"Whataboutism" has jumped the shark as an internet criticism. It wasn't much of a shark to begin with, since comparables are relevant. But the word is catchy, so it had a brief power to make people forget that.
Appreciate any feedback you provide!
That's not close to what the person you replied to said though. They simply said that Amazon is not alone in doing this. That it's a much larger problem.
> How would you argue against such an argument?
I wouldn't. I would see anyone saying: "Someone else does X" as providing additional evidence this an even bigger problem. So Amazon isn't the only one doing this? Walmart is also doing this, as well as other companies. What can we do to stop this all-together? Because focusing on Amazon won't solve the problem. In fact, in some ways it becomes easier when there are many "someone elses" doing X, because then it comes a general problem, and not a specific attack on any one company someone might have an attachment to for some reason.
Local jurisdictions can and do give steep tax (and other) discounts to attract businesses and stadiums (just two examples). You would have to revoke local governing authority to prevent these sorts of venue shopping (IANAL; if you have better suggestions, I’m all ears). I don’t believe that is realistic, so I don’t argue that as a legitimate solution.
Maybe you could tax at a federal level where you can overrule local taxing policy (similar to new SALT deduction constraints in federal tax policy), negating the benefits of venue shopping.