At the beginning of COVID Amazon made this decision that they weren't going to fulfill non-essential goods. This was a huge thing for third-party sellers because it meant that suddenly they couldn't send in any new inventory to warehouses. Some of them have loans from Amazon whose interest rates and repayment are tied to their sales so their loans went into default. Almost everyone I interviewed did at least almost 90 percent of their business through Amazon but most Amazon sellers are hugely dependent on Amazon sales.
Paris Marx is joined by Moira Weigel to discuss the third-party sellers who supply many of the goods sold through Amazon, how the company’s policy decisions reshape small businesses to act like mini-Amazons, and what that means for regulatory responses.
Moira Weigel is an Assistant Professor at Northeastern University, a Faculty Associate at the Berkman Klein Center at Harvard Law School, and a founding editor of Logic Magazine. Her most recent book is Voices from the Valley: Tech Workers Talk about What They Do--And How They Do It, co-edited with Ben Tarnoff. Follow Moira on Twitter at @moiragweigel.
Tech Won’t Save Us offers a critical perspective on tech, its worldview, and wider society with the goal of inspiring people to demand better tech and a better world. Follow the podcast (@techwontsaveus) and host Paris Marx (@parismarx) on Twitter, and support the show on Patreon.
The podcast is produced by Eric Wickham and part of the Harbinger Media Network.
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