POSTED BY MARTIN KICH

Any resurgence of the American labor movement is going to have to focus on workers in the most exploited categories—from warehouse workers to misclassified “independent contractors” to adjunct faculty—whose numbers will continue to increase due to automation and the corporatization of the public sector.

Under the headings “A Prime Day for a Workers Strike” and “Prime Deals, Less than Prime Working Conditions,” the Vox Sentences daily newsletter for yesterday, July 17, included links to the following items:

Amazon workers went on strike on the e-commerce giant’s busiest day of the year, Prime Day. Workers in Amazon’s warehouses around the world are boycotting for higher salaries and better working conditions. [Al Jazeera]

 Workers in Spain and Germany have planned walk-off strikes with demonstrations to follow. In Spain, 1,800 went on strike with the help of labor activists. Thousands more followed suit in Germany today. [Washington Post/Abha Bhattarai]

 Warehouse workers report awful conditions, saying they are on their feet for 10 hours straight, are not allowed to talk to one another, and are not exposed to any daylight. One worker said that they are worked “to death” and cannot work for Amazon and “maintain a healthy state of mind.” [Vox/Chavie Lieber]

 Employees are also denied bathroom breaks and sick days, and are granted unpaid breaks that require they walk far to get to the break room—taking away most of their downtime. [The Verge/Shannon Liao]

 Several Amazon employees have died while on the job, and ambulances have been called to the company’s warehouses more than 600 times in the past three years. [Vanity Fair/Maya Kosoff]

 The pay is astronomically low for Amazon warehouse employees. Meanwhile, founder and CEO Jeff Bezos is the richest man in modern history with a $152 billion net worth. [Newsweek/Brendan Cole]