What are the positive and negative impacts of the "Amazon effect" for
customers?
The Amazon effect has raised expectations for customers,
including an expectation of package tracking and fast delivery.
These are conveniences that make the shopping experience much
better overall for consumers. However, the downside of the
Amazon effect is that the obfuscated nature of Amazon sellers
makes product reliability lower than purchasing a product from a
smaller store. Amazon often passes responsibility for products
purchased through the site to the individual seller, many of
whom are either incapable of providing customer service or are
unethical and refuse to do so. This makes the customer
experience more unreliable than more traditional methods.
Additionally, Amazon often kills smaller businesses that may
offer niche goods, since Amazon sellers can undercut those
companies.
As ethical concerns regarding business practices such as poor
employee treatment, negative environmental impacts of production,
and decreasing use of local storefronts are recognized, how much, if
any, of the responsibility of these unethical practices fall to the
customers, and how much, if any, falls to businesses?
Certainly most of the responsibility for unethical practices falls
to businesses, since they are the ones in most control of their
own actions. While the idea of customers controlling the market
through the invisible hand or by making a fuss on social media is
great in theory, they often do not have the scope or power to
make a meaningful change. This is exacerbated by the ways in
which companies hide their misdoings; the people who know
about a company's actions may comprise only a tiny fraction of
the customer base. In these cases, which often occur, a
customer's ability to withdraw support for unethical actions has
little to no effect on the company since there are uninformed or
uncaring masses who will still buy the products regardless.
