Break up Amazon before it does any more damage to America

NY POST ^ | 10/9/18 | Maureen Callahan

[GailA]

Pretty soon Alexa will have all your med info from your doc’s reports. Part of the Electronic crap they put in Obamacare.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

I don't deal with Amazon because I find it incompatible with my values.

YMMV.

[philetus]

I have purchased products from small businesses on Amazon. There are a million small businesses selling on Amazon.

[Crolis]

Forgive me MichaelCoreleone if I get your meaning wrong, but I think the idea falls under the Distributism economic ideology.

The idea would be to emphasize a widely distributed ownership of productive assets while avoiding the concentration of those means in either a government or a sliver of ultra-wealthy.

In practice, more of a very large middle class with few poor or rich on the extremes. Not that you wouldn’t have either, but it wouldn’t be lopsided like we see in a lot of Central/South American countries where the lion’s share of wealth is concentrated into the elite.

[Excellence]

I’m not trying to stick up for Amazon, but in a lot of cases, the vendor at Amazon isn’t Amazon, but they’re just using the Amazon website. It’s like a mall; you’re not buying from the mall, you’re buying from the store in the mall, and the mall takes its cut in rent.
Having said that, somehow I’ve been consistently disappointed in anything I’ve purchased from Amazon (dented, inoperable merchandise, wrong product delivered), and avoid it.

[WhoisAlanGreenspan?]

I thought the author put it well. "We don’t break companies up because they’re evil or take jobs or don’t pay taxes. We do it because it’s time.”

Recently I was shopping for a cell phone provider and saw Metro by TMobile has the Amazon Prime deal as part of a package deal that is hugely discounted. Add to that USPS Sunday delivery of Amazon only.

[Basket_of_Deplorables]

I read it this am. Scary. Yes, they should be broken up. Sooner, rather than later.

[Basket_of_Deplorables]

Kinda early to be drinking...

[Manuel OKelley]

I actually went and read the entire article which was a bunch of fear mongering tripe.

The author also penned these classics:

https://nypost.com/2018/09/18/tone-deaf-emmys-all-but-ignore-hollywoods-metoo-plague/

https://nypost.com/2018/06/29/what-do-so-many-mass-shooters-have-in-common-a-hatred-of-women/

And the guy she refers to for source material is a giant leftist product of government from Berkely

Cannot believe this gets any mileage here.

[HiTech RedNeck]

Which shows that I am not.

[Vermont Lt]

This too shall pass.

Someone will come up with a way to do it better, cheaper, faster.

The government doesn’t need to control any more.

[HiTech RedNeck]

That’s exactly what I was getting at. Quality was high in yesteryear. Now, ordered to be a commodity rather than something special, AT&T obeyed.

[HiTech RedNeck]

My how testy you are....

[MichaelCorleone]

Not at all.

Just you’re really not making sense. And I neither have the time nor the inclination to try to figure you out.

Sooooo...have a nice day!

[Svartalfiar]

Perhaps most importantly: Since the Great Recession, Amazon has paid just $1.4 billion in corporate taxes compared to Walmart’s $64 billion.

That seems a bit disingenuous. WallyWorld has MUCH more physical property, so they'll be paying way more in property taxes. Amazon has a lot of third party sellers - the $$ pass through Amazon, but the majority of the revenue is actually going to another company, which is who is paying those sales taxes. And when was this so-called 'Great Recession'? Was Amazon even a major player at that point? WallyWorld has been around much longer and has a larger base to start with. And finally, shipping. HUGE write-off business expense for Amazon. There's no way Prime membership covers all their shipping costs, but they translate that into more income in other places as people are more active, and any shipping losses are simply written off as a business expense, lowering a big part of their income for tax purposes.

[Freedom of Speech Wins]

https://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/03/29/silicon-war-how-donald-trump-can-crush-amazons-sweetheart-postal-service-deal/

https://www.breitbart.com/london/2018/10/08/amazon-funnelled-cash-to-salafist-org-founded-by-extremist-uk-based-saudi-scholar/

The company seems evil. It is a conglomerate with all kinds of nonrelated businesses.

I believe it meets most if not all of the monopoly qualifications for identification as a monopoly and resulting breakup.

Amazon and Bezos have also been black hats, bad actors, consistently.

Amazon has helped drive mall stores, and strip mall stores across America out of business.

The one potentially redeeming factor on the company is that it can allow an individual to sell goods on its platform. The company should have been able to do this without trying to dominate and control politics.

[Freedom of Speech Wins]

Do you have any opinions on EBAY?

[Freedom of Speech Wins]

What specifically is wrong in the article and why?

I honestly feel you may be the person able to best communicate this to us here.

Also do you have any vested interest in this fight at all?

What are your experziences with Amazon?

[Freedom of Speech Wins]

There is no reason they should be able to mail things for free while individuals are now paying a dollar to mail a letter.

[Freedom of Speech Wins]

Why does one company get away with being unprofitable for so long while driving profitable companiesoutof business?

Does the politics controlling who has the most bank and the unfair advantage with the Post Office dictate who wins?

Amazon makes me think of Mitt Romeny’s line on crony capitalism in his debate with Obama about the government picking the winners. (he of course went on to reference Solyndra and picking the losers too)