Amazon's Monopoly of the tech industry is ruining the US economy

Buttflapper@lemmy.world to Technology@lemmy.world – 723 points –

I wanted to get printer photo paper for my printer, a Canon. I went to Walmart, They had nothing. Went to Target, they had one pack of photo paper and it was crazy expensive, so I went to micro center. That one was just as expensive. So finally I went back to Amazon, which I was trying to avoid, and saw the price 25 to 40% lower than anywhere I had been. Literally everything that I was looking for, I could find within seconds. Not even Best buy has even close to the amount of inventory or variety, even when you're shopping online....

Therefore, I think Amazon has a literal monopoly in the tech industry right now, you're literally forced to buy from them, because unless you have the money and financial fortitude to protest with your wallet, you're going to be buying from them. There's no other choice. They have so aggressively and dominantly taken over the supply chain market that no other tech company can currently compete with them in any aspect at all. You will be paying 40 to 50% more on everything by cutting out Amazon, and no one has the money for that anymore unless you're upper middle class or above

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I put some of the blame on retailers as well. Retail stores just don't want to carry inventory anymore, especially tech-focused ones with many of those just turning into glorified showrooms. I don't know how many times I've heard some version of: "Sorry, we don't have that in stock but we can bring it in for you."

We needed a short length of garden hose here for the house so I went to two hardware stores and one garden centre looking for one. Nothing. Not even in their dedicated gardening sections. I had to order it off Amazon. A goddamn garden hose.

Amazon has done a lot of damage for sure but retail is suffering from several self-inflicted wounds too. Home Depot, for example, is a multi-billion dollar corporation and even they have a weaker retail presence now. That's not Amazon's fault.

Harbor Freight.

When you absolutely need something to work presicely once between the day you buy it and the day you’re late for jury duty.

I've gotten some surprisingly long lasting gems there, but you can never be sure. Like you said, I've also gotten a number "single use" tools from Harbor Freight. Overall though, it's almost always been worth it.

Most homeowners don’t need better than HF. If you start getting into more sophisticated equipment their quality can be really problematic but for all the basic stuff a homeowner needs: hammer and pliers, HF is one-stop.

From there you have to be careful, but gems can be found. I’ve been using their 120V 2HP dust collector in my wood shop for years now and it is an insane value for a decent machine.

Yup. Hand tools are generally pretty safe, anything with a motor is sus. And honestly, I respect my health enough to not buy safety equipment there (3M is the way to go most of the time).

They don’t want to carry inventory because Amazon doesn’t. The prices are higher because vendors are contractually obligated to sell on Amazon at their lowest price. So retailers, with a need to have a physical presence and having to buy at more or less the same price a product is available for on Amazon, get fucked. Their only hope is vendors who make a “different” product to sell at other outlets. An example of what I mean is, Poppi soda sells for $20/12 pack on Amazon. They sell a 15 pack at Costco for the same price. Because it’s a “different” product they are not in breach of contract.

Check your local mom and pop hardware store if you have one! I had to get a feeder hose this summer as well, and the only place I found it was a local family owned hardware store.

Go on Facebook and ask your local buy nothing group. Check thrift stores line the habitat for humanity restore. Farm and home store like fleet farm/ farm and fleet. Plenty of ways to get ahold of something like that without buying new.

That requires Facebook

I'll stick to not buying things instead

I wonder how much investment it drives in Facebook to be a user who registered under an assumed name on a VPN with an ad blocker enabled.

Unfortunately, probably some.

I feel you. Fortunately, in my area there's a very popular classifieds section at one of the local newspapers, so I can stick to my guns avoiding Facebook.

So check local newspaper classifieds, Craigslist, and maybe your local library (you never know if they organize swaps).

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