Amazon's growth especially since the mid 2010s has relied on China in cooperation with the Chinese state. Amazon actually loves to bring out this figure that by volume 49 percent of third-party sales in the United States through Amazon come directly from China to the US consumer. This is not counting the additional huge percentage of things that are sourced in China by American or North American first-party sellers um Amazon gets very upset when you say that number because Amazon loves when it is asked about being a monopoly.
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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