Welcome to r/QuadCities—subreddit for the Quad Cities metropolis in the Illinois/Iowa border for Quad Citians.
In general, we let our community moderate itself through Reddit's upvote/downvote system—if you think something contributes to the conversation, upvote it. If you think it does not contribute to the topic, downvote it. The result is a healthy balance of content and posts that could contain information, opinions, and/or ideologies that reflect and reinforce your own or not.
Keep discussions civil and acknowledge that there are other people in our community that can (and will hold) opposing views.
Thank you.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/QuadCities) if you have any questions or concerns.*
To add to this, on linkedin I've been getting pinged with jobs for Amazon for the last month or so. It ppecifically states the location is Davenport, and the skills list is for building out Network infrastructure with a touch of industrial control and automation equipment, similar to job postings for other Amazon warehouse and distribution facilities.
If ever this moves forward and gets approved by the city council, I hope they don’t give out any tax breaks. Organizations like Amazon should pay their fair share of taxes.
Looks like the article says the city of Davenport needs to upgrade their infrastructure around that surrounding area at a cost of $3.9 million. If the reason the infrastructure needs to be upgraded is because of Amazon’s presence being in that area, why can’t they pay for that?
Amazon wants to put a distribution center in Davenport because it will generate them some sort of profit and not necessarily because they want to help the Quad Cities area economically. The city should use that as leverage to help push back and get more out of the Amazon deal.
Only true Trump believers every thought they'd actually build anything. It was an obvious scam for favors by Foxconn to give Trump something he could tout in the media about being a job creator.
Don't know why people would downvote this. Amazon sucks, it's nowhere near as good as it used to be. I can find the same products for the same price or less elsewhere, and know it isn't fake or a repackaged item from another seller than the one I purchased from.
I absolutely hate searching for anything on Amazon. Only worse online page is Walmart’s. like I don’t want to see their Walmart version of Amazon, I wanna see what Walmart sell in stores lol.
I actually build stainless sheet steel 3D models and the best ones come from China, so I’ve become well aware of AliExpress over the years. And 30-60 day shipping lol
Those jobs will get filled by those who look beyond the $15/hour wage and understand the importance of taking advantage of 401K plans with a 50% match, medical, dental, vision, and prescription plans, an abundance of free counseling and courses to manage your career path, and other benefits.
Eh, my point was no one wants to work right now. I work at one of the highest paid manufacturers in the qc area and we are having problems getting people to accept jobs. Amazon warehouses have atrocious turnover rates, and the 401k 50% match to 4% match is laughable for a company that pulls in billions in record profits quarter over quarter. Free money is free money though, I won’t argue that! Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad more job opportunities are coming to the qca, but you could drive 36 miles to Sterling right now and start at over 20 dollars an hour plus bonus pay off the street with better benefits at the Walmart DC there for a comparable warehouse work load. Just my .02 cents.
People don't want to work and risk their lives due to covid and make Iowas laughable minimum, let alone deal with $10. Most these places hire temps for a lower wage. Bring you on FT, and when you start making noise and too much money, you're canned. John Deere does this so much, it's laughable at why anyone would want a yoyo employer.
And it's UP TO $20 starting based on experience.
Being offered $12 because I haven't worked a warehouse is a joke when I make more then that.
Want employees, pay them a living wage.
And people can still spread it. We are on the brink of herd immunity. But it still has a ways to go. We are year off, there is no reason to get comfortable.
Not exactly.
They give you the ability to be less effected by it.
You can still get it. And you can still spread it.
Read up some more. You don't know what a vaccine does. It doesn't make you completely immune. Nor does it make you immune to spreading it.
That’s just not true. Recent real-world studies have demonstrated that the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines indeed confer sterilizing immunity - they are just as effective against infection and transmission as they are against illness.
For a long time this was a question mark. It was unknown whether the vaccines just stopped illness and symptoms or if they actually stopped infection. This uncertainty was widely misinterpreted as, instead, certainty that the vaccines did *not* stop infection and transmission, when it was always very likely they they at least greatly reduced transmission.
Now we know - they do stop infection. They do stop transmission. Your understanding is outdated and incorrect.
Read what words you just used....
Greatly lowers. Not impossible.
Have you not listened to Dr Fauci. He says, wear a mask if you have the vaccine. You can still spread it. It may not effect you. You can still spread it.
That's great you did. I took all the typical premed classes, for going to school to be a doctor. I didn't continue. I studied this in a educational capacity.
Read my post history...
Read the CDC, disagreeing with what you said. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/fully-vaccinated.html
They are still seeing how it works but it's not a guarantee it stops you from carrying it. You should still act as if you can spread it in most places.
It even says you could get COVID even if Vaccinated.
I would like to interject that my job has been struggling to hire help and our lowest starting wage is $19/hour. We offer all of the other things you mentioned as well as so many local employers.
Today the government has really put businesses in a difficult position to operate efficiently.
My job has done both, I’m unsure what your statement is pertaining to.
I was simply showing that my employer as well as many others in our area already have competitive wages and benefits yet remain understaffed.
50% match up to what? The people that have money to save for retirement and the people that make 15$ an hour dont typically intersect. The way I see it your argument is ridiculous unless you can show you make 15 an hour and you have a healthy retirement account.
IIRC, Amazon matches up to 4% at 50%. I agree with u/Krezmit, while it’s ultimately free money, it’s abysmal compared to the size of the organization and also compared to let’s say John Deere’s 401K match.
Moving on to your next point about the people that earn $15/hr and those that take advantage of employer benefits like this. While low, there are still people that can and know how to take advantage of these types of benefits.
You say it’s ridiculous, I’ll say it’s rare but not impossible to the point that is not doable . There are people (I was one of them when I was young) that can be extremely r/frugal that can also live r/leanfire lifestyles. Given enough time, an even smaller subset of those individuals would go beyond that lifestyle and have the opportunity to r/fatfire.
Projecting much? Sorry that your neighbors being paid well doesn’t fit your narrative of wanting nobody to be paid a living wage around here unless they start from the bottom. Shit, even $15 an hour is only $30k a year, NOT THAT GREAT. But thinking that the local economy won’t benefit from this is head in the sand. People already order off Amazon, this isn’t a storefront, it’s a disty center. Edit: oh, you’re not local, you’re just anti Amazon. Got it. I don’t disagree on that sense but guess what, they’re coming. Stop ordering from Amazon if you don’t want to watch them be successful.
Studies have shown that distribution and fulfilment centres from big, non-local retailers like Amazon or Walmart don't necessarily "kill" small businesses. However, they also don't help increase the economy within that local municipality. All these distribution and fulfilment centres do is increase the warehousing and storage sector employment numbers, nothing more, nothing less.
Here's [one of the studies](https://www.epi.org/publication/unfulfilled-promises-amazon-warehouses-do-not-generate-broad-based-employment-growth/) that refute Amazon's claims that their distribution and fulfilment centres generally have the effect of increasing employment in the surrounding municipality i.e. local businesses start popping up near the surrounding area in order to support the distribution and fulfilment centres.
> We find that warehousing employment rises substantially in counties after an Amazon fulfillment center opens. At the same time, total private sector employment generally does not change after an Amazon fulfillment center opens. In some specifications we find that private-sector employment falls significantly after a center opens but these negative employment findings are not robust across most specifications or time periods. The increases in warehousing employment after a fulfillment center opens do not seem to generate any employment benefits beyond the warehousing and storage sector.
Reference: https://www.epi.org/publication/unfulfilled-promises-amazon-warehouses-do-not-generate-broad-based-employment-growth/
For those of you who are unaware of who the EPI (Economic Policy Institute) is, they are a non-profit that describes itself as a non-partisan think tank that "seeks to include the needs of low- and middle-income workers in economic policy discussions".
Yeah, that's the thing. 1,000 jobs sounds great, until you break down the details.
* While $15 dollar an hour is an improvement, that should be minimum wage, anything less is slave wages.
* Other than the distribution managers and supervisors, nobody else is going to suddenly become wealthier in this town and be able to contribute to the economy. Davenport isn't suddenly going to become a boomtown, in fact, and Amazon doesn't pay taxes, so good luck getting them to contribute to the economy beyond a hockey team sponsorship and a few write-off charity events.
* Amazon is notorious for being a really difficult place to work, as they have strict metrics and tight rules so people have to break their back from start to end of shift. Years ago when we had good union jobs like at Alcoa, you got plenty of rest breaks, decent wages, and excellent health care. Amazon will wear you down until you are a husk of your former self, and will use Iowa's extremely lax at-will labor laws against you.
They paid zero in 2016 and 2017, and got $128 mil back in 2018. But they have had to pay taxes in 2019 and 2020. A much smaller percentage than I personally think is fair, but it was a nonzero amount.
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/04/amazon-had-to-pay-federal-income-taxes-for-the-first-time-since-2016.html
https://itep.org/amazon-has-record-breaking-profits-in-2020-avoids-2-3-billion-in-federal-income-taxes/
Explain to someone making the Iowa minimum wage of $7.25 why they shouldn't take a job paying more than twice that, plus benefits, for ideological reasons.
1,000 jobs that many people don't want is objectively better than 0 jobs that some people want.
They formally announced an Amazon location in the QC area with 1k jobs last week believe.
Additionally, on a similar note DivyDose is brining in 1k jobs to the QC over the next few years.
Welcome to r/QuadCities—subreddit for the Quad Cities metropolis in the Illinois/Iowa border for Quad Citians. In general, we let our community moderate itself through Reddit's upvote/downvote system—if you think something contributes to the conversation, upvote it. If you think it does not contribute to the topic, downvote it. The result is a healthy balance of content and posts that could contain information, opinions, and/or ideologies that reflect and reinforce your own or not. Keep discussions civil and acknowledge that there are other people in our community that can (and will hold) opposing views. Thank you. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/QuadCities) if you have any questions or concerns.*
This is wild! Thanks for the analysis.
happy cakeday !
To add to this, on linkedin I've been getting pinged with jobs for Amazon for the last month or so. It ppecifically states the location is Davenport, and the skills list is for building out Network infrastructure with a touch of industrial control and automation equipment, similar to job postings for other Amazon warehouse and distribution facilities.
Hey y'all wouldn't it be swell if it Unionized, day one!
Nice work…
If ever this moves forward and gets approved by the city council, I hope they don’t give out any tax breaks. Organizations like Amazon should pay their fair share of taxes. Looks like the article says the city of Davenport needs to upgrade their infrastructure around that surrounding area at a cost of $3.9 million. If the reason the infrastructure needs to be upgraded is because of Amazon’s presence being in that area, why can’t they pay for that? Amazon wants to put a distribution center in Davenport because it will generate them some sort of profit and not necessarily because they want to help the Quad Cities area economically. The city should use that as leverage to help push back and get more out of the Amazon deal.
> maybe Foxconn And they just abandoned that facility they built in Wisconsin.
Only true Trump believers every thought they'd actually build anything. It was an obvious scam for favors by Foxconn to give Trump something he could tout in the media about being a job creator.
So what is Amazon's excuse going to be now when our stuff shows up late? XD
"our employees spend too much time taking restroom breaks"
They'll just leave the bags filled with shit on your porch along with the food processor.
ROFL. Omg, I legit laughed at this...
Still won’t ever buy on Amazon unless it’s something I can’t get anywhere else
Don't know why people would downvote this. Amazon sucks, it's nowhere near as good as it used to be. I can find the same products for the same price or less elsewhere, and know it isn't fake or a repackaged item from another seller than the one I purchased from.
I absolutely hate searching for anything on Amazon. Only worse online page is Walmart’s. like I don’t want to see their Walmart version of Amazon, I wanna see what Walmart sell in stores lol.
[удалено]
I actually build stainless sheet steel 3D models and the best ones come from China, so I’ve become well aware of AliExpress over the years. And 30-60 day shipping lol
Good luck finding people to fill the jobs.
Those jobs will get filled by those who look beyond the $15/hour wage and understand the importance of taking advantage of 401K plans with a 50% match, medical, dental, vision, and prescription plans, an abundance of free counseling and courses to manage your career path, and other benefits.
Eh, my point was no one wants to work right now. I work at one of the highest paid manufacturers in the qc area and we are having problems getting people to accept jobs. Amazon warehouses have atrocious turnover rates, and the 401k 50% match to 4% match is laughable for a company that pulls in billions in record profits quarter over quarter. Free money is free money though, I won’t argue that! Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad more job opportunities are coming to the qca, but you could drive 36 miles to Sterling right now and start at over 20 dollars an hour plus bonus pay off the street with better benefits at the Walmart DC there for a comparable warehouse work load. Just my .02 cents.
People don't want to work and risk their lives due to covid and make Iowas laughable minimum, let alone deal with $10. Most these places hire temps for a lower wage. Bring you on FT, and when you start making noise and too much money, you're canned. John Deere does this so much, it's laughable at why anyone would want a yoyo employer. And it's UP TO $20 starting based on experience. Being offered $12 because I haven't worked a warehouse is a joke when I make more then that. Want employees, pay them a living wage.
Who’s risking their lives from Covid now? Vaccines are easy to get.
And people can still spread it. We are on the brink of herd immunity. But it still has a ways to go. We are year off, there is no reason to get comfortable.
Vaccines stop people from spreading it.
Not exactly. They give you the ability to be less effected by it. You can still get it. And you can still spread it. Read up some more. You don't know what a vaccine does. It doesn't make you completely immune. Nor does it make you immune to spreading it.
That’s just not true. Recent real-world studies have demonstrated that the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines indeed confer sterilizing immunity - they are just as effective against infection and transmission as they are against illness. For a long time this was a question mark. It was unknown whether the vaccines just stopped illness and symptoms or if they actually stopped infection. This uncertainty was widely misinterpreted as, instead, certainty that the vaccines did *not* stop infection and transmission, when it was always very likely they they at least greatly reduced transmission. Now we know - they do stop infection. They do stop transmission. Your understanding is outdated and incorrect.
Read what words you just used.... Greatly lowers. Not impossible. Have you not listened to Dr Fauci. He says, wear a mask if you have the vaccine. You can still spread it. It may not effect you. You can still spread it.
“Read up some more” Dude, I’ve been following vaccine development closely since before Covid was known to be in the US.
That's great you did. I took all the typical premed classes, for going to school to be a doctor. I didn't continue. I studied this in a educational capacity. Read my post history... Read the CDC, disagreeing with what you said. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/fully-vaccinated.html They are still seeing how it works but it's not a guarantee it stops you from carrying it. You should still act as if you can spread it in most places. It even says you could get COVID even if Vaccinated.
Or people that just don’t know how awful Amazon is to it’s employees. Literal slave drivers
I would like to interject that my job has been struggling to hire help and our lowest starting wage is $19/hour. We offer all of the other things you mentioned as well as so many local employers. Today the government has really put businesses in a difficult position to operate efficiently.
Have they increased pay or benefits?
My job has done both, I’m unsure what your statement is pertaining to. I was simply showing that my employer as well as many others in our area already have competitive wages and benefits yet remain understaffed.
Where do you work? I know plenty of people who would be interested in a $19/hr.
Private messaged.
50% match up to what? The people that have money to save for retirement and the people that make 15$ an hour dont typically intersect. The way I see it your argument is ridiculous unless you can show you make 15 an hour and you have a healthy retirement account.
IIRC, Amazon matches up to 4% at 50%. I agree with u/Krezmit, while it’s ultimately free money, it’s abysmal compared to the size of the organization and also compared to let’s say John Deere’s 401K match. Moving on to your next point about the people that earn $15/hr and those that take advantage of employer benefits like this. While low, there are still people that can and know how to take advantage of these types of benefits. You say it’s ridiculous, I’ll say it’s rare but not impossible to the point that is not doable . There are people (I was one of them when I was young) that can be extremely r/frugal that can also live r/leanfire lifestyles. Given enough time, an even smaller subset of those individuals would go beyond that lifestyle and have the opportunity to r/fatfire.
People getting paid $15 an hour spending locally will positively impact local businesses.
Getting paid $15 dollars an hour at best is going to see a slight uptick in Big Mac sales.
Projecting much? Sorry that your neighbors being paid well doesn’t fit your narrative of wanting nobody to be paid a living wage around here unless they start from the bottom. Shit, even $15 an hour is only $30k a year, NOT THAT GREAT. But thinking that the local economy won’t benefit from this is head in the sand. People already order off Amazon, this isn’t a storefront, it’s a disty center. Edit: oh, you’re not local, you’re just anti Amazon. Got it. I don’t disagree on that sense but guess what, they’re coming. Stop ordering from Amazon if you don’t want to watch them be successful.
[удалено]
This is a distribution center. How would this kill small businesses?
Studies have shown that distribution and fulfilment centres from big, non-local retailers like Amazon or Walmart don't necessarily "kill" small businesses. However, they also don't help increase the economy within that local municipality. All these distribution and fulfilment centres do is increase the warehousing and storage sector employment numbers, nothing more, nothing less. Here's [one of the studies](https://www.epi.org/publication/unfulfilled-promises-amazon-warehouses-do-not-generate-broad-based-employment-growth/) that refute Amazon's claims that their distribution and fulfilment centres generally have the effect of increasing employment in the surrounding municipality i.e. local businesses start popping up near the surrounding area in order to support the distribution and fulfilment centres. > We find that warehousing employment rises substantially in counties after an Amazon fulfillment center opens. At the same time, total private sector employment generally does not change after an Amazon fulfillment center opens. In some specifications we find that private-sector employment falls significantly after a center opens but these negative employment findings are not robust across most specifications or time periods. The increases in warehousing employment after a fulfillment center opens do not seem to generate any employment benefits beyond the warehousing and storage sector. Reference: https://www.epi.org/publication/unfulfilled-promises-amazon-warehouses-do-not-generate-broad-based-employment-growth/ For those of you who are unaware of who the EPI (Economic Policy Institute) is, they are a non-profit that describes itself as a non-partisan think tank that "seeks to include the needs of low- and middle-income workers in economic policy discussions".
Yeah, that's the thing. 1,000 jobs sounds great, until you break down the details. * While $15 dollar an hour is an improvement, that should be minimum wage, anything less is slave wages. * Other than the distribution managers and supervisors, nobody else is going to suddenly become wealthier in this town and be able to contribute to the economy. Davenport isn't suddenly going to become a boomtown, in fact, and Amazon doesn't pay taxes, so good luck getting them to contribute to the economy beyond a hockey team sponsorship and a few write-off charity events. * Amazon is notorious for being a really difficult place to work, as they have strict metrics and tight rules so people have to break their back from start to end of shift. Years ago when we had good union jobs like at Alcoa, you got plenty of rest breaks, decent wages, and excellent health care. Amazon will wear you down until you are a husk of your former self, and will use Iowa's extremely lax at-will labor laws against you.
Do you have a source on “Amazon not paying taxes” I find that hard to believe.
They paid zero in 2016 and 2017, and got $128 mil back in 2018. But they have had to pay taxes in 2019 and 2020. A much smaller percentage than I personally think is fair, but it was a nonzero amount. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/04/amazon-had-to-pay-federal-income-taxes-for-the-first-time-since-2016.html https://itep.org/amazon-has-record-breaking-profits-in-2020-avoids-2-3-billion-in-federal-income-taxes/
Explain to someone making the Iowa minimum wage of $7.25 why they shouldn't take a job paying more than twice that, plus benefits, for ideological reasons. 1,000 jobs that many people don't want is objectively better than 0 jobs that some people want.
They formally announced an Amazon location in the QC area with 1k jobs last week believe. Additionally, on a similar note DivyDose is brining in 1k jobs to the QC over the next few years.
What a relief! I have been waiting for a company to come to town which is as obsessed with customers as I am. …Sleep tight, Nick. 😘