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Amazon's decision to employ lawyers and lobbyists instead of oversight resulted in a public black market they openly run but are not responsible for profiting f

Amazon's decision to employ lawyers and lobbyists instead of oversight resulted in a public black market they openly run but are not responsible for profiting from. I am excited to see which state will have the first Amazon fulfillment center crawling with feds. They have to raid one eventually to get to the bottom of the lead, the counterfeits etc. How is Amazon preventing the EPA or the FTC from doing their job and raiding facilities? It's almost like big oil and big tobacco again.... all-powerful companies deliberately doing wrong for profit, like Amazon they even looked too big to challenge for a very long time. > Amazon has been selling thousands of products that violate federal safety regulations, according to the Wall Street Journal, including toys containing dangerous levels of lead. https://www.insider.com/amazon-selling-toxic-toys-lead-poisoning-2019-8 https://www.insider.com/amazon-selling-toxic-toys-lead-poiso... > At the time, Nike agreed to sell a limited product assortment to Amazon, in exchange for stricter policing of counterfeits and restrictions on unsanctioned sales of its products. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/13/nike-wont-sell-directly-to-amazon-anymore.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/13/nike-wont-sell-directly-to-a...

decebalus1 7y ago
> I am excited to see which state will have the first Amazon fulfillment center crawling with feds. I share your excitement but I'm not optimistic about this ever happening considering the increasing amount of cash Amazon is spending in DC.
dv_dt 7y ago
Inequality is back to the time of robber barons of industry, and so too is the lawlessness of many of the industry practices, where we are in the same state where technology and scale of organization are outrunning the philosophical theories of government operation to regulate them.
- compiler-guy 7y ago
  Inequality goes back far beyond that. The slaves who built the pyramids in Egypt were pretty unequal from the Pharaoh. And even that wasn't the first society with inequality. It goes back far beyond recorded history.
  - dv_dt 7y ago
    But gini coefficient measurements show the magnitude of inequality, and the magnitude today has returned to that of the 1920's robber baron era. And the magnitude is important because there is a correlation between higher economic growth and a gini value showing lower inequality than today.
    - refurb 7y ago
      Couldn’t find Gini going back that far, but other measures of inequality show we’re below that of the 1930’s. And interestingly, the poverty rate is near a century low. https://www.chartbookofeconomicinequality.com/inequality-by-country/usa/ https://www.chartbookofeconomicinequality.com/inequality-by-...
      - dv_dt 7y ago
        Look at the poverty curve again. We basically have made zero progress on the poverty rate since the 1970s and actually are drifting higher. Yet from our technology base, and continuously rising productivity, it really should be easier than ever to ensure everyone has shelter and food, and yet homelessness is exploding right now too.
        refurb 7y ago
        The poverty rate is 1/3rd what it was in 1950. Remarkable progress.
  - ch4s3 7y ago
    Not that it particularly matters, but the pyramids weren't build by slaves [1]. They were built by skilled/payed workers and some corvée labour by farmers during the flooding of the Nile as a form of taxation. [1] https://archive.org/details/pyramidscomplete00vern https://archive.org/details/pyramidscomplete00vern
- siruncledrew 7y ago
  Hell, we are reading an article about a commerce company Jeff Bezos owns from a news company that Jeff Bezos personally owns.
- friendlybus 7y ago
  Amazon/Alibaba is making money pulling millions of chinese people out of poverty. The inequality equation is the same as normal, we're just not the focus of economic production at the moment. Comparing a normal western job to a chinese wage & lifestyle makes us look like the 1%. Comparing the average westerner who sells to 10k customers to bezos who sells to hundreds of millions makes him look like the bourgeoisie. Technology and orgs always outpace regulation. The government is terrified of front-running business. It can't, the point of being a king is to control resources for the sake of generating prosperity. It can't then go and do all the work and be on the bleeding edge as well, it pays people to do that. For all the control the tech companies have tried to exert in the world they are reigned in by the banks and then government. At the end of the day amazon hasn't made a big difference in my life for all of the $x bezo has. I don't shop there, his lack of quality control is sinking his company. What's there to worry about?
  - Dumblydorr 7y ago
    What about the counterfeits and lead levels in toys? Those are two major issues that you glided right past in your non chalance
    - friendlybus 7y ago
      My non-chalance covered that reasonably well in the not buying from them and recognizing that the lack of quality is sinking their company. This isn't an inequality thing, mansa musa was more unequally rich than bezos. It's just quality control.
  - dv_dt 7y ago
    It's not that gov't is terrified or incapable, it's that the dominant regulatory philosophy in our political leadership right now is neoliberalism. Which has large failure points - the recalcitrance to regulate Amazon is the same stance as not regulating the fossil fuel industry.

decebalus1 7y ago

> I am excited to see which state will have the first Amazon fulfillment center crawling with feds. I share your excitement but I'm not optimistic about this ever happening considering the increasing amount of cash Amazon is spending in DC.

dv_dt 7y ago

Inequality is back to the time of robber barons of industry, and so too is the lawlessness of many of the industry practices, where we are in the same state where technology and scale of organization are outrunning the philosophical theories of government operation to regulate them.

compiler-guy 7y ago
Inequality goes back far beyond that. The slaves who built the pyramids in Egypt were pretty unequal from the Pharaoh. And even that wasn't the first society with inequality. It goes back far beyond recorded history.
- dv_dt 7y ago
  But gini coefficient measurements show the magnitude of inequality, and the magnitude today has returned to that of the 1920's robber baron era. And the magnitude is important because there is a correlation between higher economic growth and a gini value showing lower inequality than today.
  - refurb 7y ago
    Couldn’t find Gini going back that far, but other measures of inequality show we’re below that of the 1930’s. And interestingly, the poverty rate is near a century low. https://www.chartbookofeconomicinequality.com/inequality-by-country/usa/ https://www.chartbookofeconomicinequality.com/inequality-by-...
    - dv_dt 7y ago
      Look at the poverty curve again. We basically have made zero progress on the poverty rate since the 1970s and actually are drifting higher. Yet from our technology base, and continuously rising productivity, it really should be easier than ever to ensure everyone has shelter and food, and yet homelessness is exploding right now too.
      - refurb 7y ago
        The poverty rate is 1/3rd what it was in 1950. Remarkable progress.
- ch4s3 7y ago
  Not that it particularly matters, but the pyramids weren't build by slaves [1]. They were built by skilled/payed workers and some corvée labour by farmers during the flooding of the Nile as a form of taxation. [1] https://archive.org/details/pyramidscomplete00vern https://archive.org/details/pyramidscomplete00vern
siruncledrew 7y ago
Hell, we are reading an article about a commerce company Jeff Bezos owns from a news company that Jeff Bezos personally owns.
friendlybus 7y ago
Amazon/Alibaba is making money pulling millions of chinese people out of poverty. The inequality equation is the same as normal, we're just not the focus of economic production at the moment. Comparing a normal western job to a chinese wage & lifestyle makes us look like the 1%. Comparing the average westerner who sells to 10k customers to bezos who sells to hundreds of millions makes him look like the bourgeoisie. Technology and orgs always outpace regulation. The government is terrified of front-running business. It can't, the point of being a king is to control resources for the sake of generating prosperity. It can't then go and do all the work and be on the bleeding edge as well, it pays people to do that. For all the control the tech companies have tried to exert in the world they are reigned in by the banks and then government. At the end of the day amazon hasn't made a big difference in my life for all of the $x bezo has. I don't shop there, his lack of quality control is sinking his company. What's there to worry about?
- Dumblydorr 7y ago
  What about the counterfeits and lead levels in toys? Those are two major issues that you glided right past in your non chalance
  - friendlybus 7y ago
    My non-chalance covered that reasonably well in the not buying from them and recognizing that the lack of quality is sinking their company. This isn't an inequality thing, mansa musa was more unequally rich than bezos. It's just quality control.
- dv_dt 7y ago
  It's not that gov't is terrified or incapable, it's that the dominant regulatory philosophy in our political leadership right now is neoliberalism. Which has large failure points - the recalcitrance to regulate Amazon is the same stance as not regulating the fossil fuel industry.