OpEd - Time to Hold Big Tech Accountable

In June, the House Judiciary Committee passed six long-overdue antitrust bills to regulate Big Tech monopolies like Amazon, Facebook and Google. This bipartisan legislation could not have come at a more important time. Big Tech companies have shown repeatedly during the COVID pandemic that they will do anything to protect their bottom line—even at the expense of workers.

To keep up with customer demand, Amazon mistreated ‘essential workers’ such as warehouse employees and delivery drivers by forcing them to pack and ship goods at breakneck speed. Amazon kept its employees in dangerous and unhealthy working environments, refused to pay the employees it sent home sick, and neglected to inform warehouse workers about possible COVID-19 exposure in a timely manner, all in pursuit of the company’s self-proclaimed “customer obsession.” The company also provided grossly insufficient personal protective equipment (PPE) for employees; during the harrowing early days of the pandemic, Amazon delivery drivers in California received a single disinfectant wipe each to clean their vehicles throughout the day. Amazon even fired whistleblowers who called attention to the company’s poor safety practices and tried to discredit an employee who led a protest against unsafe working conditions by publicly deriding him as “not smart or articulate.”

Unsurprisingly, Nearly 20,000 Amazon employees contracted COVID-19 in the first six months of the global health crisis alone. Meanwhile, the pandemic put $86 billion in Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’ coffers, making him the first person in history with a net worth over $200 billion.

Let me repeat that; Bezos pocketed Amazon’s profits, did not invest in worker safety, and stepped down as CEO so that he could fly to space.

They weren’t alone in taking advantage of this chaotic time to continue to abuse their power and their workforce. Facebook launched a tool to allow companies to censor employees trying to unionize and Google’s monopoly on digital advertising resulted in the closure of 70 local newsrooms since the start of the pandemic.

Small newspapers rely on web traffic to sell their own digital ads. Google cut off that revenue stream by publishing the links to their articles in its search results without compensating the newspapers for their content. Google prevented small news outlets from building the online audience necessary to generate revenue from digital ads by hoarding online clicks that would have otherwise gone to small and local newspapers. That’s more jobs lost.

UFCW has been a leading voice for frontline tech and gig economy workers during the

pandemic, trying to remind companies that their profits were built on the backs of their workers and pushing for more accountability in their actions. Tech companies like Amazon have a history of anti-worker behavior, including firing worker whistleblowers, using tools to fight efforts to unionize, pushing automation to eliminate jobs, and failing to prevent COVID infections among their frontline employees during the pandemic.

Until now, Amazon and Google have been able to claim that they have not violated federal antitrust rules because their prices are low or even free. Our century-old antitrust statutes rely on pricing to determine whether or not a company is hurting consumer welfare and thereby violating antitrust rules. The time is long overdue for this to change. These companies should not be able to choose winners and losers in the economy. We need a level playing field for the health of our economy and its small businesses, consumers, and workers.

The bipartisan legislation passed by the House Judiciary Committee will update these antitrust rules to prohibit tech companies from using their massive wealth, accumulated thanks to consumer data, to hurt competition and exploit the pandemic for profit at the expense of American workers. Congress must pass the antitrust package advanced by the House Judiciary Committee expeditiously. Americans need to know that Congress will hold these tech companies responsible to consumers now.

Hugh Giordano
Union Representative/Organizer with United Food & Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW Local 152)

3120 Fire Road, Suite 201
Egg Harbor Township, NJ 0823