Even though Amazon is one of the largest retailers in the world, pulling in hundreds of millions of dollars a year in profit, they hire seasonal workers to fill their boxes for cheap rather than paying a permanent workforce in their warehouses.
And many of these seasonal employees are seniors who should be retired but had to keep working after being bankrupted by the Great Recession of 2008, seniors who live in RVs and work 'til it hurts during the holiday season.
From the Amazon recruiting site:
The Amazon CamperForce program brings together a community of enthusiastic RV’ers who help make the holidays bright for customers of Amazon. As a CamperForce Associate, you’ll begin this seasonal assignment in early Fall and work until December 23rd. The program lasts 3-4 months in the winter, and your responsibilities will be in the areas of picking, packing, stowing, and receiving. …Amazon offers great pay, a paid completion bonus, paid referral bonuses, and paid campsites for its CamperForce associates.
CamperForce is a somewhat demoralizing documentary by Brett Story and Jessica Bruder of Field Of Vision about the workampers who help box up all those holiday orders for "$11 per hour, overtime, bonuses, paid campsites and free health coverage (after a waiting period)".
-Via Laughing Squid
How other countries do it is here: https://www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/progdesc/ssptw/index.html
What can it be that prevents America it from joining the ranks of civilised countries? Is it arrogance, insular ignorance or the political system?