Anyone looking for a job at Amazon in Germany will encounter a picture of diversity on the company’s website, with images of people of different ages and different skin and hair colours. They all have one thing in common: They beam into the camera as if they have nothing better to do than pushing boxes back and forth, sorting them or delivering them. Amazon attaches great importance to its cosmopolitan image - and cultivates it in advertising campaigns worth millions. The company’s 36,000 employees in Germany are made up of over 100 nationalities, Amazon says. It’s website promises: “We are committed to diversity and inclusion.”
However the actual experiences at work of foreign employees often have very little to do with such rosy images promoted by Amazon and other companies. The proportion of foreign workers in the lowest wage groups in Germany is increasing. According to the Economic and Social Sciences Institute (WSI) of the Hans Böckler Foundation, around 3.6 million full-time employees worked in the ‘low-income segment’ of the labour market in 2022, with gross monthly earnings below 2,431 euros. While 586,000 of these low-income earners were of foreign origin in 2014, the number rose to 1.1 million by 2022.
Stefan Thyroke, head of the team at the Verdi trade union working on the logistics sector, states: “Employment in the logistics sector is becoming increasingly precarious in Germany, and Amazon is part of it.” Companies used to recruit “guest workers”, then posted workers from other European Union countries, and now they rely on cheap labour from non-EU countries.
Amazon has over 100 sites in Germany. Employees from Middle Eastern countries, Africa and other parts of the world often make up two-thirds of the workforce. In the lowest pay grades the proportion is even higher.
Many of these workers have only been in Germany for a short time. They do not have German citizenship, speak little German and struggle with bureaucracy, for example with an application for a residence permit. Verdi representatives and Amazon works councils help as best they can.
Hedi Tounsi, works council member at the Amazon distribution center in Winsen near Hamburg and a Verdi member, came to Germany from Tunisia in 2016. He estimates that around 90 percent of the 2,300 employees at his site come from Somalia, Eritrea, Iraq and other countries. Tounsi helps employees who understand little German, for example with correspondence with authorities. Along with German, English is now the working language at many Amazon sites. Arabic has now become the third working language at the Amazon distribution center in Sülzetal near Magdeburg.
Amazon takes advantage of the difficult situation of foreign newcomers – their unclear residence status, lack of knowledge of German and hardly any experience with comparable work - and initially ranks them at the bottom when it comes to pay. This seems strangely familiar. Car and steel companies, medium-sized factory owners and garbage collectors practiced similar practices with “guest workers” 50 years ago.
That said, a low-wage job at Amazon can be a first step into the regular job market - albeit under poor conditions.
Low pay is the biggest problem for most workers with a migrant background. Hedi Tounsi confirms this. The starting wage is 13 to 14 euros per hour, which is only slightly above the minimum wage. “(Our) main demand is: More money for hard work!” he says.
Insecure employment relationships are another problem for people without a secure right of residence. At many sites in Germany the company sources workers from temporary employment agencies and only gives a minority of them permanent Amazon contracts. At other sites, the online retailer offers contracts to new employees but for limited periods, such as one year or less.
However, this approach creates insecurity for those migrants in Germany with only a temporary or “tolerated” residency status. These workers are reliant on keeping a job with an employment contract in order to be able to stay in the country. Tounsi notes: “For fear of losing their jobs, many employees work hard and keep their mouths shut.”
Employees whose residence permits are expiring generally cannot expect any support from Amazon or many other employers, says a works council member who, like some other interviewees for this article, prefers to remain anonymous.
Nonni Morisse, is a Verdi official and a member of the union’s project team working on Amazon in Germany (see box, below). He is responsible for Amazon sites in Lower Saxony and Bremen. He says there are cases “in which Amazon remained inactive when faced with the threat (by German authorities) of deportation (of an Amazon staff member)”.
At Amazon’s site in Wunstorf near Hanover, an employee from West Africa, who was also a member of the works council was in 2022 threatened with deportation. Amazon refused to take action, but Verdi launched a campaign on his behalf: the employee’s residence permit was extended by the local authorities.
++++++++++++++
Box: NEW UNION APPROACHES
Verdi is breaking new ground in its campaigns for better working condition at Amazon. The union has employed project secretaries focused on Amazon in the federal states of Bavaria, Rhineland-Palatinate, Berlin and Brandenburg, as well as Nonni Morisse's position in northern Germany. Another colleague will be responsible for North Rhine-Westphalia from spring 2024.
These Verdi secretaries advise works councils, support company protest actions and create leaflets in various languages. According to Morisse, many companies are currently watching developments at Amazon. “If we are successful at Amazon, we can also use these strategies in other companies and industries”.
++++++++++++++++
Morisse believes that it is simply not important for Amazon to retain employees, on the contrary: in his opinion, employee fluctuation is part of the company’s business model. Peter Birke, researcher at the Sociological Research Institute at the University of Göttingen, shares this assessment. He is the author of the book (in German) “Borders made of Glass. Work, racism and migration struggles in Germany,” for which he conducted interviews with Amazon employees. Amazon's approach, Birke said, creates "two types of pressures on foreign workers, relating to obtaining an Amazon contract and to the uncertainty regarding residency permits."
Amazon asserts that supporting foreign workers is an important concern. The company has drawn up guidelines against racist language and discrimination in the workplace and employs social workers at some sites, such as Jana Rothe in Sülzetal. Employees with a migrant background regularly seek her support. She has helped colleagues who have experienced domestic violence at home and advises on problems with residency rights. “The (local) immigration office is overloaded (with work). I have contacts there and can help arrange appointments and make sure the paperwork is completed.”
There are also social workers of this type at Amazon sites in Gera, Leipzig and Werne near Dortmund. An Amazon spokesperson notes that a ‘Welcome Door’ programme for migrant workers was introduced in Germany in 2023, which “include possible services such as reimbursement of immigration fees and legal support.”
This is commendable and could be a role model for other companies. However, a real welcome programme for foreign workers requires one thing above all: welcoming them with a fairly paid and secure job. Unfortunately the world's largest online retailer is lagging far behind in delivering this.
This text is a slightly edited translation of the original, published in German