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  • Amazon is one of the world’s biggest polluters, emitting 44.4 million
    metric tons of carbon—more than most countries in the world. The
    company is even spinning its refusal to end contracts with oil and gas
    companies as an effort to save the planet, arguing that providing
    Amazon Web Services software to these companies is accelerating their
    transition to clean energy—and their extraction of fossil fuels from
    the earth. In other cases, Amazon’s rapid expansion of its data
    centers has led to states like Virginia relying more heavily on fossil
    fuels to keep up with energy demands.

    https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/v74zpy/jeff-bezos-dollar10b-earth-fund-cant-undo-amazons-damage

  • Thanks. I agree that it's important to look at the bigger picture. But I don't think some of the comparisons made by this (and other ctrl+c variations) are especially useful - e.g. to countries. There are something like 40 countries that don't even emit 1mt while the US, EU and China make up over half the annual contribution.

    What do those stats actually tell us?

    Shocker, riches places buy the most shit and the largest manufacturers make the most shit.

    Almost a third of Amazon's output is from "other indirect emissions (e.g., third-party transportation, packaging, upstream energy related)". That's punters buying shit and having it delivered, something I would argue is a product of them being the market leader rather than inherent evilness.

    Personally I think 8% of your wealth is a big number.

    I'd never say that there wasn't more to do, or that there isn't a PR angle (and apparently an HR one too). But I don't think it is as easy to dismiss as some of his other "acts of philanthropy", which are essentially laughable.

  • Almost a third of Amazon's output is from "other indirect emissions

    Right, so ignore the guy profiting from this and blame individuals.

    That's punters buying shit and having it delivered, something I would argue is a product of them being the market leader rather than inherent evilness.

    You know how amazon became a market leader? By avoiding paying taxes and other costs that retail businesses had to pay just to exist, undercutting any competition and forcing them out of business.

    But again, its the individuals fault for all this ...

  • Personally I think 8% of your wealth is a big number.

    His wealth can fluctuate by more than that in a day.It's also, to a large amount, paper wealth - Amazon stock. If he times it right, it's an interesting accounting game with no negative effect on him that he'll notice. Potential wealth turned into real cash, funding its own capital gains tax levy while also, because charity donation, reducing the tax he does have to pay on his official Amazon salary and any other stock trading and investing he does. His salary, by the way, has been fixed at $81K for the last two decades, not because he's a modest man but because his effective wealth dwarfs that by so much that it's not important.

    Bezos and his small peer group have taken us back to the robber baron era of the 19th century. Those guys also liked to build the occasional hospital, while steamrollering over a poverty-stricken workforce that vastly outnumbered the number of people their "benevolence" could help.

    He's doing this for him, for his own defence, and he can easily afford it. He can't do it every day or every year, but he doesn't have to. He already got what he wanted from you.

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