When Jeff Bezos directed the Washington Post to withhold a presidential endorsement, criticism was fierce and immediate – 250,000 subscribers canceled, the Post reported.
Imagine the impact if 250,000 – indeed 250,000,000 – canceled their Prime subscriptions. Such an action might actually Make Amazon Pay.
The #MakeAmazonPay campaign, of which Good Jobs First is a part, exists to draw attention to the company’s mistreatment of workers, disregard for consumers whose data it misuses, bullying of small local businesses, and accelerating climate destruction, especially during the holiday shopping season.
Sadly, public money – in the form of government subsidies and contracts – helps prop up Amazon’s deplorable business practices.
We at Good Jobs First have documented $6.7 billion in subsidies Amazon received from communities big and small in the United States. We found another $520 million in Argentina, China, Mexico, Poland, South Africa, Spain, and other countries, a significant undercount due to many countries’ poor transparency in reporting economic development incentives.
Many of the recent subsidies, including one for $1 billion in Oregon, have been for data centers. Because they are basically warehouses full of computers running 24/7, they create few jobs. All that nonstop computing consumes huge amounts of water and energy – and Amazon often gets discounts on utility rates, too.
Amazon also benefits from lucrative government contracts worldwide.
In fiscal year 2022-23, Amazon Web Services (AWS) saw a of jump of 76% over the previous year when it comes to public contracts from the UK government.
And Amazon continues muscling its way into procurement in the U.S. Since the Institute for Local Self-Reliance reported on Amazon’s ploy to be the dominant provider of classroom and office supplies, electronics and other goods and services for cities, counties, and school districts everywhere, the retailer’s efforts have significantly increased since then.
Now consider Amazon’s long rap sheet.
Our newest database Violation Tracker Global – which chronicles the misconduct of the world’s largest companies – records Amazon’s penalty total as more than $2.4 billion since 2010.
The most expensive of those fines have been related to Amazon’s anti-competitive practices, with cases alleging the retailer abused its marketplace and logistics advantages. Italy’s regulators fined Amazon over $1.4 billion for two such cases in 2021 – the largest fines we’ve seen (though one case was later reversed in part because a judge ruled the investigation took too long). Spain, Japan, the U.S., and France have collectively fined Amazon another $78 million for anti-competitive practices.
(Meanwhile, in the United Kingdom, regulators accepted “commitments” from Amazon that it would change its way; they issued no monetary penalties. And rather than critiquing its dire health and safety record, UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves heralded Amazon’s plans to build more data centers).
Amazon’s dominance of the online marketplace means higher prices for us, and higher costs for small business owners, who fork over an ever-higher percentage of each sale to Amazon for selling on Amazon.com (In the U.S., the Federal Trade Commission is suing Amazon for these alleged monopolistic practices).
Amazon also has its share of violations for invading people’s privacy. Across the U.S. and Europe, it has paid out over $1 billion in such fines across roughly a dozen cases (including a class-action lawsuit against Amazon and Capital One in the U.S. that settled for $190 million).
But by far, the most frequent offenses are related to cheating workers out of wages, and jeopardizing the health and safety of its workers. The cases include Amazon paying:
- $61.7 million for failing to pay Amazon Flex driver their full tips
- $5.5 million to resolve allegations it didn’t pay workers for their time taking COVID tests before their shift started – an Amazon mandate
- $5.9 million to settle allegations it had violated the Warehouse Quotas Law, which requires warehouse employers to provide employees written notice of any quotas they must follow
Amazon’s mistreatment of workers, consumers, and competitors has been well-documented. Rather than reward a company like it with our business and our tax dollars, we should collectively Make Amazon Pay – pay its workers, pay the same taxes everyone else pays, and pay for the environmental damages caused by its ever-growing carbon emissions.
