Common Dreams – June 16, 2017
Written by Andrea Germanos
Online behemoth Amazon is acquiring Austin-based Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion, the companies announced Friday—a development that watchdogs say will pad billionaire pockets and spell bad news for consumers.
Jim Cramer, host of CNBC’s “Mad Money,” expects the deal to make Amazon, headed by Jeff Bezos, “dominate food within the next two years.” He added: “I’m taking down numbers for everybody who sells food. Everybody. Because you can’t compete [with] Amazon. They will not let you compete.”
It’s already “rattled the retail sector.” …
A report last year from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance outlined the “extending tentacles” of Amazon, which “controls the underlying infrastructure of the economy.”
The company’s already increased dominance, the report warned, is “eroding opportunity and fueling inequality, and it’s concentrating power in ways that endanger competition, community life, and democracy.”
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