Is it? Amazon employees (presumably) have the same options as everyone else. Many of those options are, generally speaking, cheaper than Amazon. Whatever your feelings about Amazon in general, fact that Amazon’s supposedly cash-strapped employees choose to pay a premium for convenience is not evidence of Amazon’s malevolence.
No it’s not. Your point was completely the opposite (factory towns had shitty prices due to exclusivity).
> Amazon is forcing competitors out of business. And once they have a monopoly
They are forcing little shitty stores that have nothing to add over ordering online out of business.
They aren’t anywhere near a monopoly in any segment of the world. They aren’t even on a path to it. It’s so trivial for people to sell things online that they will never be anything close to one unless they get online sales banned for the rest of the Internet.
My aunt went to be a manager at the Walmart while everything else in town slowly went out of business. They carried sewing supplies until Franklin's went under and then they got rid of that section.
It's the same story with louder music.
This arrangement is a transfer of wealth between the middle class and Walmart regardless of whether they opt to shop at Walmart.
But in a world where Walmart posted that much profit on it's $559 billion 2020 revenues[2], somehow Walmart is being allowed to tax me, not a Walmart shopper, via my taxes, and transfer it to Walmart's owners and shareholders, by forcing me to pay for part of their employees wages.
Which they clearly have the money to actually pay for.
Unless Walmart is a break-even business, there is no excuse, period, for them to not be paying a living wage and getting sponsored by the government for it.
[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/269414/gross-profit-marg...
[2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/shelleykohan/2021/02/18/walmart...
How is it a transfer to walmart? The people who get paid the benefit are eligible for it regardless of whether they're employed by walmart or not. Suppose walmart automated their jobs and replaced them with robots, you'll still be on the hook for paying those benefits.
I'm skeptical of this. If anything amazon's push for minimum wage makes me think they're better able to afford the increased cost of labor than their competitors.
You need to look at an operating income figure to make such a conclusion. (Or another financial measure that’s “after” labor, but OI is probably the standard one.)
They are literally taking your tax dollars to do this.
This is the simplest possible economic calculus: a business that doesn't pay full time employees a living wage is getting sponsored by your tax dollars for its profits.