Amazon workers vote against unionization in Alabama

Yahoo Finance tech editor Dan Howley breaks down the Amazon union vote in Alabama and what it could mean for union initiatives nationwide.

Video transcript

SEANA SMITH: Amazon coming out on top. It looks like the company does have enough votes than it does to block a union effort down in Alabama. This is something that we were closely watching here because of the implications that it could have for warehouses located elsewhere across the country. Dan Howley following this story very closely for us. And Dan, Amazon coming out on top, at least when it comes to this vote. But the talk out there is that this debate is far from over.

DAN HOWLEY: Yeah, a lot of the labor experts that we spoke to had seemed to believe that this isn't going to be the final straw and that there will be other efforts to organize within Amazon facilities across the country. Now, the final vote of the 5,876 workers at this facility who are eligible to cast ballots, only 3,041 did. And of those, 1,798 voted against joining the union, while 738 voted in favor of joining the union. So obviously, a landslide victory here for Amazon and its effort to keep workers from organizing.

But as far as the Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Union believes, they say that Amazon interfered with workers' ability to cast votes. They will be filing a official complaint with the National Labor Relations Board. Amazon, meanwhile, saying that in a statement that it was praising workers, touting the fact that only 16% of employees voted in favor of unionizing and that they are a company that provides above minimum wage and health benefits. They especially said, our employees heard far more anti-Amazon messages from union policy makers and media outlets than they heard from us. And Amazon didn't when our employees made the choice to vote against joining a union.

But as far as we've heard from experts, there will be more efforts from this kind of grassroots campaign. Obviously, there may be a slowdown because this, obviously, is a stinging blow for unionization efforts. But that doesn't necessarily mean this is the last Amazon we'll hear from workers.

EMILY MCCORMICK: Absolutely, Dan. And I also want to see what this means for big tech. Because just earlier this year, we had Google workers form that company's own first ever union. And so despite today's apparent win for Amazon, I'm wondering if this movement among tech workers, and especially those non-tech workers at big tech companies, if that inclination is still to unionize or if this is now potentially starting to peter out a little bit.

DAN HOWLEY: Yes, so the Google Union's minority union, it's a small collection, but still, it was the first union formed at Google. There was talk from some of the experts that we spoke of, of potentially seeing the Amazon workers try to form a minority union, although that may be difficult, considering the amount of turnover at these facilities. But I don't think it necessarily means that there's going to be a slowdown over the next few years as far as labor organizing goes at these kinds of facilities. I think that we're going to see more speedup. And obviously, there are unions in other countries where these companies do business. So they're no stranger to unions. It's just in the US.

And then as far as one of the experts that I spoke to at Penn State University, Professor Paul Clark basically said to me, look, Ford, General Motors, National Steel, they all pushed back vehemently against unionization efforts. But eventually, unions managed to find their way there. So that does not mean necessarily that this is the end for workers' efforts at Amazon.

SEANA SMITH: All right, Dan Howley, thanks so much for giving us that update. And it certainly sounds like a story that we will continue to follow here at Yahoo--