In a simpler world, Amazon Prime might be an uncomplicated bright spot amid America’s vastly inadequate health care and elder care system. But in the past few years, the constant stream of negative reports about the company — poor working conditions in its warehouses, its ruthless white-collar work culture, what my dad called the “corporate bribery” resulting in two new headquarters — makes it feel like a deal with the devil. Before my dad joined academia, he was a factory worker and a union organizer for nearly two decades; he sang “Solidarity Forever” to me as a lullaby. Each one-click purchase feels like a teensy betrayal of my dad’s past, a cruel reminder that he’s now reliant on a monopolistic corporation with an atrocious labor record . (That record isn’t resolved by its recent $15-an-hour minimum wage announcement).

My sister Kim faces this irony, too. Last year, just before her 60th birthday, she found out she had breast cancer. The chemo wreaked havoc on her immune system, and she took a seven-month leave from work. Afraid of making her health worse during a historic flu season, she barely left the house and started ordering the most prosaic products on Amazon Prime in bulk: tissues, a fleece jacket, a lemon squeezer, dinner forks, deodorant. As her cancer treatment ramped up, the red badges signaled other items: wig caps, pill organizer, the Book of Common Prayer, a St. Peregrine patron saint of cancer medal. When her chemo resulted in a raging case of hemorrhoids, she was grateful not to have to ask our brother, who was caring for her, to fetch her sitz bath salts and witch hazel pads. After her reduced disability pay began to catch up with her, she used Amazon for the discounts. She once ordered 27 rolls of toilet paper for just $16.97.

My sister spends her days as a social worker in hospice, giving her a front-row seat to the travesty of end-of-life care in the United States. A bleeding-heart liberal, she’d been known for fierce Facebook posts on things like President Trump and gay marriage. When she was going through treatment, her heart was bled dry. “When I was in survival mode, I couldn’t think of anything else but feeling better,” Kim told me. “I really wasn’t thinking globally.”

I wondered how many other people were also in this kind of survival mode: perhaps the one in seven American adults with a disability affecting their mobility, or the 60 percent who have a chronic condition, or the three-quarters of workers who live paycheck to paycheck, or the more than 90,000 who work in Amazon’s “fulfillment centers” in the United States because they have no better options.

If I wanted to quit the service forever because it offends my values, I could probably do that without upending my life. But even for someone like me, who isn’t sick or disabled or poor or living in a rural area, Amazon Prime helps alleviate the pressures of a sped-up economy. I don’t use it just because I’m lazy and love to stream “Transparent.” I use it (and other timesaving apps like Seamless and Uber) because I’m overworked and one-click ordering spares me time.