Re: Pay no taxes post no profits
"Shop wisely, readers."
More like "Strategise wisely, Bezos."
Running persistent losses in retail, and then engaging in tax avoidance might be part of a grand scheme to build a dominant position, but it hasn't won Amazon any friends. With something approaching dominance in online retailing, how long before somebody (most likely the European Commission) decide that Amazon's retail strategy amounts to abusive practice?
The French establishment already hate Amazon. I suspect the other European liberal and left parties hate Amazon or are easily persuadable (over tax avoidance, labour relations, NSA integration of AWS, for treading on smaller companies, concerns over music and rights licensing, and for simply being American). And whilst Amazon have deep pockets for lobbying, so do Google, who definitely want a bigger share of content sales. The need of most governments to raise more tax means that busting-up online retailing helps - it is probably easier to have a market review that then create conditions for new (they hope) local entrants who don't have the scale and scope for global tax evasion than to tackle Amazon directly on its dubious, but claimed to be legal tax arrangements.
The link below I believe refers to US sales, but there's plenty of other evidence that suggests the position in Europe is very similar:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/08/30/amazon_dot_com_holds_ludicrous_lead_in_online_retail_sales/
Biting the hand that feeds IT
