Thursday (April 16th): France vs Amazon

Jeff Bezos

Name? Jeff Bezos

Westphalian identity? United States American

Age? 56

Why is he in the news? Technically, he isn’t. But after a French court ruling, Amazon France is set to close down its warehouses for five days to do a deep clean and to “take all necessary measures to guarantee the health and safety of staff.”

Why do we care? Since Bezos ignored our call yesterday about donating 700 million dollars to the WHO and has ignored the call of warehouse workers for better conditions all over the West, we felt we could no longer ignore the ugly truth of Amazon and praise France a little bit for standing up against multinationals. 

Why should you care? This won’t affect you unless you are French or living in France or are expecting an Amazon order that may be travelling through France…

Who else cares? The French public, small businesses and workers’ unions. We’re assuming Bezos also cares but honestly, the company is making $11,000-a-second so he probably isn’t too concerned…

Any further comments? During this crisis, we have largely criticized government responses and praised multinationals for their quick adaptation: from LVMH making hand sanitizers to Ford and GE making respirators. There is no doubt multinationals have provided assistance during these uncertain times. But at what costs? Should we silence our criticism on Amazon for doing their job and exploiting people while at it? Also paying taxes is a nice concept Amazon is not too familiar with. France has been the most vocal European country about taxation issues in Europe, especially concerning tech giants from the US.