Again, these aren’t unique to Amazon, per se. Just to the scale of their operation and the scrutiny Amazon has.

Assembly line jobs are rough and people pee in bottles, and die. The important piece these articles leave out is how much more common these are at Amazon.

I remember my first jobs at random companies where I was hourly and needed approval for bathroom breaks. It sucked and I would plan my day around break times.

I think these articles are more a function of being surprising to us because we work cushy desk jobs where we can break all we want and use unlimited sick days because we program.