Labor Notes: Lessons from the tax-Amazon movement in Seattle
Alphabet workers news
Media and organizing project Labor Notes published an article on July 23 with some lessons learned from Seattle's Tax Amazon movement, which recently scored a significant win when the Seattle City Council passed a large-company payroll tax, just two years after the Council caved to Amazon and repealed a tax intended to fight homelessness.
Amazon paid $0 in U.S. federal income tax in 2018, despite earning $11B in profits. CNBC noted in a 2019 article that "Amazon’s low tax bill mainly stemmed from the Republican tax cuts of 2017..."
Some extracts from the Labor Notes article appear below.
- Bruce
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labornotes.org/2020/07/lessons-amazon-tax-victory-seattle
Lessons from the Amazon Tax Victory in Seattle
Pressed by a relentless working class movement, the Seattle City Council on July 6 adopted a first-time-ever tax on Amazon and other big businesses that will bring in at least $214 million a year to fund affordable housing, Green New Deal projects, and union jobs.
The win was a stunning turn of events: just two years earlier, Amazon, the Chamber of Commerce, the corporate-backed mayor, and several business-oriented labor leaders forced the city council to rescind a newly adopted tax on big business of only $47 million a year.
The dramatic victory shows how workers and activists can recover from a bitter defeat and organize successfully to beat austerity...
Seattle’s Amazon tax fight, spanning more than two years, offers lessons for activists everywhere battling against austerity and for jobs and worker rights:
1. It’s about power.
Politicians, even many who call themselves progressive, often frame political struggles as consensus-building exercises in which contending parties “come to the table” to hammer out differences and reach acceptable compromises, usually behind closed doors, away from the movement.
The Amazon Tax prevailed because organizers mobilized for a fight, continually framing the struggle as one between workers and big business. They resisted the calls from many quarters, including some progressive community leaders, to not “antagonize” Amazon, to tone down their campaign, and to negotiate a compromise.
Because the political fight is about opposing interests—just like in union negotiations—what workers win is always a function of the balance of power at the moment...
2. Play offense.
Corporate executives and political leaders, reinforced by the mainstream media, continually try to tamp down worker hopes. They brand worker demands as “unrealistic” and “impractical” while insisting on austerity. The Tax Amazon organizers succeeded in electrifying working people and building a powerful movement by doing the opposite: they raised expectations, with a powerful vision of taxing Amazon to fund affordable housing, the Green New Deal, and public services.
3. Build a democratic, grassroots organization.
Building on the momentum of the massive grassroots 2019 re-election campaign, Tax Amazon built a strong, democratic movement...
That democratic process built a resilient campaign, able to withstand pressures and attacks from the political establishment.
4. In the political arena, as in union bargaining, you need a powerful weapon.
The Tax Amazon Action Conference made a critical strategic decision in January, one that proved decisive: rather than rely on the city council, they would simultaneously advance both legislation and a ballot initiative drive.
This was the equivalent of workers taking a strike vote: what the political establishment feared most was an expensive pitched battle in November over a ballot initiative that pitted workers against big business.
5. Build movements that link our fights together.
Tax Amazon organizers recognized that racial, economic, housing, and climate justice issues are linked. The legislation and the initiative both called for the affordable housing to be built with union labor, with priority-hire and apprenticeship opportunities for people living in the neighborhoods where the homes are to be built...
6. It’s never over.
... Now the movement will be challenged to force Seattle’s pro-corporate mayor, who was elected with a record donation from Amazon, to fully implement the new law. That will require continued organizing and action. Just like a union contract, the Tax Amazon legislation will need to be enforced through continued collective organizing and demonstrations of worker power.