SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
Amazon Extends Tentacles Further With Purchase of Whole Foods
'This is extreme consolidation of the food system in action, which will lead to higher prices, fewer choices for consumers, and bigger profits for billionaires like its owner, Jeff Bezos,' says Wenonah Hauter of Food & Water Watch
Jun 16, 2017
Online behemoth Amazon is acquiring Austin-based Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion, the companies announced Friday--a development that watchdogs say will pad billionaire pockets and spell bad news for consumers.
Jim Cramer, host of CNBC's "Mad Money," expects the deal to make Amazon, headed by Jeff Bezos, "dominate food within the next two years." He added: "I'm taking down numbers for everybody who sells food. Everybody. Because you can't compete [with] Amazon. They will not let you compete."
It's already "rattled the retail sector."
Indeed, writes Bloomberg, the acquisition "sends shockwaves across both the online and brick-and-mortar industries. Grocery chains plunged on Friday--Wal-Mart Stores Inc. fell as much as 7.1 percent, while Kroger Co. tumbled 17 percent--as investors worried that woes will mount in the increasingly cutthroat industry."
(Amazon's stock, meanwhile, was up 3.3 percent--making the acquisition "essentially free" for the online giant.)
According to Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food & Water Watch, "Too few companies already exert outsized influence over our food choices. This is extreme consolidation of the food system in action, which will lead to higher prices, fewer choices for consumers, and bigger profits for billionaires like its owner, Jeff Bezos."
"Consumers already face substantially reduced options for grocery shopping because of a wave of mega-mergers that have swept the supermarket and grocery manufacturing industry. In recent years, more than 4,000 grocery stores were joined under two owners after the Albertsons-Safeway and Ahold-Delhaize mergers. The proposed Amazon-Whole Foods deal only further curtails consumer choices and raise prices," she said.
A report last year from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance outlined the "extending tentacles" of Amazon, which "controls the underlying infrastructure of the economy."
The company's already increased dominance, the report warned, is "eroding opportunity and fueling inequality, and it's concentrating power in ways that endanger competition, community life, and democracy."
Speaking to that control, Barry C. Lynn, director of the Open Markets Program at New America, stated Friday that the "private corporation already dominates every corner of online commerce, and uses its power to set terms and prices for many of the most important products Americans buy or sell to one another. Now Amazon is exploiting that advantage to take over physical retail."
"But this is just part of America's Amazon Problem," he added. "The corporation wields vastly too much power over America's markets for books and music, and is fast consolidating control over other key flows of information and ideas."
Both Hauter and Lynn said regulators should block the acquisition.
If it does get approval, Whole Foods co-founder John Mackey will remain its CEO, and the company will keep its headquarters in Austin.
An Urgent Message From Our Co-Founder
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission has always been simple: To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It's never been this bad out there. And it's never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed, the threats we face are intensifying. We need your support now more than ever. We don't accept corporate advertising and never will. We don't have a paywall because we don't think people should be blocked from critical news based on their ability to pay. Everything we do is funded by the donations of readers like you. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Will you donate now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.
Online behemoth Amazon is acquiring Austin-based Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion, the companies announced Friday--a development that watchdogs say will pad billionaire pockets and spell bad news for consumers.
Jim Cramer, host of CNBC's "Mad Money," expects the deal to make Amazon, headed by Jeff Bezos, "dominate food within the next two years." He added: "I'm taking down numbers for everybody who sells food. Everybody. Because you can't compete [with] Amazon. They will not let you compete."
It's already "rattled the retail sector."
Indeed, writes Bloomberg, the acquisition "sends shockwaves across both the online and brick-and-mortar industries. Grocery chains plunged on Friday--Wal-Mart Stores Inc. fell as much as 7.1 percent, while Kroger Co. tumbled 17 percent--as investors worried that woes will mount in the increasingly cutthroat industry."
(Amazon's stock, meanwhile, was up 3.3 percent--making the acquisition "essentially free" for the online giant.)
According to Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food & Water Watch, "Too few companies already exert outsized influence over our food choices. This is extreme consolidation of the food system in action, which will lead to higher prices, fewer choices for consumers, and bigger profits for billionaires like its owner, Jeff Bezos."
"Consumers already face substantially reduced options for grocery shopping because of a wave of mega-mergers that have swept the supermarket and grocery manufacturing industry. In recent years, more than 4,000 grocery stores were joined under two owners after the Albertsons-Safeway and Ahold-Delhaize mergers. The proposed Amazon-Whole Foods deal only further curtails consumer choices and raise prices," she said.
A report last year from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance outlined the "extending tentacles" of Amazon, which "controls the underlying infrastructure of the economy."
The company's already increased dominance, the report warned, is "eroding opportunity and fueling inequality, and it's concentrating power in ways that endanger competition, community life, and democracy."
Speaking to that control, Barry C. Lynn, director of the Open Markets Program at New America, stated Friday that the "private corporation already dominates every corner of online commerce, and uses its power to set terms and prices for many of the most important products Americans buy or sell to one another. Now Amazon is exploiting that advantage to take over physical retail."
"But this is just part of America's Amazon Problem," he added. "The corporation wields vastly too much power over America's markets for books and music, and is fast consolidating control over other key flows of information and ideas."
Both Hauter and Lynn said regulators should block the acquisition.
If it does get approval, Whole Foods co-founder John Mackey will remain its CEO, and the company will keep its headquarters in Austin.
Online behemoth Amazon is acquiring Austin-based Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion, the companies announced Friday--a development that watchdogs say will pad billionaire pockets and spell bad news for consumers.
Jim Cramer, host of CNBC's "Mad Money," expects the deal to make Amazon, headed by Jeff Bezos, "dominate food within the next two years." He added: "I'm taking down numbers for everybody who sells food. Everybody. Because you can't compete [with] Amazon. They will not let you compete."
It's already "rattled the retail sector."
Indeed, writes Bloomberg, the acquisition "sends shockwaves across both the online and brick-and-mortar industries. Grocery chains plunged on Friday--Wal-Mart Stores Inc. fell as much as 7.1 percent, while Kroger Co. tumbled 17 percent--as investors worried that woes will mount in the increasingly cutthroat industry."
(Amazon's stock, meanwhile, was up 3.3 percent--making the acquisition "essentially free" for the online giant.)
According to Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food & Water Watch, "Too few companies already exert outsized influence over our food choices. This is extreme consolidation of the food system in action, which will lead to higher prices, fewer choices for consumers, and bigger profits for billionaires like its owner, Jeff Bezos."
"Consumers already face substantially reduced options for grocery shopping because of a wave of mega-mergers that have swept the supermarket and grocery manufacturing industry. In recent years, more than 4,000 grocery stores were joined under two owners after the Albertsons-Safeway and Ahold-Delhaize mergers. The proposed Amazon-Whole Foods deal only further curtails consumer choices and raise prices," she said.
A report last year from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance outlined the "extending tentacles" of Amazon, which "controls the underlying infrastructure of the economy."
The company's already increased dominance, the report warned, is "eroding opportunity and fueling inequality, and it's concentrating power in ways that endanger competition, community life, and democracy."
Speaking to that control, Barry C. Lynn, director of the Open Markets Program at New America, stated Friday that the "private corporation already dominates every corner of online commerce, and uses its power to set terms and prices for many of the most important products Americans buy or sell to one another. Now Amazon is exploiting that advantage to take over physical retail."
"But this is just part of America's Amazon Problem," he added. "The corporation wields vastly too much power over America's markets for books and music, and is fast consolidating control over other key flows of information and ideas."
Both Hauter and Lynn said regulators should block the acquisition.
If it does get approval, Whole Foods co-founder John Mackey will remain its CEO, and the company will keep its headquarters in Austin.
We've had enough. The 1% own and operate the corporate media. They are doing everything they can to defend the status quo, squash dissent and protect the wealthy and the powerful. The Common Dreams media model is different. We cover the news that matters to the 99%. Our mission? To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. How? Nonprofit. Independent. Reader-supported. Free to read. Free to republish. Free to share. With no advertising. No paywalls. No selling of your data. Thousands of small donations fund our newsroom and allow us to continue publishing. Can you chip in? We can't do it without you. Thank you.