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Amazon Rules Out Displaying Tariff Impact After White House Attack

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Re: Amazon Rules Out Displaying Tariff Impact After White House Attack

#51

Post by pjc50 »

carlosjobim wrote: post #29
sofixa wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> found this unreasonable and confusing until one day I read a conservative argument that this is actually a good thing, because it stops the government from increasing sales tax too much. It constantly reminds residents of how much extra they're paying for sales tax and encourages voting for politicians who will reduce sales tax if it's too high. Okay, it's a reasonable argument, I wasn't super against it anymore It…

It's psychology. Just like withholding taxes on salaries before they are paid.

That's more about forcing people to manage their cashflow and not giving them the opportunity to not pay the income tax.

Re: Amazon Rules Out Displaying Tariff Impact After White House Attack

#52

Post by pjc50 »

ourmandave wrote: post #11
Filligree wrote: post #5

The executive really shouldn't be interfering with private companies in this way. This is Amazon bowing to fears of retaliation. For what, giving customers true information?

Apparently Amazon didn't get the memo on Jan 20th that all decisions must begin and end with "How will this affect the Emperor's image?" It used to be limited to the state run channel Fox News. Even they would screw up once and a while. Depending on the severity, they'd either be dragged on X or receive an unhappy on-air call from the Palace in Mar-a-largo.

> state run channel Fox News

As I keep saying, this is the other way round. In the west we don't have state controlled media, we have a media controlled state. Private propaganda organizations can very effectively steer policy by getting people to believe nonsense.

Re: Amazon Rules Out Displaying Tariff Impact After White House Attack

#54

Post by roganartu »

Uvix wrote: post #45
watwut wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That conservative argument is just an excuse. The price is not shown in full, to make it harder for customer to know how much they are spending before they are at the counter. It is fully possible to show full price along with tariffs and taxes, if you want to show them. It does not necessitates misleading prices. This is just conservatives being pro-manipulation and against informed customers. When I was ordering pa…

How do you show the final price to someone when dining in and carrying out food have different tax rates? You won’t know the price until they complete the purchase. How do you put the final price on an ad that will be broadcast over a large area or distributed in a newspaper that goes to same, with different tax rates in different parts of the area? You won’t know the price until you know which location they’re shopp…

You simplify the tax code so that, like the vast majority of other developed nations, these situations do not apply.

However that requires a centralization of power that is politically unpalatable in the US currently.

In practice, I think that this issue largely persists in the US because of tipping culture though. It perpetuates an acceptance of final cost uncertainty that makes the insanity of all the examples you describe seem somehow not so weird after all.

Re: Amazon Rules Out Displaying Tariff Impact After White House Attack

#55

Post by pjc50 »

redserk wrote: post #10
mmcconnell1618 wrote: post #8

There is no regulation or legislation that is telling Amazon they can/can't or should/shouldn't post this information. Amazon appears to be responding to the wishes of the President out of fealty or fear. The threat of a negative response by the President is enough to change the behavior of the company.

To me, this calls into question to what degree Amazon will willfully comply with government requests that come in via phone call and not a warrant. From the Amazon shopping side, you can build quite a profile on someone based on their past order history. Want to find protesters? There’s been a number of folks who don’t usually order office supplies suddenly ordering the thick Sharpie markers in a certain area... Hope…

> to what degree Amazon will willfully comply with government requests that come in via phone call and not a warrant

This has been rumbling on for years, regardless of administration, because the security services love overreach. This is the basis of the whole "EU safe harbor" dispute, because Microsoft can't guarantee to EU customers of their Ireland datacenter that they will follow GDPR and not leak customer secrets to US security services.

Re: Amazon Rules Out Displaying Tariff Impact After White House Attack

#56

Post by carlosjobim »

pjc50 wrote: post #51
carlosjobim wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's psychology. Just like withholding taxes on salaries before they are paid.

That's more about forcing people to manage their cashflow and not giving them the opportunity to not pay the income tax.

Whatever you say... Some countries even hide the labour tax from the pay slips, meaning most salaried people believe they pay much less in tax than what they actually do.

Re: Amazon Rules Out Displaying Tariff Impact After White House Attack

#57

Post by jqpabc123 »

paulryanrogers wrote: post #48
jqpabc123 wrote: post #4

I guess they don't want consumers/voters to see how much China is paying??? Time to wake up and smell the coffee --- tariffs are really a tax on *YOU* --- not China. No country has ever taxed it's citizens into greatness.

> No country has ever taxed it's citizens into greatness. Why do people repeat this? The greatest era of middle-class growth and success was when the rich paid much more in taxes. Perhaps a better phrase is "No government maintained a middle-class by letting the rich soak up all the gains".

Ok, so how about, "No country has ever taxed it's *middle class* into greatness"?

Or since the middle class constitutes the majority of citizens, "No country has ever taxed *the majority* into greatness"?

Re: Amazon Rules Out Displaying Tariff Impact After White House Attack

#58

Post by senectus1 »

4d chess. Amazon won no matter what.

either WH says nothing and the values are shown.

WH says something in outrage (like they did) and amazon backs down.. but its such big news that the awareness has been heightened. Now even the most rabid MAGAhead knows that this is going to cost them at the hip pocket, and knows that the WH knew, and used their power to shut amazon up.

JB won this round.

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