The Cost of Free Shipping by Jake Alimahomed-Wilson;Ellen Reese;

Author:Jake Alimahomed-Wilson;Ellen Reese;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Book Network Int'l Limited trading as NBN International (NBNi)

PRELUDE

Even as its economic footprint grew, Amazon was for a long time remarkably absent from Seattle’s civic life—a reflection, perhaps, of the libertarian leanings of its founder and CEO. In 2012, Amazon came under heavy criticism for this lackluster performance,5 and soon after began making tentative forays into local politics and philanthropy.

A look at Amazon’s electoral spending in Washington State reveals that its first significant contribution—$5,000 to CASE (Civic Alliance for a Sound Economy), the Political Action Committee of the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce—took place in 2013.6 Over the next few years, Amazon made contributions of $25,000 or more to a handful of ballot measure campaigns, including several to fund transit service and transportation improvements—through regressive taxes, naturally. In 2016, Amazon began a partnership with the non-profit Mary’s Place, donating space to shelter homeless families. At the same time Amazon came under fire for contracting with an anti-union security firm, not doing enough to improve the diversity of its tech workforce, and straining Seattle’s housing market and urban infrastructure.7

The real turning point came in 2017. In the wake of Donald Trump’s victory in the 2016 presidential election, a coalition calling itself “Trump-Proof Seattle” came together to channel the general outrage into local action on tax reform. Emboldened by an energetic campaign, in July 2017, the Seattle City Council unanimously passed a tax on high-income households, aware that the measure would face legal challenges. The Transit Riders Union co-convened this coalition, due to our interest in finding more equitable means to pay for public services like transit. Although the Washington State Supreme Court refused to review several legal rulings against Seattle’s income tax in 2020, those rulings were hotly contested both in and out of court. A mayoral election was also underway, and skyrocketing rents and the deepening homelessness crisis were topics of intense debate. Sensing the activist mood, Amazon must have felt nervous—enough to contribute to CASE an unprecedented $365,000 to secure the election of now-Mayor Jenny Durkan over several rivals, all of whom were more critical than she of the company’s role in Seattle.

Amazon was right to worry. By autumn 2017, the grassroots wing of Trump-Proof Seattle had reinvented itself as Housing For All, and propelled onto the political stage a plan to address homelessness through a tax on large businesses. The original proposal, which would have netted a modest $25 million annually, quickly won support from homeless service providers and one major labor union, SEIU Healthcare 1199NW, whose members include workers at one of Seattle’s largest shelters. The Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce, the Downtown Seattle Association, and other business groups lobbied against the measure. In November 2017, after heated city budget deliberations punctuated by overflowing public hearings, occupations, and die-ins,8 the city council narrowly rejected the tax, but voted unanimously to form a task force charged with crafting a more considered proposal in the new year.

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