Amazon snubs French free delivery ban with one-cent charge

What actually happens is that Amazon makes no profit, and thus does not get taxed on profits. But it still pays VAT, Property, B&O, etc.

The first problem seems better addressed by tax reform, since it impacts many industries other than book selling, and this measure won't stop it with Amazon anyhow.

The second problem is one of increased efficiency (to use an economist's definition) causing disruption. The French seem to have been resistant to that since the industrial revolution, so it might be helpful to understand this law in that context. It's hard to see how they're going to win that one in the long run, although prolonged skepticism to the benefits of efficiency might have helped create some of the social benefits in France. From the outside though it looks like this social bias has hurt France more than helped it (other countries have maintained robust social programmes without rejecting technological disruption) so I wouldn't welcome laws promoting it.

The third problem is not just a case of nationalism, but because it makes it harder to soften the blow of disruption by pointing to other local jobs in technology. It's comes down to an argument on globalization. The jury is still out on whether globalization will be a net positive or negative. To me it seems unstoppable, though, and I don't think it's wise to be on the wrong side of the trend.

1) The first part is exactly how the EU was designed: operate from one country, reduce your overhead. Maybe it is not Amazon's fault that they comply with the rules?

2) The second part is exactly how the Congress wanted its tax laws: if you bring money home, pay your taxes, if you don't, we are not involved. Maybe it is not Amazon's fault that they comply with the rules?

Not really. If that money is stored in a bank, most of it will be loaned out. If it is used to buy bonds (including but not limited to government bonds) then it goes to the issuer. And so on.

Certainly, but having small local bookshops doesn't preclude also having Amazon.

When did you start buying? I lived in a small town (roughly 40,000 people) and in 1981 I could buy Lance A. Leventhal's "6809 Assembly Language Programming" on order in less than a week. The 6502 version was in stock.

The problem is that chain bookstores emerged right around this point in the local malls (Waldenbooks, for my local area) and killed the local bookstores.

So, in my town, the local bookstore, right off the downtown park, went under in favor of the chain store in the local mall--neither of which now exist. So, now the damage can't be undone without a significant investment by somebody, but the upside profit is limited by whether Amazon is willing to undercut you.

Don't get me wrong. I loathe most local businesses in small towns. It used to be that they were slow, but they were reliable. If they said it would be done on date X two weeks out, it would be done on date X or they would start moving heaven and earth. Now, they tend to be slow and unreliable. The last car repair I had to deal with was: "Well, it didn't come in the shipment. It will be another week." "Um, no. Get the part tomorrow." "Not gonna happen." "Actually, yes, the part will be here tomorrow because I'm having it FedEx'd in. And me, my lawyer, your manager, the dealership owner, and GM are going to have a conference call while you are fixing the car you've already had for a week." Those kinds of businesses should go under post haste.

Nevertheless, there are some local businesses that get it and do a great job serving the local area. They don't deserve to get wiped out because WalMart, Amazon, etc. can force things that the smaller businesses cannot.

> Nah, probably easier to keep pretending that it's super-simple to manage humans at scale just because it's easier to reason about.

This canard about libertarians [1] not understanding the complexity of the real world is oft-repeated, but it is misguided, and comes off as condescending to boot.[2]

The likes of Hayek and Friedman did not contend that reality is simple; they contended that it was complex -- too complex for economic systems based on expansive government intervention (socialism, mercantilism, etc) to grapple with and produce satisfactory outcomes.

They advocated a free market system on the premise that it was the best way to handle this complexity, not on the basis that it doesn't exist.

Now, you are free to question whether empirical evidence bears out either point. But it is ignorant to suggest libertarianism is based on eschewing complexity.

1. Here I am referring mostly to libertarians of a consequentialist lean. Libertarians of a mostly deontological lean are orthogonal to this discussion because whether or not they understand the world's complexity is mostly immaterial to their policy prescriptions, as they are concerned mostly with morality, not outcomes.

2. Usually unintentionally, I would hope, though it seems that at least with mpyne it is not.

In complex organized sports like football (association or American, take your pick), there are lots of rules about the movement of players, the flow of the game, etc. that are generally followed, and penalties are generally well enforced when the rules are not followed. And yet there are no laws behind these rules. It would appear that complex rules can be created and enforced by mechanisms other than law.

Yes, but the alternative to a huge number of laws is not necessarily total lawlessness and lack of rule of law.

And in fact, laws are not even the only way of regulating activities - the are plenty of other ways of setting and enforcing rules. See the work of Elinor Ostrom, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics†, on the the community-based governance of the commons.

† not a "real" Nobel prize, I know