Amazon should learn from its "Fair Share" Pie Cutter.

Amazon just doesn't get it. Just like other big corporations, they seem to think they can get away with tax-dodging and other predatory business practices. They're wrong, and today — Tuesday, April 3rd — we’re going to let them know with a message they won't be able to miss. Amazon says it wants feedback and we will give them what they asked for:  honest customer reviews about how Amazon as a "pie cutter" is cutting the pie so that only the 1% get any pie!

Amazon sells this pie cutter that’s supposed to make perfectly even slices, so everyone can get their fair share. We don't know anything about this product, but we know for sure that Amazon doesn't like to play fair so it’s possible Amazon is putting the squeeze on this company as well.

Joining our online action is easy. If you've bought something from Amazon before you can write up your own blistering "review" of the pie cutter that actually speaks to Amazon's tax-dodging and other predatory business practices they use to avoid paying their fair share:

1. If you've purchased something from Amazon before, you can just go to this page to find the symbolic pie cutter.

2. Get creative and have some fun writing the review of the pie cutter. (If you’ve never bought anything from Amazon before, no big deal, you can share the reviews that your fellow activists wrote.)

3. Brag and spread the word to your family and friends! Here's the link to the reviews page you can share on Facebook, Twitter, and by email:

Click here to write the "review" of Amazon through this "Fair Share Pie Cutter."

Here are more example reviews to get you inspired. You're welcome to just copy & paste them too!

• I want my fair share of pie. Corporations like Amazon not paying their fair share cuts into public services and education.
• Corporations like Amazon should pay their fair share – it’s as American as apple pie.
• Corporations like Amazon paying their fair share – is it a pie in the sky idea? Not if the 99% stand up to Amazon and other behemoths. Enough is enough.
• Yeah I bought this pie cutter thinking that it was gonna cut the pie evenly, ya know so everyone gets a fair share. Well, come to find out that Amazon doesn't even follow the example of one of their products. They paid an effective 5.5% federal tax rate by giving stock options to executives. What?? How is that fair?

Amazon’s new business model: writing laws?

by Nate Jackson We know that Amazon wants to expand its influence. It is no longer content with mistreating warehouse workers or dodging its tax responsibilities, now it wants to create laws directly or at least throw money at an organization that does so.

Amazon supports a shadowy corporate front group called the American Legislative Exchange Council simply known as ALEC. It is an organization that writes “model legislation” for our elected officials while wining and dining them at expensive “educational” vacations at three annual conferences a year.

Amazon started supporting ALEC last year and has already proven a valuable member. According to The Center for Media and Democracy, Amazon’s director of US State Public Policy, Braden Cox, spoke at a workshop hosted by ALEC around E-Commerce and E-Taxes. Interesting side note, the workshop was primarily an instruction manual on how Amazon could outmaneuver its main Goliath sized rival Walmart by manipulating the tax codes for its own benefit. They don’t want the special tax breaks for which they lobby to go to just any old corporation after all.

ALEC claims that it is a group of public and private institutions, but it really gets most of its money from big corporations that read as a who’s who of corporate tax dodgers and influence peddlers: Amazon, FedEx, Walmart, Bank of America, and Exxon Mobil amongst others. The companies invest in ALEC and they get our elected officials to shop legislation that balloons corporate profits at the expense of not only democracy, but often worker rights. ALEC has written hundreds of bills that put the needs of their corporate sponsors ahead of the needs of workers and the spirit of a democracy that is supposed to be “of the people.” ALEC has pushed legislation such as the “Living Wage Mandate Preemption Act.” This gift to big corporations tried to stop cities and state government from requiring living wages as part of a contractor negotiation. In essence they wanted to control government in its hiring practices to benefit big corporations at the expense of decent wages for workers.

ALEC has also pushed for legislation to weaken collective bargaining and deny workers from trying to better their work conditions. The recent rounds of anti-union bills introduced in Wisconsin and around the country can be traced to ALEC as it tries to weaken the workers' efforts to protect themselves from predatory employers.

Corporations should not be writing laws and the fact that Amazon supports an organization created to circumvent our democratic process is another red flag for the giant online retailer.

Instead of investing in an organization that gives Cliff’s Notes to lawmakers, Amazon should be investing in its workers, paying it fair share of taxes and ensuring that every job they create is a good job.

What if form followed function at Amazon.com?

If Amazon.com designed a headquarters campus that reflects the hidden truth of their corporate behavior, they would be proposing a design that reveals some inconvenient truths they’d rather keep secret. But we're bringing some questions to the city's design review meeting on Amazon's proposed South Lake Union headquarters expansion.

Note: all of these questions cite specific sections of the official Design Review guidelines for downtown development.

Will there be reserved parking for ambulances & car campers?

Working conditions were so rough at Amazon’s Pennsylvania warehouse that they stationed paramedics outside to treat workers who collapsed from heat exhaustion. Their Nevada warehouse is staffed by temporary migrant workers, some of whom camp in the desert during the holiday season. Is this what can we expect to be going on behind the scenes of their glossy corporate headquarters — or are these kinds of conditions only good enough for warehouse workers?

(Design Review Guideline D-4: "Provide appropriate signage".  If Amazon's corporate behavior requires parking outside their facilities for ambulances, they should be marked that way for all to see.)

Will the site feature an anaconda terrarium for inspiration?

Last year, Amazon offered a $5 bonus to shoppers who scanned a bar code at a real-world store and then bought the product online — a promotion that seemed designed to squeeze the life out of local community businesses. This is just the latest way Amazon has abused its position to put the squeeze on competitors and prey on independent publishers.

(Design Review Guideline D-3: "Provide elements that define the place." Putting predatory practices at the center of the building would define the place that is Amazon's corporate headquarters far better than the "awareness garden" they have proposed.)

Will the development include a dodgeball court in the tax department?

Amazon.com is one of the worst corporate tax dodgers in the country, paying an effective Federal income tax rate of only 5.5% — far less than the 35% rate set in law. They avoid paying their share by exploiting a loophole that gives them a tax break every time they hand out stock options to their top executives — and gives the rest of us that much in budget cuts.

(Design Review Guideline D-5: "Provide adequate lighting". We are concerned that Amazon does not want their corporate tax-dodging to come to light.)

Does Amazon plan broken mirrors in the executive suites?

A fully-functioning mirror is like an invitation for executives to pause and reflect on their work. But the glossy image of Amazon.com cannot hold when you reflect on how they do business and start to focus on the ugly inconvenient truths hidden behind the screens of the giant online retailer.

(Design Review Guideline B-1: "Respond to the neighborhood context". Preventing honest self-reflection is directly responsive to the context of a neighborhood which is designed and zoned to cater to Amazon's corporate growth.)

Another Amazon Secret?

by Nate Jackson A huge secret has been exposed: Amazon treats its warehouse workers poorly. True sweatshop work conditions where the temperatures race past 100 degrees and delivery quotas that demand breakneck speeds and a “safety last” mentality.  That’s bad enough, but did you hear about another secret of the giant online retailer? They dodge taxes. A lot.

Amazon’s effective federal tax rate was 5.5% in 2010 way below the standard rate of 35%, set by law, for big corporations. Amazon maneuvers itself out of paying its fair share amount by gaming the system through a financial scheme—giving bonuses to executives.

When Amazon spoons out bonuses to executives in the form of stock options sometimes worth millions, the giant retail company gets to claim those bonuses for tax breaks. Basically by stuffing their own pockets they can then recoup that cost without paying their fair share in taxes. It’s a two for one special that is perfectly legal, but perfectly immoral.

Amazon has an obligation to live up to its end of the bargain that we as a society make with corporations. We, the public, give big corporations: an educated workforce, customers and a business friendly infrastructure. We build roads, bridges, construct power grids and supply access to other basic needs of business. What we demand in return is pretty simple: good jobs, safe products or services and corporations paying their fair share in taxes. Amazon executives seem like they’ve forgotten the deal.

Amazon doesn’t just sidestep its Federal tax obligation, but it actively fights against collecting state sales taxes as well. The big kid on the online playground has bullied state officials in California, New Jersey and other states to get what it wants.

In California, Amazon threatened to pull its business out of the state unless they got a tax break. When that threat was called by the state legislature, the giant online retailer decided it didn’t want to play by the same rules as every other business. It decided to take the law into its own hands--it created and pushed a new initiative.

In New Jersey, Amazon demanded our lunch money in special tax holidays, in exchange for creating low wage, high turnover warehouse jobs. The giant online retailer, whose CEO is worth billions, is dangling low wage jobs in exchange for tax breaks that in the light of Amazon’s huge size, amounts to chump change.

Amazon is the largest online retailer in the world, worth billions. It’s sheer size is setting the norms and expectations of online business and if we, together, don’t do something it will continue to squeeze out profits no matter the cost. It will continue to use sweatshop conditions in its warehouses, wheel and deal for special tax breaks and if necessary create new laws to get out of paying its fair share.

We need to hold Amazon to live up to its obligation of giving back to the communities from which it benefits. The giant retailer should be paying its fair share in taxes, treating all of its workers well and competing for business in an ethical and straight-forward manner instead of playing by its own rules. The largest online store in the world needs to keep up their end of the bargain. Maybe they are just forgetful--time for a gentle reminder.

It's a Jungle in There: The secrets behind the screen of Amazon.com

By Nate Jackson Amazon.com is the largest online retailer in the world. The company based in Seattle has led the industry of online retailing in efficiency, selection and prices. It has shiny offices, tall buildings and young well dressed software engineers strolling about town, but it has secrets that it doesn’t want you to see. One of those secrets is how poorly it treats thousands of its workers right here in America.

We are not talking about the business suit employees you see rushing around South Lake Union or riding the Seattle Streetcar, the gift from Paul Allen.  We are talking about the backbone of any retailer, the warehouse workers who get the goods moving from your online shopping cart to your real world doorstep. You click, they work, and according to Amazon warehouse workers, often in horrible, terribly unsafe conditions.

Recent media investigations revealed that workers in the Amazon.com warehouses are under constant threat from management to meet exhausting productivity levels while trying to deal with long hours, unsafe work sites, including high heat and a lack of training and safety/lifting gear, unforgiving concrete flooring, low pay and few, if any, benefits such as a day off.

Amazon warehouse workers are treated like disposable employees, often employed through "temp" firms in schemes designed to ensure that these workers receive second-class or worse pay, training or benefits, making it extremely clear that Amazon has no regard for these workers when compared to its  bottom line. This is wrong.

A warehouse in Pennsylvania literally became a “sweat shop” because the company would not buy air conditioning even when temperatures spiked past 100 degrees in the boiling summer heat. It wasn’t until the media brought to the public's attention that workers were collapsing from heat exhaustion, and caravans of ambulances were literally being parked outside the warehouse to carry collapsing workers to the hospital, that Amazon.com took action. The public pressure that resulted from these investigations finally forced Amazon into installing air conditioning.

An Amazon.com warehouse in Nevada hires temporary workers for the holiday season and offers an unusual "perk" to the transitory workforce: the chance to camp out in the desert heat on the side of an interstate highway.

Amazon uses threats of termination as its motivation to warehouse workers. Quotas are king while workers hustle from station to station dodging forklifts and other machinery, at their peril,  to keep the exhausting pace set by the management. If one worker doesn’t work at breakneck speed, Amazon just gets another one.

Amazon doesn't appear to question its production quotas, even when workers are fleeing in droves from exhaustion: the only priority for Amazon is the speed that the packages are moved at the lowest possible price. The cost to its workforce, from the low pay, the unsafe conditions, or the rocketing turnover, is clearly of no importance. The quota is all.

What makes all of these reports about Amazon's secret homegrown sweatshops is that it's not like Amazon is forced into these practices because it is struggling to survive. Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos is worth billions of dollars. Amazon has been so lucrative for him that he is putting together a space shuttle to fly tourists into space. Yet, Amazon treats its workers to desert heat, long work hours, limited breaks, low pay and unsafe and unkind production quotas designed for machines not humans? If Amazon’s CEO can afford to fling millionaires into space for a weekend holiday it can afford to treat its workers right.

The 99% to Olympia: No more big bank tax cuts

by Nate Jackson Hundreds of silent protesters lined the halls beneath the state capitol dome.

We had dollar bills strapped over our mouths and watched as Washington State Legislators slinked by on their way to a party. It was hard to understand what they were celebrating. They had just rammed through a budget that slashes essential services while doling out more tax breaks to big banks. Activists and concerned community members from Washington CAN!, Fuse and Working Washington came to Olympia to do something about it.

This last week we have been in Olympia to tell our legislators that we won’t stand for a budget that does not reflect our values. Budgets are a moral statement. What we value, we should fund. We value quality education, affordable healthcare and good jobs for those that want to work. We reject continuing giveaways to big banks and tax breaks for the 1%. This budget passed by the Senate doesn’t reflect those values, and we can’t let it stand.

On Tuesday we had a sit in.

One of the main architects of the state senate all slash budget was State Senator Zarelli. So we went with dozens of people to send him a message: stop balancing the budget on the backs of the poor. Stop playing politics with people’s lives.

We sat in Senator Zarelli's office sharing our stories on how his all-cuts-all-the-time budget would directly affect our lives, leaving us wounded.

Will is a man who has is disabled and cannot work. He previously owned and operated a successful software company, but the sudden onset of a mental disorder stripped him of the ability to work. He is taking medications to combat the symptoms.

"Without the disability lifeline I couldn't afford my meds," he said. "I'd be in prison or dead."

He talked to the cluster of media cameras about how Senator Zarelli's budget would quite possibly end his independence.

"I'm getting better with the meds. I hope to be able to work soon," he said. "But this budget...it will take me again to a place where I won't be able to come back."

Senator Zarelli’s office called the cops.

On Wednesday we tried to appeal to the allegiances of the state senators who voted for the strip-healthcare-fund-big-banks-budget. We pretended our schools, clinics and universities were named after big banks.

Wearing baseball caps with names written on them like "Wells Fargo Elementary," "Citigroup Childcare," and "JP Morgan Chase Clinic," we asked our legislators if we could get funding now that we looked like their favorite constituents.

Senator Sheldon checked the “yes” box for big banks when it came to his budget vote, but he ran away from us when we asked him for funding now that we were big bank wannabes. He mumbled something under his breath and rushed off ducking around a corner. He was pretty fast.

Senator Rodney Tom, who also said yes to big bank loopholes, decided to talk to us in his office for quite a while. Too bad his argument was fundamentally flawed.

"When you negotiate you don't say 'here's my final offer right from the beginning," he said. "I trust the leadership; Murray and Zarelli will work this out. They know where I stand. Those things will get fixed."

Let's translate that from politician to English.

Imagine a bully in the playground is throwing his weight around. He is pushing and shoving and sees a good-natured kid waving at him. The bully strides over and demands five dollars. The kid, following Senator Tom's logic, should give the bully five dollars and then politely beg for one of them back.

Voting for a budget that goes against the values you “hold dear” doesn’t make any sense at all no matter how you spin it.

The state senate had shown where its values lay reaffirming their allegiance to the one percent and big banks by dishing out special tax breaks that annually run into the billions. Their budget cut deep: eliminating the disability lifeline, cutting environmental protection funding and stripping tens of millions from our already threadbare schools.

We value funding essential services like education and healthcare by having everyone paying their fair share. The big banks have taken enough bailouts and tax breaks. It’s time our state senators stop pretending the big banks need more public cash when services we actually care about are on the chopping block.

It’s time for the big banks and the 1% to pay their fair share. Budget problem solved.

The 99% greet the “President of the 1%."

by Nate Jackson

Outside of the Meydenbauer Center in downtown Bellevue, more than a dozen of us laid down on the cement as a red carpet was rolled over us. We formed a human red carpet, inviting the 1% gathered for Mitt Romney's big fundraiser to literally walk all over us. After all they’ve been gaming the system buying tax cuts for the rich, shipping jobs overseas and cutting budgets of public services, for so long that we thought it would be nice if they had to do it face to face for once.

Just then a black, stretch limousine pulled up to the curb and three men in business suits stepped out and were taken aback that the 99% had shown up to the exclusive event. They rushed inside.

We had gathered outside of Bellevue City Hall on a blustery winter afternoon to protest the 1% flashing their cash for another 1%er. The “President of the 1%” Mitt Romney wants to lower taxes for the rich, cut down corporate tax rates and put more money back into the pockets of the folks who are doing just fine. The rich and the big corporations don’t need any more tax cuts. They need to pay their fair share.

Hundreds strong accompanied by a trombone, flute and buzzing vuvuzelas, we marched through downtown Bellevue carrying a blown up version of the Constitution covered in corporate logos. We pointed out some of the big corporations that over the past three years had paid nearly nothing in federal income taxes.

We then marched the circle at the exclusive “Shops at The Bravern,” which feature such 1% stores as Neiman Marcus and Louis Vuitton, to let them know that if you can afford to shop here then at the very least you can pay your fair share.

The suits walking into the Meydenbauer Center were there to attend a $2500 fundraiser for Mitt “1%” Romney. They wanted to wave their money around and try to buy themselves a president, but they had to work their way through a throng of the 99%.  Inside the venue Romney was asking for money for the privilege of getting a photo with him. We offered a picture with our own version of Mitt Romney, a cardboard cutout holding a “Of the 1%, by the 1%, for the 1%” sign, for free—they declined.

We came out to the 1% fundraiser because we will no longer put up with the short-sighted economic plans of the 1% and big corporations. The economy shouldn’t be aimed solely at enriching the super rich and heaping more and more profits on big corporations at the expense of the 99%. The economy needs to work for the rest of us. We need good jobs that treat us fairly and a government that isn’t bought and sold by the 1%, but works for us.

Let's roll out a human red carpet for Mitt 1% Romney

The 99% will be on hand when Mitt 1% Romney rolls into town. We want the richest 1% and the big corporations to pay their fair share. On March 1st, members of the 1% will gather for a $2500-per-photo fundraiser at the Meydenbauer Center in Bellevue in support of Mitt Romney’s campaign to lower their (and his) taxes even more.

Let's tell the 1% how we feel. Join us in Bellevue to greet the President of the 1%.

This fundraiser is a political event of the 1%, by the 1%, and for the 1%. It's a moment when some of the richest people in our region will be gathered in one of the richest zip codes in the country to raise money for one of the richest presidential candidates in history — all to support his campaign for even lower taxes on the rich and big corporations.

Thursday, March 1, 2012 4:00: Gather at Bellevue City Hall (450 110th Ave NE) & march to Meydenbauer Center (11100 NE 6th Street) 5:00: Greet Mitt Romney & his 1% funders with a human red carpet 6:00: Special 99% photo opportunity

Protestors to welcome Mitt Romney to Bellevue with a human red carpet

***MEDIA ADVISORY FOR MARCH 1, 2012***CONTACT: Sage Wilson,  sage@workingwa.org

Raising voices against government of the 1%, by the 1%, and for the 1%

On March 1st, Mitt Romney and his fellow members of the 1% will be welcomed to their $2500-per-photo fundraising event in Bellevue with a human red carpet that's rolled out directly over workers, students, unemployed people, and others.

Our human red carpet will dramatize the ugly truth behind this gathering: the 1% are converging in Bellevue to fund a political agenda that's about walking all over the rights and interests of the 99% while offering lower taxes on big corporations and the rich. It's a vision of government of the 1%, by the 1%, and for the 1% — no matter the cost to the rest of us.

When: Thursday, March 1, 2012, 4 pm - 7 pm

Where: Gather at Bellevue City Hall at 4 pm for a march arriving at Meydenbauer Center at 5 pm. Meydenbauer Center is located at 11100 NE 6th Street.

What: Human red carpet to greet Mitt Romney in Bellevue, plus a rally, a march, and a special 99% photo opportunity.

The 99% will be offering this special red-carpet welcome to Mitt Romney and his supporters because their $2500-per-photo fundraiser is an event where some of the richest people in our region will gather in one of the richest zip codes in the country to invest money in support of one of the richest presidential candidates in history — and his agenda of lowering taxes on the rich even further. Romney's recent proposal to pay for a 20% tax giveaway to the rich with big cuts to Social Security, Medicare, and other programs is just the latest example of how the 1% are using their money to walk all over the rights and interests of the people of the 99%.

When the 1% contribute money towards lower taxes on their own wealth, it may be a good investment for them, but it's a raw deal for the rest of the us. And it raises the question: is this a democracy, or a hedge fund?

Working Washington is bringing people together to fight for a fair economy. We are speaking out to demand that our political leaders do what it takes to invest in good jobs and move the economy forward. We need jobs — not cuts to funding for education, health care, and other services. For more information, visit WorkingWA.org

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The Port of Seattle should live up to its responsibility

by Nate Jackson Living check to check is hard enough. Giving up those checks because an employer is mistreating you is even harder.  But that’s exactly what Seattle port truck drivers did this month.

The Seattle port truck drivers three-week walkout brought them some big wins, but it also showed how deep the problems run at the Port of Seattle.

The Port of Seattle is our port. The people of King County own the land where our port operates, and the people of King County elect the port commissioners who set up the rules. But lately the Port has failed to do its job. The commissioners who are supposed to oversee our port are looking the other way while the big companies take advantage of truck drivers, airport workers, and many others.

Forgetting its roots?

The Port was created in 1911 to oversee the seaport and eventually the airport. It was designed to counteract the abuses that big companies were hurling on workers at the time. Back then, people were not able to get their products moved without jumping through hoops and paying heavy fees to the for-profit companies that had a stranglehold on the emerging shipping industry.

The people of the region waged a long organizing fight and eventually won a historic vote to create the publicly owned and operated Port. The idea was that a publicly-controlled Port could streamline operations, develop a strong regional economy, and protect workers from big business abuses.

The Port has in fact played a central role in the region’s development, and the jobs that the seaport and airport create are vital to our region. Some would even call the port the lifeblood of our local economy.

But the Port needs to do more to live up to its mission and do right by the people who work at our seaport and airport. The Port of Seattle’s own Office of Social Responsibility says in its mission statement:

"The Port's Office of Social Responsibility engages stakeholders to inspire commitment and ensure that all port business actions are conducted within a framework of socially responsible values such as fairness, inclusion, openness and economic development for all."

As the Port truck drivers helped reveal, right now the Port of Seattle is simply not doing enough to make sure that the jobs created by our port are good jobs that provide living wages, reliable schedules and the ability for workers to organize for better working conditions.

Every job at our port should be a good job. It’s a fight that port truck drivers can win, and it’s a fight that airport workers and others can win too. It’s a fight for basic fairness, and the Port of Seattle should be on our side.