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Amazon's Monopoly of the tech industry is ruining the US economy (lemmy.world)

submitted 1 month ago by Buttflapper@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world

224 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I wanted to get printer photo paper for my printer, a Canon. I went to Walmart, They had nothing. Went to Target, they had one pack of photo paper and it was crazy expensive, so I went to micro center. That one was just as expensive. So finally I went back to Amazon, which I was trying to avoid, and saw the price 25 to 40% lower than anywhere I had been. Literally everything that I was looking for, I could find within seconds. Not even Best buy has even close to the amount of inventory or variety, even when you're shopping online....

Therefore, I think Amazon has a literal monopoly in the tech industry right now, you're literally forced to buy from them, because unless you have the money and financial fortitude to protest with your wallet, you're going to be buying from them. There's no other choice. They have so aggressively and dominantly taken over the supply chain market that no other tech company can currently compete with them in any aspect at all. You will be paying 40 to 50% more on everything by cutting out Amazon, and no one has the money for that anymore unless you're upper middle class or above

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[–] TheFeatureCreature@lemmy.world 184 points 1 month ago (22 children)

I put some of the blame on retailers as well. Retail stores just don't want to carry inventory anymore, especially tech-focused ones with many of those just turning into glorified showrooms. I don't know how many times I've heard some version of: "Sorry, we don't have that in stock but we can bring it in for you."

We needed a short length of garden hose here for the house so I went to two hardware stores and one garden centre looking for one. Nothing. Not even in their dedicated gardening sections. I had to order it off Amazon. A goddamn garden hose.

Amazon has done a lot of damage for sure but retail is suffering from several self-inflicted wounds too. Home Depot, for example, is a multi-billion dollar corporation and even they have a weaker retail presence now. That's not Amazon's fault.

[–] helenslunch@feddit.nl -1 points 1 month ago (4 children)

Retail stores just don't want to carry inventory anymore

Retail stores are more than happy to carry anything consumers want to pay for. If they don't stock it, it means people don't buy it, and you can't fault them for that.

That's not Amazon's fault.

That's mostly the fault of consumers who buy from Amazon (and other e-tailors).

[–] micka190@lemmy.world 5 points 1 month ago

That’s not Amazon’s fault.

That’s mostly the fault of consumers who buy from Amazon (and other e-tailors).

There's quite a few retail stores that don't keep inventory, even for common things. Staples comes to mind, where it feels like half their damn office items aren't in stock, so you need to wait for them to have it brought in.

The problem is that those same retail stores can't compete with Amazon's shipping speed. It becomes a case of:

I want to buy a thing, I need it fast, so I guess I'll check my local retails stores
My local retail stores don't have it in stock, but I can order it and it'll be there in 4-5 days
I can just buy it off of Amazon at a comparable price, and have it tomorrow

It's alright if they don't want to carry inventory, but they need to have the shipping speeds to compete, otherwise there's no reason for the consumer not to just buy it off of Amazon directly.

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