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Comment by say_it_as_it_is | Hacker News Reader

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If next-day delivery requires unfair working conditions, then yes we should drop it. However, it's a false dichotomy to pretend as if the alternative to "next day" is "three weeks."

The Unionised Royal Mail seems to manage next day delivery fine. Does any country have a unionised mail service where you wait 3 weeks, or even 1 week, for packages?

The post office offers amazing service and its workers have been a key part of the labour movement.

Also next day delivery is almost never an option where I live so I don't bother with it.

Following this logic, would you say that the only way to guarantee same day delivery be to legalize slavery for Amazon delivery drivers?

Are you going to wait 3 weeks for your deliveries to arrive?

First, you know full well that it won't be three weeks. However, I'm willing to allow a bit of exaggeration to make a point. But let's make the argument reasonable: I have to wait five days for the equivalent of UPS Ground from the other coast (UPS, which I will point is unionized and offers next-day delivery). As a trade-off, drivers aren't pissing in bottles. Are you saying you'd rather drivers piss in bottles rather than wait a few more days for delivery?

But of course all of this is moot: many examples abound of delivery companies capable of delivering things the next day and having a unionized workforce.

> Let's see how important union strength is when you don't receive next-day deliveries.

That doesn't happen now, I haven't seen next-day since the start of COVID.

My life has been just fine without next-day deliveries. It has also been fine without being the master of a slave plantation, or having a live-in servant that works for pennies and sleeps in a closet, or a number of other things that would make it more comfortable and convenient at the expense of others.

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(It does, unfortunately, depend on a large number of people growing my food, making my clothes, and soldering my electronics largely being treated like shit, but none of those are immutable facts of the world.)

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