This company delivers packages faster than Amazon, but workers pay the price

That was the question I had in mind last summer, before Jang's death, when I met several of Coupang's warehouse and delivery workers. Like Jang, who had told his mother that workers were treated like "disposable objects," they had all experienced the dehumanizing effects of Coupang's algorithmic innovations. Some talked about a bruising pace of work hitched to the expectations of superhuman delivery times. Others said it was difficult to even go to the bathroom at work. In 2014, when Coupang began offering Rocket Delivery, its on-demand delivery service, it had promised stable careers with above-average benefits even to bottom-rung workers.