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The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

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Re: The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

#281

Post by slowmovintarget »

boredpeter wrote: post #259
kimbernator wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's trivial to create a website (frontend and backend) that offers similar functionality to Amazon. There's nothing special about their software platform. You can't open-source marketing and the insane delivery network Amazon has. Those, among other things, are the reason they are successful. They could release all of their software completely open source and literally nothing would change.

You can’t open source it but the government could nationalize it and make it a benefit to small businesses everywhere without the anti competitive profit seeking motives of a private business controlling it.

Expropriation is the first step to destroying the thing. There no reason for unbelievably good customer service if you get paid by taxpayers regardless of outcome.

Re: The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

#282

Post by tonyedgecombe »

RandomLensman wrote: post #272
exabrial wrote: post #25

Apple, Google, Facebook, Amazon, break them all up. And for the love of crap, stop approving billion dollar mergers.

Highly fragmented markets are also bad for price discovery - so how do we know what size to have?

I read an economics paper a while back that said you need at least four players to get a competitive market.

I’m not sure how you would translate that to limits on the size of a company though as every sector would be different.

Re: The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

#283

Post by RandomLensman »

klysm wrote: post #279
RandomLensman wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Highly fragmented markets are also bad for price discovery - so how do we know what size to have?

We are so incredibly far from highly fragmented I don’t think that’s even worth thinking about at this stage

If you don't think about it, could create a weird set of local/product/etc. monopoly like things instead. Not thinking about isn't an option because it ignores the incentives if you force limit sizes.

Re: The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

#284

Post by tonyedgecombe »

NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #211
ezfe wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here are some possibilities (not claiming these are practical or a solution): The first is splitting Amazon-retail from their other products (Alexa, Ring, AWS, etc.) The second is splitting Amazon-logistics out. I'm not exactly sure how this would work, but it could be argued that Amazon logistics could operate standalone.

The first one seems obtuse. If here were some 1960s-style comglomerate that sold shower curtains and offered professional bowling ball waxing, with a 95% monopoly in both... Why would splitting it out into two monopolies improve anything? Even if there are some unknown, misunderstood synergies between the two businesses, will they not just collude in that way that bridge players do, without any overt actions that cou…

It would stop cross subsidy. I’m sure I read that the distribution side of the business gets AWS services at cost.

Re: The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

#285

Post by gorbypark »

gbear605 wrote: post #183
jasonjayr wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Overstock & Wayfair scan + compare identical & similar listings at Amazon and other sites, and will message sellers if their price is not the better price. It's annoyingly a pretty standard practice. And they will see through the "different SKU" trick simply by comparing the product images.

Isn’t the solution to just ban all of the companies from doing it? More companies than just Amazon can be anti-competitive.

I think that's a good solution in this case (ban it for everyone), but remember that there are different rules for companies who are found to have monopolies in a specific market. Something a monopolist does could be illegal while being completely legal for their competitors (who don't have a monopoly).

Re: The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

#286

Post by tonyedgecombe »

billjings wrote: post #216
someonehere wrote: post #54

What does breaking up Amazon look like? I’m genuinely curious because half the comments I see in here are “break up Amazon!” or “break up FAANG!” What does that look like? What would Amazon look like if broken up? In the end we all know lobbyists from Amazon will somehow influence their outcome.

An obvious choice would be AWS. AWS operates fairly independently of the rest of the company, and its huge profits subsidize the retail wing.

If you imagine the situation in reverse, where they were two independent companies it would make very little sense to merge them. One is a high margin technology business and the other a low margin distribution company. There would be very little synergy.

Re: The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

#287

Post by nemo44x »

thelastgallon wrote: post #17

An excerpt from: https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/25/greedflation/ Amazon binds its sellers over to something called Most Favored Nation status. That means that sellers can't offer their goods more cheaply than they do on Amazon – even if it costs them (lots) less to sell in Target or direct from their websites. This means that every time a seller adds a dollar to their Amazon sale price, they have to add a dollar to…

Isn’t this very common among all resellers? For example if you own a hotel and want other websites to sell your availability they will only list you if you don’t list the same availability for less money. They do this in part because people use the service to search for hotels and even they find one they want they go to other places to see if it’s cheaper.

Re: The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

#288

Post by bee_rider »

boredpeter wrote: post #259
kimbernator wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's trivial to create a website (frontend and backend) that offers similar functionality to Amazon. There's nothing special about their software platform. You can't open-source marketing and the insane delivery network Amazon has. Those, among other things, are the reason they are successful. They could release all of their software completely open source and literally nothing would change.

You can’t open source it but the government could nationalize it and make it a benefit to small businesses everywhere without the anti competitive profit seeking motives of a private business controlling it.

The original commented suggested that an open source Amazon was the “real solution.” Open sourcing Amazon’s software and then nationalizing their distribution network is a very different suggestion!

Re: The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

#289

Post by taeric »

abduhl wrote: post #276
taeric wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is why I didn't say it applies differently. I said it is enforced on a ranking that is based on ROI. And... it really has to be. There are almost certainly low key levels of bad practices in small shops. But it would cost more and take more out of the economy to enforce them than it is to just not care. Now, that bar is rising, of course. Things that used to not matter years ago are easily enforced today.

So your view is that we should enforce extremely strict laws arbitrarily and capriciously based on however the particular regulator or prosecutor feels about a given entity? I can’t imagine how this could be abused.

If you've ever been on the interstate system, then you are basically with me. Literally it would be trivial in today's world to have a hookup on your car to check your speed against the local signage on a somewhat real time basis. Sounds absurd, but there is a pretty good chance every long haul truck you see out there is doing exactly that.

Similarly, mens rea is a thing. Such that statutory enforcement of rules is often a regressive policy that isn't necessarily a good idea.

Re: The FTC sues to break up Amazon over an economy-wide “hidden tax”

#290

Post by SoftTalker »

jbluepolarbear wrote: post #159
endisneigh wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. Let's use your example. The sellers should stop selling that item on Amazon, and sell their light bulb on Walmart, or where-ever. Customers who really need that will go find it at Walmart, or where-ever. This strengthens the competitors to Amazon, which is bad for Amazon and good for the consumer. The consumer also find the lower price that they wanted. Alternatively, they buy the alternate product on Ama…

You’re just wrong, Amazon controls around 35% of all US e-commerce. Not being able to sell on Amazon instantly removes most of your available customers. The second largest is Walmart and it’s closer to 7%. Walmart, target, whatever, don’t add up to Amazons market.

There are companies that do not sell on Amazon. I seek them out. They will tell you that if their product appears on Amazon, it's counterfeit.

It's probably an impossiblity if your business model is selling cheap imported Chinese garbage at a profit, but that's the businesess you chose. Others have chosen to sell quality items on their own terms. Those are the businesses I want to reward.

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