parties btw)
- oxymoran 5y agoAnd also clearly have never been high enough to realize that they are more likely to be super paranoid and going 10 miles under the speed limit than driving through a fence or running over children. It’s not at all comparable to being drunk.
- throwaway0a5e 5y agoYour comment is an equally bad generalization. It's easy to get distracted and then focus on that distraction while high. That's not conducive to safe driving. We don't want people mindlessly blowing through an intersection because they were fixating on how the wind was making the tarp on the truck in front of them flutter.
- JshWright 5y agoDriving high is still driving impaired. The failure modes may be different, but that doesn't mean someone who is high is safe to drive. I'm not sure what the point of your comment is though, as I don't think anyone is suggesting that these drivers will actually be high while driving. Rather, they are people that use marijuana recreationally and would test positive for THC, disqualifying them from many jobs (despite the fact that urine THC levels do not corelate with how "high" someone is).
- wordsarelies 5y agoDriving high is like driving as a grandma. You're hyper vigilant, looking everywhere, your reactions are delayed a little such as that of an 60 year old person, and you're definitely listening to speed "limit" as the maximum, and not as the average.
- zxcvbn4038 5y agoI’m keeping my camera ready for when Snoop Dogg brings me my package.
- jack_riminton 5y agoWhen did HN start having such low quality comments?
- zxcvbn4038 5y agoWhat sort of intellectual dialog and witty repartee did you expect? I'm pretty sure that the guy at Amazon who decided to hire the potheads isn't going to win a Nobel.
- jack_riminton 5y agoA debate about drug classification? An insight with data or maybe even an intelligent anecdote about the travails of hiring in modern day USA? Your comment wouldn't even get points on Reddit, it might get a "lol" on twitter
- wolverine876 5y agoAgreed. I see almost no intellectual curiosity and learn little these days. I'm only here because I hope it might change again.
- paulcole 5y agoPeople who live in glass houses and all. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28338633 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28338633
- wutbrodo 5y agoI'm genuinely confused by this comment. Can you explain why you think speculation about the hardware costs of Waymo robotaxi is at all related to a complaint about silly jokes on HN?
- new_guy 5y agoHow about just having decent working conditions and paying a living wage? Amazon is cancer.
- pessimizer 5y agoThose are also good ideas, but you don't have to exclude pot smokers in order to implement them.
- missedthecue 5y ago$15/hr is what populist politicians have been calling a living wage. What do you think they should pay?
- wutbrodo 5y agoI think you may be misunderstanding the parent comment. In current usage, the term "living wage" doesn't have any connection to employee wages or what quality of life they buy. It's just a shibboleth reaffirming one's identity as anti-corporation qua corporation.
- Shadonototro 5y agodrug addicts who are willing to work like slaves with crappy salary only because they are so high to even reason about it not to mention the security risk nice society!
- jack_riminton 5y agoPot smokers are worlds apart from 'drug addicts', which i presume you're equating with opiates or other highly physically addictive substances
- Shadonototro 5y agoyeap, so MURICA can legalize it first, secures the market, lobby "allies" into legalizing too, so it can become a global giant can't you see already the propaganda, the pro-'canabis' all around the world? a drug is a drug, my dear friend i seen many "pot" smoker in high school, they couldn't even concentrate properly during tests, they all failed miserable at society look, some even are being grabbed by amazon because nobody wants to work like a slave anymore, only pot smokers! who would have guessed!
- jack_riminton 5y agoA 'drug' is whatever the law dictates is a 'drug' There's no reason why alcohol shouldn't be considered more dangerous than pot, especially considering the amount of road deaths it causes
- the_only_law 5y ago> a drug is a drug, my dear friend Surely then, there’s no difference between ibuprofen and fentanyl. After all, a drug is a drug.
- Shadonototro 5y agoyeap, that is why they specifically say: > Ibuprofen can cause blurred vision, drowsiness, and dizziness. Do not drive or operate heavy machinery until you know how ibuprofen affects you
- black_13 5y agoRecruit the undead
- loudmax 5y agoAmazon's delivery time targets are more likely to cause accidents than employing pot smokers. As long as their drivers are sober while they're driving, what they do on their own time shouldn't be a problem. What's likely to cause accidents is incentivizing drivers to ignore stop signs and run red lights so they can meet their delivery target metrics.
- mynegation 5y agoOf course Amazon is watching out for their business interest, but they are doing the morally right thing here. I do not smoke anything as a personal preference and do not enjoy when second-hand smoke and smell affects me but I support legalization for the simple reason that criminalization of marijuana and stigmatization of pot smokers is much much worse.
- ffhhj 5y agoSomething I learned from a pot smoker: they sometimes mix it with other drugs for higher effects.
- crazy_horse 5y agoYes, add caffeine... Hippie speedball.
- gunfighthacksaw 5y agoI regularly mix cannabis with a super potent CNS depressant that I buy from a shifty young woman dressed as a waitress in my local bar.
- ChefboyOG 5y agoDoes CNN know about this?
- Bilal_io 5y agoI bet Fox does
- zardo 5y agoSometimes I mix cannabis with more dangerous drugs like alcohol.
- Ms-J 5y agoAnd what is your point? Everyone has the right to enjoy substances as she/he wants.
- 5y ago
- da_big_ghey 5y agoWell I am all in favor of legalizeing, but there is side effect: those who are smoking in public, cigarette but especially pot, must have harsh consequence. I go to some place in US and it is stinking everywhere on public streets. People can not force everybody to inhale their drug fume only because they want their high. Edit for clarifying: maybe a $200 fine is good point for starting, go up to $500 with repeating. I also think many smoker drop cigarette butts and we need greater fine for that if it will stop.
- resoluteteeth 5y agoIf by "harsh consequences" you mean a $20 fine for smoking pot/cigarettes/cigars in a crowded public places I guess maybe. If you're proposing locking people up that seems a bit extreme.
- pitched 5y agoJust out of curiosity and this isn’t meant to be mean, but, what kind of harsh consequence do you think would be appropriate for imposing that smell?
- koheripbal 5y agoNot gp, but I think a fine is pretty reasonable. Jogging in the park and inhaling pot constantly is getting really annoying. I know a number of families that moved to the burbs, and one of the reasons they voiced is the sharp increase is pot smell/smoke in the kids' playgrounds.
- LargoLasskhyfv 5y agoJoggers in parks are also annoying. Run in the woods, forest.
- wordsarelies 5y agoThis is no doubt an unintended consequence of city ordinances/state laws that require you be X feet away from others. Where the fuck-else can you go other than a public place if you live in the city and have no yard?
- canti 5y agoAs marijuana becomes increasingly legalized, I'm not sure why any company would continue to test for it, other than maybe using saliva tests to make sure workers aren't getting high on the job.
- AmericanChopper 5y agoFrom a safety point of view, it’s difficult to test for marijuana intoxication. There’s a simple test any employer could do to test whether their forklift driver is drunk right now. The best a marijuana simple marijuana test can do is whether you’ve had it in the past few days.
- canti 5y agoYou make a decent point. This is why I mentioned a saliva test, but in truth I'm not sure how effective it is. Anecdotally, I can tell you I once smoked at night before bed and passed a saliva test the next morning.
- AmericanChopper 5y agoI believe they do that for police roadside tests in Australia. From what I can gather they have a rather bad reputation for not correlating very well with intoxication. BAC is a well understood thing to measure, but marijuana testing seems pretty unreliable to me. I’ve read conflicting reports about how strongly TCH found on a saliva swap correlates to actual intoxication, and I don’t believe there’s been much scientific investigation done to determine what levels of intoxication are safe for what activities. As the primary customers of these products are law enforcement, and private sector “rules enforcement”, I’ll remain skeptical of them until somebody manages to convince me otherwise.
- southpawflo 5y agoafter all, what's the difference between a drunk driver and a stoner driver? the drunk driver runs the red light, and the stoner keeps waiting for the stop sign to turn green!
- duskwuff 5y agoMore realistically: The drunk driver will tell you that they're basically sober, and will be shocked when everyone can tell from their behavior that they're drunk. The stoned driver will tell you how stoned they are, and will be concerned that everyone else on the street can tell from their behavior. (These are, of course, broad generalizations. There will be exceptions.)
- jack_riminton 5y agoI wonder if they'll eventually introduce some sort of sobriety or reaction-time test on their phone apps to see if you're in a state to drive
- PragmaticPulp 5y agoI’m guessing they can do this because they’re big enough to push back on insurance requirements. The drug testing requirement for delivery drivers isn’t necessarily a moral imperative from management. It’s a condition of their insurance requirements. The article touches on this: > Other delivery companies are continuing to screen applicants, concerned about the insurance and liability implications in the many states where weed use remains illegal.
- didgeoridoo 5y agoOr perhaps they are underwriting their own insurance. Once companies get big enough, it makes more sense for them to hold onto the premiums themselves and just pay an insurance company to administer the paperwork.
- BEEdwards 5y agoOther places that don't' drug test and you'll probably be paid better and not work in sweatshop like conditions - most office jobs...
- samizdis 5y agoI'm not sure how one might reliably assess/assert impairment for a cannabis user. Traces can last for weeks and result in positive tests (blood analysis), even if the user isn't remotely stoned at the time. Don't know whether there's a breath test nowadays that indicates use in the past n hours, which might give a better idea of likely impairment.
- nmstoker 5y agoIt's not an idea I've explored seriously in any depth, but it seems like testing for capabilities required for a specific task might be a way to go here over actual drug tests. Thus if it's determined that people need a certain reaction time to drive safely, that could be one thing tested. Clearly setting the levels and the particular capabilities might well be contentious, but by aligning the test(s) with what's needed for the task it's fairer and in certain ways more robust: for instance, you could be under the threshold for alcohol/cannabis but if you combine that with legal medicines that cause drowsiness or simply happen to be extremely sleep deprived, you might pass a traditional test but the combined effects would lead one to fail a capability test. It also helps in other ways too, such as fairly treating older people - you might be a sharp 75 year old and yet come up against some age limit. This let's you continue so long as you maintain the capabilities. Then if things start to change it's clear and takes some of the awkwardness out of the discussion about whether one is still fit for a job. Of course the risk is that people are pseudoscientific or arbitrary in setting the capabilities to a level that doesn't align. We've all seen the unrealistic hiring prerequisites that managers ask for if left to decide (must have ten years experience of XYZ!) In the wrong hands these could be used unfairly (eg setting totally unrealistic levels precisely to screen out groups they don't want).
- cwkoss 5y ago"Several meta-analyses of multiple studies found that the risk of being involved in a crash significantly increased after marijuana use13—in a few cases, the risk doubled or more than doubled.14–16 However, a large case-control study conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration found no significant increased crash risk attributable to cannabis after controlling for drivers’ age, gender, race, and presence of alcohol." from https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/research-reports/marijuana/does-marijuana-use-affect-driving https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/research-reports/mari... I wonder how much marijuana actually contributes to crashes. I think people can certainly get too high to drive, but unlike alcohol which lowers inhibitions, being 'too high' could even increase inhibitions somewhat (more anxiety, paranoia), so I'd expect people too high to drive are much less likely to get behind the wheel than drunk people. I certainly buy that 0.1% BAC + marijuana is probably worse than 0.1% BAC alone, but I'm curious what a just legal limit would be in comparison to 0.08% BAC regulations. What BTHCC produces equivalent impairment to 0.08% BAC, and how does that interact with THC tolerance? Are people who consume thc multiple times per day worse drivers than people who never consume thc, when both groups are sober? I'd imagine there is a tolerance effect where stoned frequent-users are better drivers than stoned infrequent-users. Would be interesting to try to make a cabinet arcade-style driving game that would accurately predict actual-road driving ability. Could even be used as a tool to demonstrate the dangers of drunk driving by putting it into bars and letting people try when above the legal limit (definitely some dangers of giving people good scores when they perform well while drunk though...)
- indymike 5y agoMy company fixes recruiting process and software problems. Hats off to Amazon for this. I probably have the pot smoker conversation about once a month, usually with a 50-something or older executive that is running a factory short-staffed. Pot is radioactive for many employers because insurance discounts and employment regulations are stuck in the "Refer Madness" era (Refer Madness was a propaganda film about the dangers of pot). So, employers face two surprises: increasing liability, workers comp and other insurance AND potentially, "hi we're from a government agency and under regulation XYZ 202 sub paragraph 293888 you need to drug test and immediately fire those that flunk or we will fine you. Have a happy day!"
- wolverine876 5y ago> 50-something or older executive Do you mean to imply or assume that 50-somethings are unfamiliar with marijuana? It was already common for Baby Boomers, who are older than that. What happens is that open-minded, pot-smoking 20-somethings think 50-somethings are close-minded and ignorant. Then 30 years later many of those 20-somethings are the exact same as their predecessors. Instead of dismissing the older generation, the 20-somethings might consider how they will avoid that fate.
- mLuby 5y ago> My company fixes recruiting process and software problems. Hats off to Amazon for this. I probably have the pot smoker conversation about once a month, usually with a 50-something or older executive that is running a factory short-staffed. Reading between the lines, the exec is trying to hire more workers for their factory, and wants to know if they can stop testing for marijuana so they'll be able to hire more workers. To which the poster, who has recurring experience with this issue, must (unfortunately) recommend against it because of the reasons they enumerate. Or maybe it was just a close-minded, ignorant ageist comment. Better to assume positive intent though.
- wolverine876 5y agoI asked, I didn't assume anything.
- neonate 5y agohttp://web.archive.org/web/20210903083804/https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2021-09-01/amazons-answer-to-delivery-driver-shortage-recruit-pot-smokers http://web.archive.org/web/20210903083804/https://www.latime...
- outside1234 5y agoThis company is just a nightmare. Seriously, do we really need more folks that smoke pot on the road?
- batch12 5y ago> Seriously, do we really need more folks that smoke pot on the road? Who cares if they smoke pot when not working. We don't need high/impaired people on the road.
- TulliusCicero 5y agoThe hell kind of comment is this? Would you ask, "Do we really need more folks who drink beer on the road?" As long as they're not high/drunk when they're working, what's the issue?
- ComputerGuru 5y agoThe money quote: Other delivery companies are continuing to screen applicants, concerned about the insurance and liability implications in the many states where weed use remains illegal. […] “If one of my drivers crashes and kills someone and tests positive for marijuana, that’s my problem, not Amazon’s,” said one Amazon is just looking out for Number One and to hell with their so-called “partners.” This isn’t anything new. If I were an ADA prosecuting such a case, I’d charge Amazon as a co-conspirator.
- a9h74j 5y agoEspecially with their new corporate slogan, "Puff hard and break things."
- drewg123 5y agoboost the number of job applicants by as much as 400% Anybody else think they meant 420% ?
- KingMachiavelli 5y agoDamn, I always forget that drug testing is still a thing. If you were under the impression that Amazon & other companies are actually screening for cannabis use, you should realize that in any legal state they basically did everything they could to make sure their employees would not test positive. It's extremely hard to find people that would work minimum wage and are completely weed/drug free - especially if you need young, physically fit workers. Having higher turnover because you have to fire people after a while because of a drug test just means you have less experienced drivers. It's funny that, as the article points out, school bus driver jobs would outbid Amazon since that means that schools are having the same issue but really have no choice when it comes to drug testing and are generally more restrictive.
- ipaddr 5y agoBus companies cannot compete. Bus companies will simply claim a shortage and your child will be left at home if the route has no driver. To get the contract you must be the lowest bidder. In order to do that you need to pay drivers as little as possible. Raising wages means losing money.
- adrusi 5y agoUhh no. Leaving kids stranded at a bus stop is a huge liability for the school because if the kid wanders off and gets hurt or gets in trouble, the school could be held at fault. If a bus company is leaving kids stranded more than once in a blue moon, they will lose their contract.
- madaxe_again 5y agoNah, the school can blame the bus company, and the bus company can blame the school. Any queries about abandoned children just get bounced back and forth until the matter is forgotten about. Split liability typically means no liability.
- honksillet 5y agoOne underappreciated aspect of this. They will ignore marijuana at time of hire. But they will absolutely test you if there is ever an accident or if you are injured at work (even if you just strain your back picking up a heavy object) before you see an occupational health doctor. If you come back positive in the course of injury, they won't cover your workers compensation bills. They'll fire you (for being intoxicated) and you'll have to cover your own medical expenses without access to workers comp coverage or the emoyee health plan (because you've been fired).
- bserge 5y agoTake full advantage of the system. Smart. These people might never suffer no matter what changes, unless maybe there's some sort of purge.
- userbinator 5y agoThe article seems to allude to that: “If a delivery associate is impaired at work and tests positive post-accident or due to reasonable suspicion, that person would no longer be permitted to perform services for Amazon,” she said.
- tbrownaw 5y agoIs that not a different kind of test, for current presence rather than past use?
- tyrfing 5y agoOne large brown delivery company also rarely drug tests. Drivers of school buses, semi trucks, and similar have federally mandated drug testing, non-CDL delivery drivers don't. Particularly when liability is transferred to contractors, the surprising part is that this wasn't the encouraged policy from the start. Also, any shortage is entirely self inflicted from offering poor wages.
- MeinBlutIstBlau 5y agoThat delivery company also has a union which could've been negotiated for.
- gruez 5y ago>Also, any shortage is entirely self inflicted from offering poor wages. Yeah! All the millennials who can't buy a home are just self-inflected by not bidding high enough! Government policy certainly didn't' contribute to either!
- ineedasername 5y agoThere's a difference: Amazon can pay more. As you said, the millennials can't. If there's a millennial out there flush with cash but didn't get the house they wanted despite having $$$ more than needed, then yes-- that would be their own choice. Just like it's Amazon's choice to live with a driver shortage if they can pay more but won't. Based on their 2020 profits, they can pay more. $20B in profits, 170,000 deliverers worldwide. They could take 10% of that and pay those folks an average of about $10,000 more/year. They have the money, so if their business suffers at all as a result of too few drivers, then it's absolutely self-inflicted.
- gruez 5y ago>There's a difference: Amazon can pay more. As you said, the millennials can't. Just like it's Amazon's choice to live with a driver shortage if they can pay more but won't. But GP was talking about "any shortage", not just amazon's shortage. For the sake of argument I'll let that slide. I'm sure millennials can pay more. It just would involve uncomfortable sacrifices, and most people don't think that's not worth the trade-off for going from renting to owning. Likewise, amazon would like more delivery drivers, but isn't desperate enough to actually raise wages and/or improve working conditions. >Based on their 2020 profits, they can pay more. $20B in profits, 170,000 deliverers worldwide. They could take 10% of that and pay those folks an average of about $10,000 more/year. You forgot to include the cost of capital.
- oblib 5y agoI wouldn't work for Amazon even if they gave me weed to smoke.
- peanut_worm 5y agoIt is strange to me that the only job I have ever been drug tested for was a movie theater as a janitor. No tech job has ever even mentioned it.
- wutbrodo 5y agoMarijuana testing is an arbitrary bar, but a fairly well-known one, so you do actually improve the distribution of your candidate pool by using it for low-skilled jobs with a large, undifferentiated labor pool. Specifically, if it's known that these jobs test for Marijuana use, you're cutting off the portion of the applicant pool that knows this but still uses anyway, which stochastically reduces the likelihood that a candidate will eg show up to work intoxicated (fwiw, I'm a big fan of marijiana: I use it regularly, am a commensurately lighter drinker relative to my peers, and I'm pretty sure I'm making the right choice in terms of health and responsibility) Like I said, it's an arbitrary bar and a path-dependent one, and a counterfactual equilibrium in which alcohol or another intoxicant was tested for would work just as well. But it's not irrational for employers to use it in certain labor market conditions. There are analogues in other labor markets, like requiring a college degree to be a firefighter; the false positive rate only really starts to matter if you start finding it difficult to find qualified applicants. Tech jobs, by contrast, already have plenty of bars that their employees need to clear. In this context, any candidates swept up in blunt drug tests are likely to be false positives, and the use of the bar is a net negative for the employer.
- mikewarot 5y ago>One solution is to raise their wages. But that can happen only if Amazon agrees to pay its delivery partners more for their services, which the company can be slow to do. It's not a labor shortage, it's just a correction in the price of labor
- bpodgursky 5y ago> Amazon delivery contractors are often outbid by school bus companies. Drivers who work for those can make more than $20 an hour and be home for dinner. Amazon contract drivers typically earn $17 an hour and often work late into the night to keep up with demand. I mean, sure, Amazon can raise their wages to compete, and then we run out of... school bus drivers? I'm not sure that's any better. At a point, you either need to increase the labor pool (by pulling people out of unemployment, retirement, etc) or seriously automate the profession, and we're just not there with delivery services right now.
- spfzero 5y agoSchool bus drivers are carting human lives around, not inanimate packages, so I guess it's good that they make more. It's a different job and the pay should reflect that.
- antattack 5y agoSchool bus drivers should be making double of what they are actually making just for increased liability alone.
- ghoward 5y agoI've learned how to drive school buses, and I absolutely agree with your opinion. My first day on the job was my last (well, I drove a bit the next day before refusing to drive in a situation I was not comfortable in); it was just way too stressful thinking about those kids and how any mistake I make could hurt them. Edit: clarified my actual quit story.
- programmarchy 5y agoFor warehouse workers, this would not be a problem. Although I imagine that could impact Amazon's bottom line. For delivery drivers, it's a terrible idea. Driving large vehicles around people's neighborhoods while high is dangerous. It's a negative externality Amazon is recklessly putting onto the public. Cue mental gymnastics of potheads claiming they actually drive better while stoned.