United States: Amazon workers in New York vote to form first union

Marking a first in the history of e-commerce giant Amazon in the United States, employees at one of its New York warehouses voted to form a union on Friday 1 April. The vote, which finished 2,654 in favour and 2,130 against, was organised under the auspices of the National Labor Relations Board, the independent federal agency responsible for enforcing labour law. The victory of the Amazon Labor Union (ALU), founded by Christian Smalls, a former employee who was fired from the JFK8 distribution centre in New York in March 2020 for calling a temporary work stoppage in protest against safety issues at the site, came as a surprise. Amazon, which is the second-largest private employer in the US, with over one million employees, has fought hard since its creation against any form collective representation and the level of turnover is such that union activists do not know who to lean on. At the same time, employees at another Amazon warehouse – in Bessemer, Alabama – were also voting for the second time on their right to unionise (see article n°12465). The final vote count is not yet known, however, as Retail Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU) president Stuart Appelbaum and Amazon each challenged large numbers of ballots. According to the count conducted on Thursday 31 March, 993 votes were cast against unionisation and 875 were cast in favour, with 59 ballots declared void and 416 being challenged. It will therefore be up to the court to decide, in the coming weeks, on the status of the latter ballots. After years of decline, American unions have recently made several symbolic gains, including the establishment of the first union at Starbucks – in Buffalo, New York – on 9 December (see article n°12850).