A global pandemic is shaking capitalism to its core. In the midst of this crisis, Amazon recently hired 100,000 new warehouse workers and announced it was hiring an additional 75,000 on April 13. The company is offering temporary premium pay of $17 per hour — $2.00 more than their usual start rate.

For the many thousands of out-of-work young socialists and other fed-up workers who have lost their jobs in the service and hospitality industry, this is a perilous moment. But it’s also a great opportunity for activists to join a burgeoning network of organizing going on within Amazon.

Why Amazon? Because it’s one of the most important companies in the American and global economies — a company in which an organized and invigorated working class might be able to exercise some real power in the twenty-first-century economy.