WASHINGTON — The US economy showed signs of rebounding after it added 943,000 new opportunities for workers to be exploited by employers in July, according to data reported by the Labor Department today.
“Exploiting workers is sometimes more difficult in summer, so it’s great to see such bullish numbers in July,” said Jonathan Hare, an economist at New York University. “Since capitalism beat back the scourge of COVID-19 we are now seeing workers spending long, grueling hours indoors through the hottest months of the year, quite possibly without air conditioning, often on their feet for hours without a break. If we’re lucky, we might even see some of these employees develop symptoms of seasonal depression, because while CEOs and board members will be vacationing with their families this August, many workers will likely be stuck indoors all day long without access to natural sunlight.”
Workers across the country have noted the increased opportunities to potentially contract COVID-19 at their place of work.
“I’ve mostly been home with my family this past year, so the odds of getting sick seemed pretty low,” said Harry Conley, a former sales representative who lost his job in the spring of last year. “In my recent job search, I’ve noticed lots of ads saying they’ll be moving to in-person work soon, so now I’ll be able to put my wife and kids in danger, too, just as the numbers of the Delta variant continue to rise. My kids are too young to get vaccinated, and my wife has asthma so it’s good to know that there are still lots of chances for my boss to put my family at risk to justify the cost of some commercial real estate they’re renting downtown.”
Andy Jassy, the new CEO of Amazon, said industry leaders are thrilled for the opportunity to exploit at such a large-scale.
“At Amazon, we value growth and efficiency, so the opportunity for us to take advantage of so many workers is really valuable to us,” Jassy explained. “Smaller job numbers may have meant that we’d need to be more concerned about unionization efforts, or complaints about human rights abuses at our warehouses. But with numbers like these, we could probably have a few more people die on the job and rest assured that there would be thousands clamoring to replace them. And that makes our investors happy.”
At press time, Hare added that the new opportunities for exploitation would likely be accompanied by a cut to the social safety net and any advancements in consumer protections.