Amazon

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Amazon.com, Inc. is an American multinational technology company based in Seattle, Washington, which focuses on e-commerce, cloud computing, digital streaming, and artificial intelligence. It is considered one of the Big Five companies in the U.S. information technology industry, along with Google, Apple Inc., Microsoft, and Facebook.[1][2] The company has been referred to as "one of the most influential economic and cultural forces in the world", as well as the world's most valuable brand.[3]

History

Amazon was founded by Jeff Bezos in Bellevue, Washington, on July 5, 1994. The company started as an online marketplace for books but expanded to sell electronics, software, video games, apparel, furniture, food, toys, and jewelry. In 2015, Amazon surpassed Walmart as the most valuable retailer in the United States by market capitalization.[4] In 2017, Amazon acquired Whole Foods Market for US$13.4 billion, which substantially increased its footprint as a physical retailer.[5] In 2018, it's two-day delivery service, Amazon Prime, surpassed 100 million subscribers worldwide.[6]

Amazon Tweet about solidarity to Black community, June, 1 2020 Source: Amazon Official Twitter

Commitment to Anti-Racist

“We believe Black lives matter,” reads Amazon blog post published on June 3rd 2020. Amazon committed to donating “a total of $10 million to organizations that are working to bring about social justice and improve the lives of Black and African Americans.” Amazon’s Black Employee Network will also be given a grant to “fund local organizations that support education and racial equality initiatives in communities across the country where our employees live and work.” Not only donating $10 million to organizations that are working to bring about social justice and improve the lives of Black and African-Americans, Amazon also launched an employee match program giving the organizations an additional $17 million for a total investment of $27 million.[7]

On June 9th 2020, Amazon updated the post to say it would match employee donations of up to $10,000 per employee to the 12 organizations listed in the blog.[8]

"Together we stand in solidarity with the Black community - our employees, customers, and partners - in the fight against systemic racism and injustice", wrote by Amazon back in June 1, 2020 in it's tweet.[9]

The Seattle-based company is also removing non-inclusive language from their documentation and software. Words such as "blacklist," "whitelist," "master," "slave" and others will be eliminated.[10]

Diversity in Workplace

November 2020, Amazon announced it's plan to double the number of Black leaders in it's senior ranks. The e-commerce giant said it plans to hire and promote employees for vice president and director roles across the company. “At Amazon, we’re constantly learning and innovating – and our long-term efforts in diversity and inclusion are no different," Amazon said. "As part of this work, we are setting aggressive goals in our ongoing effort to be a top employer for Black employees." Amazon plans to promote employees within the organization through the help of the company's skill development programs for Black, Latinx and Native Americans, such as the Black Employee Network Executive Leadership Development Program. Amazon is also requiring all its employees across the globe to take diversity and inclusion training.[10]

As reported on Amazon global gender and U.S. race and ethnicity data as of December 31, 2019, over 59% of Amazon's managerial roles around the world were held by White people, while Black people accounted for just 8.3% of those positions. Overall, Black employees made up roughly 26.5% of Amazon's 400,000 workforce in 2019.[11] In 25 years, Amazon has had only two black directors in it’s otherwise all white board. According to data from 2014, 85% of Amazon’s Black employees work in warehouses.[12]

Warehouse Protests Leads to Racism

The company’s track record with non-white employee organizers has also proven to be in conflict with it's public statements regarding racial equity, said Amazon Employees for Climate Justice - a group of employee activists at the company. “Actions speak louder than words,” the group said, citing Amazon’s treatment of Chris Smalls, a black activist who was fired for organizing employees to protest against unsafe coronavirus-related conditions in Amazon warehouses.

“Amazon’s words mean nothing when they are firing black employees organizing for better working conditions, when leadership planned racist smears against Chris Smalls, calling him ‘not smart or articulate’, when they deny our call for racial equity assessments in their business decisions and eliminating the environmental racism of its pollution.”[13]

References

  1. Ritholt, Barry.The Big Four of Technology. Bloomberg. 31 October 2017. Retrieved January 23, 2021.
  2. Rivas, Teresa.Ranking The Big Four Tech Stocks: Google Is No. 1, Apple Comes In Last. Barrons. 22 August 2017. Retrived January 23, 2021.
  3. Kantar. Accelerated Growth Sees Amazon Crowned 2019's BrandZ™ Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brand. PR Newswire. 11 June 2019. Retrieved January 23, 2021.
  4. Streitfeld, David; Kantor, Jodi. Jeff Bezos and Amazon Employees Join Debate Over Its Culture. The New York Times. 17 August 2015. Retrieved January 23, 2021.
  5. Wingfield, Nick; de la Merced, Michael J. Amazon to Buy Whole Foods for $13.4 Billion. The New York Times. June 16, 2017. Retrieved January 23, 2021.
  6. Amazon. Retrieved January 23, 2021.
  7. Manfredi, Lucas. Amazon to double company's Black leadership over next two years, ensure "inclusive language in software coding”. Fox Business. 3 November 2020. Retrieved January 25, 2021.
  8. Peters, Jay. BIG TECH COMPANIES ARE RESPONDING TO GEORGE FLOYD IN A WAY THEY NEVER DID FOR MICHAEL BROWN. The Verge. 12 June. 2020. Retrieved January 25, 2021.
  9. Amazon Tweet. Amazon Official Twitter. 1 June 2020. Retrieved January 25, 2021.
  10. 10.0 10.1 Marcos, Coral Murphy. Amazon plans to double representation of Black VPs, directors in 2020 and 2021. USA Today. 5 November 2020. Retrieved January 25, 2021.
  11. Amazon Staff. Our workforce data. aboutamazon.com. Retrieved January 25, 2021.
  12. Brémond, Anaïs. Racism in big tech: Amazon workers speak up. welcometothejungle.com. 8 July 2020. Retrieved January 25, 2021.
  13. Paul, Kari. Amazon says 'Black Lives Matter'. But the company has deep ties to policing. The Guardian. 9 June 2020. Retrieved January 25, 2021.