“Free shipping is the God of online retail, so powerful that France actually banned the practice to protect its retail outlets.”
D.C.’s attorney general says Amazon punishes sellers who list cheaper anywhere else. That keeps prices high across the whole internet, not just on Amazon. Sellers pay Amazon’s fees and bake them into every price, so the “free” Prime shipping is billed to everyone. Prime has at least 126 million members, close to one for every American household.