Amazon's monopoly is decimating US economy

theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/06/when-exactly-does-amazon-become-a-monopoly/530616/

Why are we letting this monopoly silently destroy our local economies?

Back in the day we would be able to drive down the street and buy everything we could possibly need from a local small business and get things in less than 20 min. Now Amazon has replaced the small business owner's ability to generate wealth, with a $12/hr warehouse slave. Or the owner's can bend over to Amazon's pyramid-like scheme, just to get data raped and replaced by Amazon's in house product. Now we wait 2-7 days for cheaper crap-products. That is, until they launch the drones which will just put us back in the same place as before, waiting 20 min for a product to arrive. People are literally buying clothes and shoes that don't fit, spending weeks sending exchanging them online when they could have just went to a store and find the perfect fit in just 30 min or less. Less reasons to go outside, no consumer culture(malls), no ability to generate wealth. Just more solitude and endless consumption at our own detriment.

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Jeff Bezos is working with the US Deep State is the reason why he bought the WaPo (CIA newspaper).

I want to support small local businesses.
But I am guilty of shopping at Amazon.
Why can't I fucking find a plain dark fleece with no corporate logo bullshit on it?
I could waste hours searching stores for that and not find it.
Or just order it on amazon in 5 minutes.

Putting those $15 an hour bag boys out of work, even if they are 70 yo. Next automated fast food. Congrats to the liberals, once again you are getting what you asked for!!!

a universal basic income? Sounds great.
people will need money to consume and keep it going so they will just print money and let people but shot on Amazon.
Welfare for all sounds good. For 25k yearly I would never leave my home

>walmart been round for decades

It's not decimating shit. It's done a lot more than reduce it by a factor of ten. Learn what fucking words mean, faggot.

Good goy!
Submit to our power. Don't even try to compete with us. The rules don't apply to us. Take that 25K/year and the fidget spinner comes free!

because right wing pinkos shoot up pizza parlors baseball games churches and the small business owners vehemently deny selling the guns or ammo to some schizo nutjob while amazon conveniently compiles a database of what customers they have what they have bought and comply with the govt because they put their country first not their little gun shop before country

why are warehouses like that so tall? that's an awful lot of wasted space

Bumping...

I was at Walgreens yesterday, looked at their prices for Crest White Strips, every single box was around $10 more expensive than online.

Don't get me started on HDMI cables... the market at electronic stores is like 500-1000% compared to online.

Remind me again why online shopping is bad?

good, I don't want spend time in some shitty mall standing in line with the other faggots.

one click with the mouse and I get it delivered right to my door.

fuck your little cuck shops.

AMAZON FUCK YEA

That factory is so out of date. Still using humans to pack books instead of robot springs u dear the books and conveyor belts.
The problem op is AMA on is' a monopoly, it functions in practice like a monopsony.
a monopoly keeps prices artificially high but a monopsony keeps prices artificially low.
Sense low prices are thought good for the consumer, our laws are not (yet) well set up for that.
thinking/ideologies has to change to understand artificially low prices are just as bad for citizens, before the laws change (same thing with the milk, corn/timber/steel/etc subsidies)

>Worried Amazon is destroying local economies

>Amazon is a publicly traded stock.

Amazon's distribution structure is so convenient. When you use amazon prime, you can get most of the stuff you want to buy for less than you can at a local store and it shows up at your door really fast. When it's for electronic equipment or cables or kitchen stuff or other basic products, I don't mind. This gets rid of plenty of big-box stores and replaces them with warehouses in Kentucky. It means that the local businesses that do survive are the ones with added service experiences -- community hubs, places that help you learn like a good record store, or places that hold events. I think this makes towns better. Hopefully in the long run this will result in the death of big-box stores. Eventually too the human labor in the warehouses will largely be replaced by robots that can grab anything from a shelf, box it, and ship it. This will result in lower costs for everyone.

The main economic problem would be if amazon start raising prices. However, they're still basically the cheapest for almost every product. If they keep on this way, then they provide value and convenience for consumers and they concentrate shitty warehouses in a small number of places in the US. All seems pretty fine to me. Gives us more time and money to work on things we really care about, like making music or going hiking or other shit that's actually cool. I know my view isn't popular but I think amazon is mostly improving life in the US.

you shop at walgreens for the convenience of not going to a grocery store having to find parking and having to spend 10 minutes inside of one finding the item you wanted. walgreens is a 5 minute maximum shopping experience

>Shop local
>Get charged fuck high prices in order to make ends meet
Or
>Shop Amazon
>Get those same products for a fraction of the price delivered to your door without having to deal with shitbag teenagers who would rather shitpost on their phone than provide customer service.
When "local economies" provide cheaper goods/services than Amazon, I'll start using them again. Until then, they can fuck off.

>right wing
Are you sure about that buddy?

And a corporation working hand in hand with the govt? Totally not crony-capitalism.

*The problem op is amazon is not a monopoly*
Sorry for the bizarre typo

if there werent so many idiots who cry the govt is out to get them and when no one listens decide to kill innocent people then it wouldnt be necessary

Amazon is great. It opens up markets and lets people buy things they normally can't find.

That said, I don't think I'll be able to buy groceries online and expect it fresh and ready to go.

Then again, it's only me

Like it's the first time.
You started with the central bank then,
You did the same with Microsoft
Than Walmart
Than google.
That's how they control population .

>This will result in lower costs for everyone.
See here
The problem is the prices are too low to make a living making much of anything, so new earth innovation stops. What places like Walmart and amazon do is impoverish local manufacturers by pushing prices so low nobody but pacastain dirt farmers can make stuff, leaving everyone out of a job.
Wallmart especially did more than anyone else to gut American jobs by underhand dealing and saying 'if you don't sell it for 50cents to us" we won't stock it, and flying to poor Asian countries to make cheap knock offs of everything.
It doesn't matter how cheap shit is if no one has a job to pay for it, and it's filled with lead plastics that make your kids IQ drop

Bezos skimped on this months protection payments.

Bump

Yes! Let's feed a corporation tons of money, enable them to destroy every business/job in our town, and crush any possibility of owning our own assets and creating generational wealth for our own families.

I worked for Amazon for the holiday season. It's a complete depressing shithole and I felt like I was in a sweatshop.

I avoid buying any thing from amazon.

Yeah see that's the thing: UBI will never happen because liquidating excess population is easier.

>Now Amazon has replaced the small business owner's ability to generate wealth

I'd hardly call Walmart a small business.

why so eager to have your life in the hands of a billion dollar CIA-sponsored corporation? do you know how easily they could cut your gibs if they deem you a dissident? UBI is fucking dystopian.

Replace every instance of the word "Amazon" with "Walmart."

Just don't fucking do it. Stop being a weak faggot. You don't have to get everything you want.

Glad they bought out Whole Foods. That store is for faggots and hippies. I hope Amazon destroys it with a Wal-Mart style drop in pricing of the food so unwashed masses waltz in and scare the urban hippie yuppies who vote for Obama and Hillary and realize they don't really like niggers and spics.

These companies saw what was coming and did nothing to change their ways to be competitive. It's good Amazon and Netflix are destroying video stores and brick and mortars. Those faggots deserve it for gouging us.

That's an interesting perspective. Let's think about how this works with, say, flash drives. I was buying a new one recently and, like I always do, looking at all the options. There are some small ones (like 8mb) made by sandisk now that are dirt cheap. I don't know how they can be making much more than a few cents off each one. Also, there are fancy ones made by Samsung with nice metal casings that are 128gb or more). They cost a bit to buy but they're quite glamorous and a step up in technology (with USB 3.0 and waterproofing). I went for the more expensive Samsung option, so I'm paying more for a nicer, newer product, which helps support the R&D that went into the new product. I don't see innovation being stifled by the amazon sales model. I think that it does cut margins quite thin, but not to the point that we lose choice or that we stop buying quality products. It seems like a pretty good balance to me. It also means that I don't have to drive to my local Staples to buy the same product for a few dollars more. I always find shopping at places like Staples to be a bit depressing anyway.

>we would be able to drive down the street and buy everything we could possibly need from a local small business
But you couldn't.
Back before online shopping we had to go to the store only to discover they didn't have what we wanted in stock but they could order it in and have it in about five business days.
Amazon doesn't make my life any better.
Neither do brick and mortars.

>anti Trump people hate Amazon
>now conspiracy nut Sup Forumstards are turning on them too

What a time to be alive

The developer builds those spaces to be flexible in a any number of occupies, anything from a 2 story office to light manufacturing to warehousing.

yeah Amazon is just killing the national brick-and-mortar stores
the sames ones that ruthlessly killed all the local non-chain stores
I have no sympathy for all of the marts that are being massacred by Amazon right now

>get anything I want delivered to my doorstep in three days and pay 2/3 as much as retail
Fuck off Luddite.

Why so eager to have your life in the hands of a big corporation? Do you know how easily they could lay you off if they decide it's cheaper to replace you with an Indian? At will employment is fucking dystopian.

It is the free market. Taken to the extreme.
Let us watch it attempt the impossible.

this is the free market adjusting itself
you don't want to be a communist tyrant do you

Blockbuster had a chance to buy Netflix relatively cheap in 99. They laughed the Netflix folks out of their boardroom.

5 years later, when they were getting their shit pushed in they tried to buy Netflix for like 50 mil. Netflix basically gave them bantz and they died off.

Fuck those big chain stores that are crying about Amazon. They killed main street America and now they want our concern? Fuck no. They made this monster, now they will be fed to it.

>Back in the day we had to drive down the street and buy everything we
fixt

The only "local economy" being hurt by Amazon at this point is brick and mortar Walmarts. Walmart killed local economy years ago.

Walmart is cancer too. They are literally a wholesaling warehouse that sells directly to consumers instead of retailers. This should not be legal.

The only monopolies that exist today are government enforced. Unless Amazon is exploiting some government regulation that gives them a competitive advantage then they're doing anything wrong. Companies should not be punished for more effectively pleasing their customers compared to the competition.

To be fair, because I don't really know, but how much does your average non-Amazon/Box Store warehouse employee make?

I certainly don't want a monopoly but (and this is sad to say) $12/hr is about what I would expect that gig to pay in our economy. Was this a historically higher paying job? Because if not, then there's your answer + they are providing a quality product. Amazon prices fairly and is extremely convenient.

If they've bottomed out wages for the job itself then absolutely, this needs to be pursued aggressively - but even then it's still not a monopoly. Anyone is free to distribute and sell law-fully acquired media notwithstanding IP issues which is not what I'm discussing - I'm talking basic online retail sales, etc. They've just got the infrastructure in place.

They can't though, thats the point

Yes. This. Blockbuster killed all local video stores. Then Blockbuster got killed by Netflix.

>Jews vs Jews
Let them fight.

Okay, so what solution do you propose?

better to place your life in the hands of a government that actively enables these practices? before trump, all of washington was cheering as americans were replaced by cheap labor for a minute GDP boost. now you want these same people to ensure your survival? top fucking kek

So your argument is that people shouldn't get what they want when it's readily available and easy to acquire, solely because of your corporate boogeyman. Here's my question: Why the fuck should I submit myself to getting sub-par quality products, or not getting the products I want at all, from these "local stores" you seem to admire so much? If these local stores can't have a big or varied enough stock that they aren't carrying what I want then fuck them and fuck you because businesses exist to serve me, not the other way around, and I'm going to buy from the business that has what I want.

Renaissance of Mom & Pop shops?

>You don't have to get everything you want.

Too bad this is America and i fucking can because Im a god damn American who works and pays his taxes

Go fuck yourself, the world is my oyster poorfag

Exactly. Amazon delivers a better product, faster, cheaper, and without the horrors of going through a musty store full of fat ugly rednecks and niggers. Notice there is not people of Amazon? I didn't think so.

Why not? It drives prices down. Fuck the middle man, they aren't needed. Greedy faggots.

cheap stuff, good rating system, awesome service.

how can you complain though, really. just buy stock or something.

>Companies should not be punished for more effectively pleasing their customers compared to the competition.

This works up until a certain point. Once a company becomes too big they can push out competition, establish a monopoly and then do whatever they want

All the coolest shops don't sell the stuff amazon sells

you can get antiques, and restaurants of every type, and garden centers/shops, maps and art work

plenty of stores around still. think of all the professional services companies out there

Amazon is just another Walmart, a place to buy chinkshit

Every dollar I save on Amazon goes back into the economy anyway, I just consume more stuff now and eat good at lunch time

Amazon is so convenient. When corporations become stronger than governments I will fight for them.

Also, buy the stock called STAG. It pays a dividend, and with Amazon chewing up warehouse space, industrial space is now harder to find driving up the rents

>It doesn't matter how cheap shit is if no one has a job to pay for it
This. Dark days ahead.
I ordered a power supply from Amazon. Delivery date was 26th. Then it became the 28th. Then suddenly the 8th of the next month. Apparently Amazon was out and was relying on Just-In-Time shipping from a manufacturer in China to get my shit to me. At least at a store I know it's out when I go there and it's not there.

When Amazon conquers the market they WILL raise prices.

Amazon isn't great. I hate those 3rd party sellers they try to push on you. But by and large, the experience at a brick and mortar retailer is much worse. At least they let you place an order without asking you 20 questions first.

this desu

Staples is indeed trash. I'm not against online shopping in general.
I'm also not against low prices, just artificially low prices. You have to think about everyday items.
While blockbuster was indeed trash, it was never unprofitable, it was bought out in a hedge fund style deal, reorganized and spun off with the debt. they always made money, just not enough to service the debt they didn't even create. Wall Street fucks destroyed blockbuster, not the market. Never trust a hedge fund.

You're implying Amazon doesn't employ millions of small businesses and helps them sell dead product at higher than normal profit margins.
Also, why is the bot always as snow nigger?

I'd like to add to that big name stores and the internet can't provide a personal and professional touch for certain services and goods. Smart people would start boutique style stores for certain things like hand crafted furniture, art, etc.

There are certain things that aren't mass produced and have a niche market to them. If people can't adapt to that, they deserve to die.

Example, my cousin owned and operated a furniture store that would appeal to yuppies because each piece she produced was unique and all that artisan shit yuppies eat up. Not my cup of tea but I'm not her target audience, now am I?

Well a Pier One opened up to her across the street. She failed to provide good service because she made it a habit to bring her toddler to work with her and would interrupt showing a customer around the store to tend to her kid. Instead of being smart and putting the kid in daycare, she decided she'd be Super Mom and fuck her business up.

Also she's kinda dumb. She believes stores have "energy". Basically she's a 40 year old cougar who has the mental maturity of a teenager.

But she blames "corporations", which is what dumb people use to describe big business while not realizing any size company can be a corporation, for her failure. She didn't produce a bad product, she sucked dick at customer service and business savvy.

>15+ options for a product instead of 1-3
>both shill and non-shill photo and video reviews of your product right there below it
>don't have to waste time wandering around the store to find sections
>don't have to waste time with inconveniences like the store putting the Q-tips in the beauty section instead of the health/medicine section
>don't waste time in traffic, finding parking, or checking out
>don't have to have your mood depressed by being around fat, old and nonwhite people

fuck me I accidentally went grocery shopping on the 1st of this month
never again

It's not the buyers' fault Amazon is offering a superior service. You're never, ever going to get large numbers of consumers to voluntarily opt for inferior services just to "save the economy." That's not how it works. There is only one realistic way for businesses to make money and that's by producing a service consumers want. If they can't do that, then they will die and they will deserve to die. Trying to shame people for being lazy isn't going to help your cause. You might as well yell at a rock for rolling downhill instead of uphill. It's just really obvious physics in both cases. You have to deal with it because it's not going to stop working the way it always works.

>railroads decimated small farmers
>highways decimated family stores.
>free trade decimated local/domestic industry.
>outsourcing decimated working class jobs
>internet decimating retail

See a pattern?

It's called disruption, competitive advantage.
If these things did not happen, the prices of goods and services would rise well above anyone's ability to afford much, thus reducing our quality of life substantially.

are those things bolted to the ground or something? If they weren't I'd think one retarded forklift driver could cause like 50 rows of them to collapse. I think we've all seen videos of that happening before.

kek I had this one fat beaner professor that for some reason told us that she bought her toothpaste on amazon for some reason. Can't remember the context, but I just found it baffling.

How did those people survive??? Where are their descendents!!!?!?!?! We must speak for these extinct people!

Can't stop progress

This.

Amazon is a distribution, akin to Walmart, and many other 'big' stores that stock goods from many different companies.

There is no monopoly, you're just retarded.

The internet should be locked to state-wide communications.
Global communication should only be via message boards and things of such nature to share ideas rather than things such as money... The internet is what's destroying society. Limitations need to be put in place that limit the globalization it is causing; only ideas should be able to be globally shared.

>These companies saw what was coming and did nothing to change their ways to be competitive.

How can you compete with a company that breaks every fucking law in the book and gets away with it? Netflix was literally a mass intellectual property infringing dvd-burning operation. Oh well, guess you'll never know what it was like to meet a qt at blockbuster, take her home and bang her while watching the newest thriller on VHS.

>Jeff Bezos is working with the US Deep State is the reason why he bought the WaPo (CIA newspaper).
Yep. CIA is working with Amazon, google, facebook. The goal being monopolization of information and global communism.

Rassenkrieg is the solution; not becoming a hermit.

I'd gladly shop at a brick and mortar store, but even the ones that survive are getting shittier and shittier. Poor selections, high prices, empty shelves. Have to drive 5 miles to get anywhere and if the shop there doesn't have it, have to drive another 2 miles to find another store.

I don't like amazon, but retail is a shadow of what it used to be. Some days IRL shopping I feel like I've wandered into a soviet era rusian mall.

>It opens up markets
it dominates markets, in price terms it opens them up, they've been reinvesting for years so basically they make money and put it into expansion and warehouse stuff and not paying shareholders or staff or anyone jsut crowd any competitor out and eventually it will all add up
. The investors are beting amazon will continue to gain control so they are happy they wil eventually get their money back.
If anyone threatens amazon's marketplace you will probably be killed by someone you've never met.

more efficient.

I expect amazon to go through some down sizing however as their prices arent as low as you would expect.

It's not really about what they pay thier unskilled labor, it's what they pay thier suppliers, meaning the manufacturers, and in turn what the manufacturers can afford to pay thier skilled workers and designers.
A single market, a monopsony with a single buyer, isn't the healthiest market.
Buy the way, it's not really 'what they pay thier suppliers' but, 'what they force thier suppliers to accept'

Dude, I'm in my 30's. I remember the video store. While it was fun to go, fuck it, now I can stream shit and not have to deal with traffic, dipshits, and some made up story of you having sex with some chick while watching Pulp Fiction on VHS.

>IMPLYING ONE NEGATES THE OTHER

AMAZON IS DESTROYING LOCAL ECONOMIES AND ITS ALSO A PUBLICLY TRADED STOCK

THAT JUST MEANS YOU CAN BUY AMAZON STOCK AND PROFIT WITH THEM AS THEY DESTROY LOCAL ECONOMIES

We should have let everythimg burn to the ground in 2008 instead of kicking the can down the road for another decade. All of these big business exist because of government support for their financiers and the steady expansion of its market across the globe.

Amazon is just cleaning up what Wal-Mart started.

It's just a more expensive, less convenient version.

Q-tips are for make-up. They have no legitimate medical uses. Don't put them in your ear or wherever.
That's sound very progressive.
>meet a qt at blockbuster, take her home and bang her while watching the newest thriller on VHS
I'm sure that's what you fantasized about while perusing the softcore porn in the unadvertised backroom section.

>the atlantic shilling on behalf of small businesses and local economies

but in the same breath they'll publish an article trashing white working class americans, laugh about their deaths, then larp about automation being fukken awesome

save me the crocodile tears, atlantic

Why would I go to some shitty local store spending 30 minutes to and back, plus the price of gas, deal with incompotent staff and choose from a micro selection? Amazon has better prices, computers that never make mistakes, instant check out, and a massive selection?

If these other stores cannot compete with that OR offer me something amazon does not sell than they worthless.

And if you ordered shoes that don't fit or can't handle planning things 2 days in advance to deal with the shipping times that's your own incompetence.

When the drones come I will not shed a single tear for the worthless mom and pop stores that close down.

I remember when people said this about Walmart and Best Buy. Now those stores are dinosaurs.

If you're complaining about this, please lrn 2 capitalism. gg no re.

It's not just the US/Amazon, everywhere in the world we are going in that direction. Physical stores are being replaced by online stores and there's not much that can be done about it.

'

>Why are we letting this monopoly silently destroy our local economies?

Letting?

You're fucking supporting them with your purchases (voluntarily). The only reason they exist is because people can't get enough of buying their shit. That's what I hate about 75% of the complaints on this board... The shit you all are bitching about are things you've overwhelmingly supported wiith your business for the last 40 years.

There's a farmer's market once a week at a local park in the town where I live
it's always packed despite Amazon
big box stores just don't offer anything; in a way hardware stores are the worst because they don't hire experienced people anymore and you can't get any real advice (what used to be one of the main reasons for going, making an informed decision vs ordering from a catalog)

Just bought a lightning cable for 6 bucks. It's like 30 at a phone dealer. Retail shops are good for some things. We will see more of a different kind. Say clothing boutiques with good service. We don't need to fucking drive to stores to get overpriced crap like phone chargers. This is much better.

>no consumer culture

good. now we can clear up room for actual cultural strongholds, like starbucks.

>t's not really about what they pay thier unskilled labor, it's what they pay thier suppliers, meaning the manufacturers, and in turn what the manufacturers can afford to pay thier skilled workers and designers.
Yes, that's true. Thanks for putting a finer point on it.