Amazon Will Pay $0 in Taxes on Multi-Billion Dollar Profits

Amazon will pay $0 in taxes on the multi-billion dollar profits it made last year, according to a report from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP).

Via the ITEP report:

Amazon, the ubiquitous purveyor of two-day delivery of just about everything, nearly doubled its profits to $11.2 billion in 2018 from $5.6 billion the previous year and, once again, didn’t pay a single cent of federal income taxes.

The company’s newest corporate filing reveals that, far from paying the statutory 21 percent income tax rate on its U.S. income in 2018, Amazon reported a federal income tax rebate of $129 million. For those who don’t have a pocket calculator handy, that works out to a tax rate of negative 1 percent. The fine print of Amazon’s income tax disclosure shows that this achievement is partly due to various unspecified “tax credits” as well as a tax break for executive stock options.

This isn’t the first year that the cyber-retailing giant has avoided federal taxes. Last year, the company paid no federal corporate income taxes on $5.6 billion in U.S. income.

Amazon was created in the 1990s by Jeff Bezos, who is currently the richest person in the world. Bezos also owns the Washington Post, which has become one of the most vocal critics of President Trump since he ran for office.

The web giant has achieved a commanding position in online retail, and is also moving into physical retail with its takeover of grocery chain Whole Foods.

It is particularly well-known as a book retailer. Amazon accounts for nearly 64 percent of online physical book sales and 83 percent of e-book sales in the U.S. As I reported earlier in the year, the tech giant is abusing this market power to act as a digital book-burner, banning books on the basis of their political viewpoint.

Are you an insider at Amazon or any other corporation who wants to confidentially reveal wrongdoing or political bias at your company? Reach out to Allum Bokhari at his his encrypted, 2FA-protected email address allumbokhari@protonmail.com. 

Allum Bokhari is the senior technology correspondent at Breitbart News.