Just as holiday shopping is in full swing this week, so are parcel carriers across the country. I am a United Parcel Service driver and this season is the busiest time of the year for me and the thousands of people who deliver American goods to your door. , driving around the streets of San Francisco and pounding the pavement to make sure people here get their orders in time for the holidays.
But at the end of a long day, I’m one of San Francisco’s lucky drivers who don’t have to deal with a brutal commute.
why? He started his career as a delivery driver at a time when it was still considered a viable working-class career in the Bay Area.
I grew up on Mission in the 1990s. My parents are from Mexico and worked hard to support our family. But I had trouble concentrating in school and was a bit of a troublemaker, and I ended up working in the juvenile justice system where he worked for two years. When I was released in 1999, I bounced back and forth between various stuck jobs. At that time, a caseworker sent me to her UPS and I got a job with the union where I still work.
I started working in the warehouse and worked overnight to load trucks for the route. Seven years later, I learned to drive a stick to become a driver myself. Today, I earn over $40 an hour, have excellent health insurance and retirement benefits, and have all the protection of a union contract.
Gentrification nearly drove me out of the house, like so many other working-class people. In 2015, a developer bought the apartment my family lived in. My father was offered $20,000 to move out, but he knew he wouldn’t be able to find a new affordable rental property with that money.
Later that year, my mother, sister, and I piled up our savings in hopes of buying a house. But I couldn’t find anything I could buy in either San Francisco or Oakland. We were looking as far away as Richmond when our luck changed. Our realtor called. A San Francisco home sale fell through and it was within our budget. It was a lot of work, but I jumped at the chance to stay in a city I could call home. I received the keys on New Year’s Eve.
If I were in the delivery business now, even our modest home would be way beyond my price range.
In just a few years, we’ve seen Amazon’s fulfillment facilities grow from one Bay Area site in 2013 to 37 sites today. But Amazon employees haven’t benefited from the company’s expansion.
Amazon drivers do the same job as me, but get paid half as much. Additionally, Amazon’s low wages are affecting the entire industry. Over the past decade, parcel delivery driver wages have fallen 19% in California (adjusted for inflation). That’s about $12,000 less per year for the average driver. Wages for warehouse workers in California also fell 3% over the same period.
Naturally, Amazon employees don’t stay long. He has an annual turnover rate of 150% for the company’s warehouse workers. The company’s business model is to create bad jobs and keep workers from sticking around and demanding the rewards and respect they deserve.
The tech giant’s business operations also affect UPS. To compete, UPS is changing its business practices. My colleagues and I work more weekends, and UPS has created a new classification for low-paid drivers. This is what we are fighting to change in our next union contract.
I have worked with unions to oppose Amazon’s influence on the industry.I discuss work rights with local Amazon employees every day and encourage my colleagues at UPS to do the same. I’m here. The Teamsters Union has made supporting Amazon workers a national priority.
In March, the San Francisco Oversight Board unanimously decided to suspend all new parcel delivery services in the city for 18 months. This prompted Amazon to suspend work on a proposed last-mile warehouse in San Francisco’s Showplace Square.
Board Decision Offers Opportunity to Reassess Amazon’s Impact on San Francisco Communities, as well as Create New Processes to Help Both Employees and Consumers Benefit from Ecommerce Growth It can be obtained.
The workers who provide vacations to San Francisco people deserve a good job so they can live here.
Salvador Medina is a UPS driver and member of Teamsters Local 2785.