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Amazon is not predatory to me. It has greatly improved my life from a convenience and cost perspective. They also recently raised their wages for all warehouse

Amazon is not predatory to me. It has greatly improved my life from a convenience and cost perspective. They also recently raised their wages for all warehouse employees such that it's one of the best places to work for unskilled labor in many locations. Amazon has made many small time merchants rich through their platform, and it's software engineers are among the highest paid in the industry, so I have to strongly disagree about the zon, but the rest of it agree wholeheartedly.

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
durnygbur 6y ago
Amazon from Europe's perspective: - IT - an average employer at best including salaries, extremely competitive workplace, offices in most expensive cities, I don't think they offer any equity - warehouses - they were wrecked by German unions and opened 4 warehouses in Poland serving exclusively German market and burdening the brand new EU-funded highways, as if they were shunning from complying with the German labor code and German wages (the market is too lucrative to abandon it)
- leetcrew 6y ago
  if having a warehouse in germany is so unattractive that it's better to put them in poland and ship everything across the border, isn't that more of a problem with germany than amazon? edit: okay, that was a bit glib. but isn't complaining about this sort of thing at odds with the idea of an integrated european economy?
  - durnygbur 6y ago
    > isn't that more of a problem with germany than amazon? On top of unions and a desperate neighbour, Germany has saturated retail market including world's 5th biggest Schwarz Gruppe who certainly are not happy with a new foreign competitor, but that's a topic for many dissertations.
  - jasonv 6y ago
    Reno is in the same spot. The number of Tesla, Walmart and Amazon trucks clogging I-80 at all hours of the day is astonishing. It also clogs the highway and impedes traffic. I wish they could put a toll or ban trucks from 7am to 7pm so people can get over the hill without tracking trains of trucks. Not sure how this could be solved without an effort of some kind, but as far as o can tell, there are zero policies guiding their behavior.
    - athms 6y ago
      I am sure Nevada's lack of income tax and the tax breaks the state gives, plus Reno's proximity to California is the reason logistics is centered there. Reno sells itself as the West Coast shipping hub. Pretty much everything I order from Amazon these days comes from Nevada even though I am in Silicon Valley. I know Amazon has several warehouses in California, but I have never seen any order originate from California. The company probably uses them as local distribution points for its own shipping service.
    - CameronNemo 6y ago
      Wow I had no idea this was happening. I wonder if taxing the hell out of these trucks would tip the scales toward moving the logistics closer to the destination market, which I presume is the bay area and peripherals.
  - anoncake 6y ago
    It's really a problem with the EU. Its member states still compete with each other too much, companies shouldn't be able to shop around for the laxest labour laws like that.
    - kyuudou 6y ago
      I disagree, consumers should be able to decide if they want to buy a product or not and do their due diligence investigating the producer. The countries where labor is cheaper benefit by getting more work and ultimately they uplift themselves. Now, if it comes out that such labor is abused or managed corruptly and so forth, that is a product I will not knowingly or willingly buy.
      - anoncake 6y ago
        In the real world, customers don't actually do that and in fact cannot for everything they buy. Regulation is simply more efficient and effective.
        kyuudou 6y ago
        >Regulation is simply more efficient and effective. And that efficiency and effectiveness benefit an elite few. If people continue to "wake up" globally, becoming increasingly empowered by technology and democratizing philosophies, they will come to the logical conclusion that they can "vote" with their currency. Companies will definitely fucking pay attention if people stop buying their shit. For example, I've taken the "buy local as possible" ethic to its logical extreme, realizing for example that I have to make compromises for things like consumer electronics. "The real world", as you say. But I think it's defeatist to just buy the cheapest junk you can afford in complete disregard of its means and origin of manufacture unless that's the only solution. Just today, I was shopping around where to buy Sid Meier's Memoirs book since I just learned about it today on HN. I could elect the easy, lazy, one-world-ruled-by-Bezos path and click Amazon to save a few cents and get it delivered a day less, or I could go the slightly less convenient but more positive route of Indiebound.
pwinnski 6y ago
The US House committee that spent 18 months investigating cataloged an extensive report[0] on Amazon's predatory ways, and reading it one quickly realizes that not everyone feels warm and fuzzy toward the company as you do. There's a lot. The section on Amazon begins on page 248, and is very readable. [0] https://judiciary.house.gov/uploadedfiles/competition_in_digital_markets.pdf https://judiciary.house.gov/uploadedfiles/competition_in_dig...
- s3r3nity 6y ago
  Just theater - no legislation. Too many senators / congress people have Amazon warehouses with 1000's of jobs in their backyard, and would never support breaking them up on weak committee recommendations.
  - pwinnski 6y ago
    This is step one. It is possible that step two will die on the floor, but this report made it out of committee, which is farther than I expected it to get, so I'm not quite so pessimistic about step two. Right now one party wants to go after the big tech companies for what seem to be the wrong reasons, while the other party doesn't seem to have the will to go after them at all. But in the end, we got a report with good recommendations, so we'll see if bad motives can bring about some good results.
srsQtho00 6y ago
Serious question: is convenience for others the only bar we have to step over before enabling a certain type of utilitarian role? Precisely quantified utilitarianism is the way? Quantified by who? Is our math, purposefully constrained for consistency, the right tool for that job? What long term impact on those workers and society does creating so many low-effort monotonous jobs have? Is there an upside besides expansion of low effort consumption and criticism of real effort?
- johannes1234321 6y ago
  It matches the Zeitgeist of individualism we are in, which is destructing politics. Politics are about finding a common path for a society. A world where I optimizer for myself is very different, from one where I optimizer for society.
  - srsQtho00 6y ago
    What is it? Who is we? What common path are you referring to? What are its attributes in terms of maximizing individual time economy? IMO that’s what the sharing through social effort is. Maximizing each individuals time economy. Instead we seem to be maximizing time economy for people who can pay to externalize effort. We’re really not optimizing for self by taking on more hours for less pay to keep Wall Street up. Which to me ties right in with creating low effort jobs. Rather than decrease the amount of real work by expanding access to that work. Let’s just hand out mops and brooms. Heard there’s coal to shovel out east! Who knows, having more time may make things like cleaning a toilet and picking up packages seem less onerous. We’re optimizing for a minority to be coddled by the effort of the majority. And being paid off with a fraction of the real output given the math I see. Based upon hand me down stories from people with a very different intuition for quantification and science. Would someone explain to me how kowtowing to such a social reality makes any sense scientifically? Westerners all on about “science!” could stand to take a long look at their actual beliefs and application of agency.
waylandsmithers 6y ago
As a parent who has basically never had to think about running out of diapers thanks to Amazon, I couldn't agree more (and sure, there are other companies who could do this). This has nothing to do with anti-trust but out of all the major tech corps Facebook really seems the most like a big tobacco company- sure they are adding value to the economy and ostensibly giving individual consumers something they want, but as a society we'd generally be better off if it just kind of went away.
- mthoms 6y ago
  Interesting that you mentioned diapers. This is a quote from page 398 of the subcommittee report - >The Subcommittee’s investigation identified several instances in which a dominant platform was pricing goods or services below-cost in order to drive out rivals and capture the market. For example, documents produced during the investigation revealed that Amazon had been willing to lose $200 million in a single quarter in order to pressure Diapers.com, a firm it had recognized as its most significant rival in the category. Amazon cut prices and introduced steep promotions, prompting a pricing war that eventually weakened Diapers.com. Amazon then purchased the company, eliminating its competitor and subsequently cutting back the discounts and promotions it had introduced. I'm curious... After reading that, do you still feel the same way about Amazon? Price might not mater to many on HN but to millions of people it does.
  - waylandsmithers 6y ago
    That's a fair point, and I was generally aware of Amazon's behavior in matters like this, and some general overall effect on consumer surplus. Does it bother me enough to make me cancel my subscribe and save to drive to the store and lug the box of diapers to my car? No. I'm fine with letting the government make the rules on what is economically destructive behavior.
- jamra 6y ago
  That’s really funny to me. One of the criticisms I’ve read about Amazon is how they destroyed diapers dot com. There could have been several other sites all worth billions of dollars without the need for a single one stop shop.
jimkleiber 6y ago
It may be a benevolent monopoly to you but that doesn't mean it's not a monopoly. The predatory behaviors seem to be focused on other companies, other competitors, not on consumers. Actually, seems they are treating consumers very well (often thru very low prices subsidized from profits elsewhere) to drive competitors out of business. So from a consumer standpoint, perhaps it is good now, but we also don't know how much better it could be if there were competition. From a competitor standpoint, it sure doesn't sound fun. I have friends who sell things on Amazon and if they get too big, sometimes Amazon even squeezes them out of their business. I wonder if antitrust law is to protect consumers or to protect other potential producers. Regardless, I imagine some of the idea behind it is that monopolies have relatively unchecked market power and while they can be good to consumers, they can also turn bad for consumers with little freedom for consumers to leave.
xutopia 6y ago
You forget all the successful merchants that have their products copied by Amazon and undercut. They'll embrace you on their platform but use their knowledge of your sales against you. Look at all the Amazon Basics products out there and tell me this is not concerning to retailers making use of their platform!
cryptica 6y ago
Amazon is a great company. They've created an incredible amount of value both for themselves and their merchants. They've been consistently helping small businesses and giving them a fighting chance. They've created so many jobs in the process. Doing the right thing is part of their business model.
zepto 6y ago
None of the points you made actually contradict the claim that Amazon is predatory.
pwinnski 6y ago
This comment won't leave my head. I think the unspoken, perhaps unrealized, context for this comment is the idea that a company must be predatory to everyone in order to be actually-predatory. A company that is predatory to literally everyone would not survive long. Obviously any predatory company must benefit one or more groups at the expense of others, or else how could they exist? I mean, I think Facebook is terrible, but clearly many people find some benefit, or Facebook wouldn't have the billion-plus users they do. I don't deny that some people find benefit from Facebook, I just don't think that benefit outweighs the cost to society. So Amazon is not predatory to parent commenter. In many ways, they're not predatory directly to me, either! I order goods from them at times, I use AWS, and overall I might argue that my life is better with Amazon than without. But my personal experiences aren't definitive. In order to benefit me, Amazon, by all reports, is preying on others. Competitors, suppliers, employees, and so on.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

durnygbur 6y ago

Amazon from Europe's perspective: - IT - an average employer at best including salaries, extremely competitive workplace, offices in most expensive cities, I don't think they offer any equity - warehouses - they were wrecked by German unions and opened 4 warehouses in Poland serving exclusively German market and burdening the brand new EU-funded highways, as if they were shunning from complying with the German labor code and German wages (the market is too lucrative to abandon it)

leetcrew 6y ago
if having a warehouse in germany is so unattractive that it's better to put them in poland and ship everything across the border, isn't that more of a problem with germany than amazon? edit: okay, that was a bit glib. but isn't complaining about this sort of thing at odds with the idea of an integrated european economy?
- durnygbur 6y ago
  > isn't that more of a problem with germany than amazon? On top of unions and a desperate neighbour, Germany has saturated retail market including world's 5th biggest Schwarz Gruppe who certainly are not happy with a new foreign competitor, but that's a topic for many dissertations.
- jasonv 6y ago
  Reno is in the same spot. The number of Tesla, Walmart and Amazon trucks clogging I-80 at all hours of the day is astonishing. It also clogs the highway and impedes traffic. I wish they could put a toll or ban trucks from 7am to 7pm so people can get over the hill without tracking trains of trucks. Not sure how this could be solved without an effort of some kind, but as far as o can tell, there are zero policies guiding their behavior.
  - athms 6y ago
    I am sure Nevada's lack of income tax and the tax breaks the state gives, plus Reno's proximity to California is the reason logistics is centered there. Reno sells itself as the West Coast shipping hub. Pretty much everything I order from Amazon these days comes from Nevada even though I am in Silicon Valley. I know Amazon has several warehouses in California, but I have never seen any order originate from California. The company probably uses them as local distribution points for its own shipping service.
  - CameronNemo 6y ago
    Wow I had no idea this was happening. I wonder if taxing the hell out of these trucks would tip the scales toward moving the logistics closer to the destination market, which I presume is the bay area and peripherals.
- anoncake 6y ago
  It's really a problem with the EU. Its member states still compete with each other too much, companies shouldn't be able to shop around for the laxest labour laws like that.
  - kyuudou 6y ago
    I disagree, consumers should be able to decide if they want to buy a product or not and do their due diligence investigating the producer. The countries where labor is cheaper benefit by getting more work and ultimately they uplift themselves. Now, if it comes out that such labor is abused or managed corruptly and so forth, that is a product I will not knowingly or willingly buy.
    - anoncake 6y ago
      In the real world, customers don't actually do that and in fact cannot for everything they buy. Regulation is simply more efficient and effective.
      - kyuudou 6y ago
        >Regulation is simply more efficient and effective. And that efficiency and effectiveness benefit an elite few. If people continue to "wake up" globally, becoming increasingly empowered by technology and democratizing philosophies, they will come to the logical conclusion that they can "vote" with their currency. Companies will definitely fucking pay attention if people stop buying their shit. For example, I've taken the "buy local as possible" ethic to its logical extreme, realizing for example that I have to make compromises for things like consumer electronics. "The real world", as you say. But I think it's defeatist to just buy the cheapest junk you can afford in complete disregard of its means and origin of manufacture unless that's the only solution. Just today, I was shopping around where to buy Sid Meier's Memoirs book since I just learned about it today on HN. I could elect the easy, lazy, one-world-ruled-by-Bezos path and click Amazon to save a few cents and get it delivered a day less, or I could go the slightly less convenient but more positive route of Indiebound.

pwinnski 6y ago

The US House committee that spent 18 months investigating cataloged an extensive report[0] on Amazon's predatory ways, and reading it one quickly realizes that not everyone feels warm and fuzzy toward the company as you do. There's a lot. The section on Amazon begins on page 248, and is very readable. [0] https://judiciary.house.gov/uploadedfiles/competition_in_digital_markets.pdf https://judiciary.house.gov/uploadedfiles/competition_in_dig...

s3r3nity 6y ago
Just theater - no legislation. Too many senators / congress people have Amazon warehouses with 1000's of jobs in their backyard, and would never support breaking them up on weak committee recommendations.
- pwinnski 6y ago
  This is step one. It is possible that step two will die on the floor, but this report made it out of committee, which is farther than I expected it to get, so I'm not quite so pessimistic about step two. Right now one party wants to go after the big tech companies for what seem to be the wrong reasons, while the other party doesn't seem to have the will to go after them at all. But in the end, we got a report with good recommendations, so we'll see if bad motives can bring about some good results.

srsQtho00 6y ago

Serious question: is convenience for others the only bar we have to step over before enabling a certain type of utilitarian role? Precisely quantified utilitarianism is the way? Quantified by who? Is our math, purposefully constrained for consistency, the right tool for that job? What long term impact on those workers and society does creating so many low-effort monotonous jobs have? Is there an upside besides expansion of low effort consumption and criticism of real effort?

johannes1234321 6y ago
It matches the Zeitgeist of individualism we are in, which is destructing politics. Politics are about finding a common path for a society. A world where I optimizer for myself is very different, from one where I optimizer for society.
- srsQtho00 6y ago
  What is it? Who is we? What common path are you referring to? What are its attributes in terms of maximizing individual time economy? IMO that’s what the sharing through social effort is. Maximizing each individuals time economy. Instead we seem to be maximizing time economy for people who can pay to externalize effort. We’re really not optimizing for self by taking on more hours for less pay to keep Wall Street up. Which to me ties right in with creating low effort jobs. Rather than decrease the amount of real work by expanding access to that work. Let’s just hand out mops and brooms. Heard there’s coal to shovel out east! Who knows, having more time may make things like cleaning a toilet and picking up packages seem less onerous. We’re optimizing for a minority to be coddled by the effort of the majority. And being paid off with a fraction of the real output given the math I see. Based upon hand me down stories from people with a very different intuition for quantification and science. Would someone explain to me how kowtowing to such a social reality makes any sense scientifically? Westerners all on about “science!” could stand to take a long look at their actual beliefs and application of agency.

waylandsmithers 6y ago

As a parent who has basically never had to think about running out of diapers thanks to Amazon, I couldn't agree more (and sure, there are other companies who could do this). This has nothing to do with anti-trust but out of all the major tech corps Facebook really seems the most like a big tobacco company- sure they are adding value to the economy and ostensibly giving individual consumers something they want, but as a society we'd generally be better off if it just kind of went away.

mthoms 6y ago
Interesting that you mentioned diapers. This is a quote from page 398 of the subcommittee report - >The Subcommittee’s investigation identified several instances in which a dominant platform was pricing goods or services below-cost in order to drive out rivals and capture the market. For example, documents produced during the investigation revealed that Amazon had been willing to lose $200 million in a single quarter in order to pressure Diapers.com, a firm it had recognized as its most significant rival in the category. Amazon cut prices and introduced steep promotions, prompting a pricing war that eventually weakened Diapers.com. Amazon then purchased the company, eliminating its competitor and subsequently cutting back the discounts and promotions it had introduced. I'm curious... After reading that, do you still feel the same way about Amazon? Price might not mater to many on HN but to millions of people it does.
- waylandsmithers 6y ago
  That's a fair point, and I was generally aware of Amazon's behavior in matters like this, and some general overall effect on consumer surplus. Does it bother me enough to make me cancel my subscribe and save to drive to the store and lug the box of diapers to my car? No. I'm fine with letting the government make the rules on what is economically destructive behavior.
jamra 6y ago
That’s really funny to me. One of the criticisms I’ve read about Amazon is how they destroyed diapers dot com. There could have been several other sites all worth billions of dollars without the need for a single one stop shop.

jimkleiber 6y ago

It may be a benevolent monopoly to you but that doesn't mean it's not a monopoly. The predatory behaviors seem to be focused on other companies, other competitors, not on consumers. Actually, seems they are treating consumers very well (often thru very low prices subsidized from profits elsewhere) to drive competitors out of business. So from a consumer standpoint, perhaps it is good now, but we also don't know how much better it could be if there were competition. From a competitor standpoint, it sure doesn't sound fun. I have friends who sell things on Amazon and if they get too big, sometimes Amazon even squeezes them out of their business. I wonder if antitrust law is to protect consumers or to protect other potential producers. Regardless, I imagine some of the idea behind it is that monopolies have relatively unchecked market power and while they can be good to consumers, they can also turn bad for consumers with little freedom for consumers to leave.

xutopia 6y ago

You forget all the successful merchants that have their products copied by Amazon and undercut. They'll embrace you on their platform but use their knowledge of your sales against you. Look at all the Amazon Basics products out there and tell me this is not concerning to retailers making use of their platform!

cryptica 6y ago

Amazon is a great company. They've created an incredible amount of value both for themselves and their merchants. They've been consistently helping small businesses and giving them a fighting chance. They've created so many jobs in the process. Doing the right thing is part of their business model.

zepto 6y ago

None of the points you made actually contradict the claim that Amazon is predatory.

pwinnski 6y ago

This comment won't leave my head. I think the unspoken, perhaps unrealized, context for this comment is the idea that a company must be predatory to everyone in order to be actually-predatory. A company that is predatory to literally everyone would not survive long. Obviously any predatory company must benefit one or more groups at the expense of others, or else how could they exist? I mean, I think Facebook is terrible, but clearly many people find some benefit, or Facebook wouldn't have the billion-plus users they do. I don't deny that some people find benefit from Facebook, I just don't think that benefit outweighs the cost to society. So Amazon is not predatory to parent commenter. In many ways, they're not predatory directly to me, either! I order goods from them at times, I use AWS, and overall I might argue that my life is better with Amazon than without. But my personal experiences aren't definitive. In order to benefit me, Amazon, by all reports, is preying on others. Competitors, suppliers, employees, and so on.