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Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

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Re: Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

#511

Post by kashyapc »

mankash666 wrote: post #510
jimnotgym wrote: post #419

Bezos can keep his donations, I just want Amazon to pay tax like any other business would in the UK, pay employees NI like any other business in the UK, and pay minimum wage like any other business in the UK. It shouldn't be up to the billionaires to choose where to spend money that should be in the hands of national governments and workers. This article for instance shows homeless Amazon warehouse workers living in…

Yes yes - how very evil if Besos & Co. to dare follow the law. This socialistic rhetoric is all fun and games till jobs are lost & companies close down - case in point - etsy [1] [1]: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/25/business/etsy-josh-silver...

What are you talking about? Jimnotgym is precisely asking to not screw the society and follow the law (yeah, they found some "legal" loopholes, therefore one could argue that Amazon is in the "legal green zone") pay regular taxes and treat the warehouse workers et al like decent humans.

Re: Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

#512

Post by flyinglizard »

ben_w wrote: post #454
flyinglizard wrote: post #438

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shouldn’t Amazon shareholders expect the company to look for low tax jurisdictions to operate from? Is there a morality issue that I’m not seeing?

Yes, there is. Societies — as we know how to make them — break down if everyone figures out how to avoid paying their way. If a hacker gets root, they’re just using the rules of the system, finding a loophole they can exploit… taxes and laws are systems that can be exploited, but even in the cases where I find them bad (and I have plenty of broad examples of things I don’t like), I think it’s worse to let people get…

It's not weakness, it's a commercial decision, both for Amazon AND for the jurisdiction. It's another tool the governing body has for drawing (or repelling) businesses.

There isn't a moral rate of taxation anymore than there is an absolute moral price to pay for a night at a hotel.

Re: Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

#513

Post by mankash666 »

kashyapc wrote: post #511
mankash666 wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes yes - how very evil if Besos & Co. to dare follow the law. This socialistic rhetoric is all fun and games till jobs are lost & companies close down - case in point - etsy [1] [1]: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/25/business/etsy-josh-silver...

What are you talking about? Jimnotgym is precisely asking to not screw the society and follow the law (yeah, they found some "legal" loopholes, therefore one could argue that Amazon is in the "legal green zone") pay regular taxes and treat the warehouse workers et al like decent humans.

Stop making nonsequestirs. If Amazon is breaking laws, sue them. There's no forced labor in warehouses, it's at-will. No one's stopping the unhappy from getting another job. Raise the minimum wage in territories you suspect are untenable.

Then there's the whole hypocrisy of you shopping on Amazon. How much do you save by shopping on Amazon (and equivalents). Why isn't a 100% of your shopping local and sustainable?

Just stop with the B.S

Re: Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

#514

Post by beezischillin »

The thing that pisses me off, more than anything, is that huge companies like Amazon take advantage of a society and lobby for laws more favourable to them until society reaches a breaking point in tolerating it. Small businesses are already pretty much dead in the water by the time that happens due to the anti-competitive nature of these behemoths. And then the government decides to crack down and regulate and once more it's always the small businesses that suffer the most or go out of business.

A self-regulating free market with competition would be beautiful but at this point we're past that and this scorched earth policy has to end somehow because it's a race to the bottom.

Re: Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

#515

Post by projektir »

notaboutdave wrote: post #258
sonnyblarney wrote: post #154

I don't believe these externalized 'throwing money at things' solves much. What he can do is find innovative solutions within is own organization for the wellbeing of his own staff. And given his power in the value chain, start to demand basic rights in the crap countries of the world where the crap he peddles is made. Steve Jobs had so much power that literally in one, single email, in one sentence, could have chang…

Here's a Henry Rollins anecdote on how throwing money at tent cities might not be the best idea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XY2n4BYbgYE&t=23m51s

Meanwhile: https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2013/10/25/240590433/what...

Re: Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

#516

Post by icelancer »

staticautomatic wrote: post #485
icelancer wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, Amazon is purely net negative. Billions of dollars of wealth, the vast majority created on the backs of laborers via exploitation the world 'round. I get the shtick. I hear it enough. It's not true, but it's a good story. Plays well on social media. The world is almost certainly better off with Amazon existing than without, even if they do some heinous stuff.

Suffice it to say you're demonstrably incorrect.

Funny, I think that about your opinion. Which is what both of our statements are, except that I actually admit it while you and others assert it as fact.

Re: Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

#517

Post by manigandham »

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #497
manigandham wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies follow laws and regulations, and optimize for profit and sustainability within those rules. Why would they ever pay MORE than they have to? There are no ethics or morals here. Taxes are not charity. If you want to change the tax laws then you can do so, via the government that you take part in.

I don't have complete control over every government in the world. It is perfectly reasonable for me to criticize the way that companies act, even if it is incentivized by a government. People do not have to be mindless money maximizers. They have a choice in how they act and they are responsible for their own actions regardless of what incentives the government creates.

Nobody has complete control over any government, anywhere in the world.

Companies are also not citizens, they are abstract structures designed to deliver value to customers and make a profit in doing so. A corporation has no specific loyalty to the government beyond following the laws and paying the dues required for operating. Corporations are also not able to judge what the "ethical" amount to pay is, which is why the government sets those rules on behalf of the people it represents.

You're turning a government issue into a corporate issue because it sounds easy, but ultimately its just treating (or rather complaining about) the symptom rather than enacting any solution. Again, perhaps you should join the government and enact the change you want to see?

Also since you are talking about responsibility and actions, I assume you donate all the spare cash you have that isn't going to taxes. Or is that not ethical in your case?

Re: Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

#518

Post by DoreenMichele »

gaahrdner wrote: post #477
DoreenMichele wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Addiction is rooted in the same intractable personal problems that lead to homelessness. People on the street are often using street drugs in place of prescription medication, sometimes by preference because, for example, they have a psych diagnosis and street drugs have preferable side effects to the medication they are supposed to be on. I knew a bipolar man somewhat well who was homeless. He smoked marijuana i…

I didn't say addiction is the problem, I said it was a major cause of homelessness, so I don't really understand the downvotes. The National Coalition on Homelessness seems to agree, citing "A 2008 survey by the United States Conference of Mayors asked 25 cities for their top three causes of homelessness. Substance abuse was the single largest cause of homelessness for single adults (reported by 68% of cities). Subst…

I was homeless for nearly six years. I did no drugs, but I had the myriad underlying personal problems that so frequently lead to drug use.

What I'm trying to tell you is people blame drug use when it is really more like a symptom than a cause. It's like saying "The pain killers did it."

The conclusion winds up being that if people wouldn't do drugs, their lives would work. The reality is more like if their lives worked, they wouldn't do drugs.

Again, it's like saying "Chemotherapy causes homelessness!" because some folks on the street are having a medical crisis. If you just stopped chemo cold, it wouldn't get them off the street and now their cancer is going unchecked.

There are things you can do that help, like improve the crappy American health care system. But "Just don't do chemo" isn't an answer but that's exactly how substance abuse gets addressed.

Think of it this way: Most people on the street are male. No one goes around saying in all seriousness "Just don't be male. Problem solved!"

Re: Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

#519

Post by heelhook »

TheCoelacanth wrote: post #497
manigandham wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies follow laws and regulations, and optimize for profit and sustainability within those rules. Why would they ever pay MORE than they have to? There are no ethics or morals here. Taxes are not charity. If you want to change the tax laws then you can do so, via the government that you take part in.

I don't have complete control over every government in the world. It is perfectly reasonable for me to criticize the way that companies act, even if it is incentivized by a government. People do not have to be mindless money maximizers. They have a choice in how they act and they are responsible for their own actions regardless of what incentives the government creates.

> People do not have to be mindless money maximizers.

No. They don't. Companies do.

To a degree, they DO have a fiduciary duty to maximize profit over the long haul; if Amazon didn't take all legal shortcuts it'd be at a competitive disadvantage and a competitor could put it out of business.

Optimizing every aspect of their operation gives Bezos, the person, the opportunity to act following his moral compass (space exploration, philanthropy, etc.)

Re: Amazon's Bezos Launches $2B Fund to Help the Homeless

#520

Post by heelhook »

jimnotgym wrote: post #443
artursapek wrote: post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They pay the tax they are legally obligated to. You can't expect any business to pay a penny more than that. It's on the lawmakers to remove the loopholes (which they and their friends probably exploit as well, so good luck with that...)

Please see my reply above. It is alleged that they do not pay the tax that they are legally obliged to. No loophole, just special treatment.

Not OP, but OP's point stands. If they can get special treatment, someone else's might be able to. The fact that it's a possibility means they must use it or risk being at a competitive disadvantage of a less ethical player.

Before an argument of "this justifies any type of behavior such as murdering your competitors' CEOs." There's a natural limit (albeit fuzzy) to what rules is in the company's self interest to seek a "special treatment". Relationships with gov't go sour, governments change, etc. What used to be "special treatment" might quickly transform into proof of wrong-doing against the company.

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