[pauldickwin]

It's more important to keep in mind that Amazon created hundreds of thousands of new jobs, raised minimum wage in many areas, and brought many people out of absolute poverty. No matter which way you look at it, a net positive rather than a negative.

[PaulDavisThe1st]

> No matter which way you look at it, a net positive rather than a negative.

You just listed the positives, without any the negatives, and without any sign of actually weighing one against the other.

I don't know if Amazon is a net social positive, but it certainly isn't obvious and the answer coudl very well be no despite the positives.

ps. I helped create Amazon.

[whoaisme]

"It's more important to keep in mind that the CCP created hundreds of thousands of new jobs, raised minimum wage in many areas, and brought many people out of absolute poverty. No matter which way you look at it, a net positive rather than a negative."

Your logic seems highly suspect.

[chairmanwow1]

The CCP created hundreds of millions of new jobs and brought hundreds of millions of people out of absolute poverty.

The CCP has its problems, but you must respect that so much economic growth has never happened so quickly for so many people in human history. A lot of people are living happier, more productive, more interesting lives because of the actions of the CCP.

[mint2]

The question is would a similar number jobs have been created had there been another ruling party. It’s like giving trump credit for investing in the vaccine, it’s a near guarantee given America’s economy that the vaccine would have been invested in even if Mickey Mouse had been president. In my mind, neither Biden nor Trump get any credit for the vaccines.

China saw massive famines due to the Great Leap Forward, ccp policy, killing millions. How do we know that had a different government been in power the jobs wouldn’t be created, perhaps faster like with Taiwan, and at the same time the famines avoided? So no, I’m not going to give the ccp credit for creating jobs that like as not would have anyway been created.

[pauldickwin]

Obviously, there are drawbacks with the CCP (and Amazon), but I can tell you one damn thing for sure: those people would not have been lifted out of poverty under the socialist/communist regime of Mao. Under that regime, people were mocked and tortured for working harder than others and trying to innovate. Deng Xiaoping embraced free markets and their own flavor of capitalism to bring this net positive to China.

[Matticus_Rex]

When a government drastically restricts economic freedoms and then restricts them less than they did, you shouldn't praise that government for causing the increased prosperity that results -- it was their fault it wasn't happening in the first place, and they "helped" by getting out of the way. Sure, you can say the Deng Xiaoping CCP isn't the same as Mao's CCP, and there are aspects of that which are true. But at most, Deng's CCP was simply reducing the drastic limits on economic freedoms that the party had put in place. They're not causing the prosperity -- they're declining to continue stopping that prosperity from happening.

[mariodiana]

Yes, I heard the Uighurs lives got a lot more interesting — but not quite yet as interesting as did the Jews of Germany, when the Nazi regime lifted a nation broken by war out of its funk.

It's simply monstrous that we would compare Amazon — whatever criticisms someone might have for the company's business practices — with Communist China, and something like that needs to be called out.

[kshacker]

You mean without Amazon, we would not be buying at Whole Foods for example? You mean there are net new jobs not just jobs that may have been lost in my company? I understand Amazon's benefits, and I know someone else may not have executed as well thereby slowing progress, but who knows maybe YouTube tv with it's bundled benefit of YouTube shopping would be ruling the world and we would be discussing that :)