Amazon increases its average starting pay for front-line US staff to $19+/hour, up from $18/hour; warehouse and delivery workers will earn $16/hour to $26/hour (Annie Palmer/CNBC)

Annie Palmer / CNBC:
Amazon unveils Sparrow, a robotic arm using AI to move items of varying shapes and sizes for packaging, saying it identifies ~65% of Amazon’s product inventory  —  – Amazon on Thursday unveiled new warehouse technology at its robotics and delivery conference.

Annie Palmer / CNBC:
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy says the layoffs will continue into 2023, after the company cut roles across its Devices and Books businesses on Wednesday  —  KEY POINTS  — Amazon will continue to lay off employees in the coming year, CEO Andy Jassy wrote in a memo to workers on Thursday.

Annie Palmer / CNBC:
Amazon’s Andy Jassy has no plan to force employees to return to the office, will “proceed adaptively as we learn”, and says most have returned for some weekdays  —  – Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said the company doesn’t plan to call its employees back to the office.

Matt Day / Bloomberg:
The Amazon Labor Union withdraws its petition for an election at a southern California warehouse, after losing an election at a New York warehouse last week  —  Amazon.com Inc. workers seeking to join a union at a company warehouse in Southern California have backed away from their attempt …

CNBC:
Research details Amazon’s post-pandemic shrinking US warehouse footprint: 21 facilities have closed, 21 are canceled, and 27 are delayed or on hold  —  – Amazon is closing, canceling or delaying warehouses across the U.S. after its pandemic expansion left it with too much space.

Annie Palmer / CNBC:
Internal memo: Amazon’s head of workplace health and safety Heather MacDougall is leaving the company on October 7; MacDougall joined Amazon in 2019  —  – Heather MacDougall will depart Amazon on Oct. 7, according to a memo viewed by CNBC.  — MacDougall joined Amazon in 2019 as vice president …