The exchange began after Warren tweeted a clip from Thursday’s Senate Finance Committee hearing, in which she accused Amazon and other companies of “manipulating the tax code to avoid paying their fair share.”
Hours later, the Amazon News Twitter account responded with, “You make the tax laws @SenWarren; we just follow them.”
“If you don’t like the laws you’ve created, by all means, change them,” Amazon tweeted, adding that the tech giant “has paid billions of dollars in corporate taxes over the past few years alone.”
Amazon went on to say, “In 2020, we had another $1.7B in federal tax expense and that’s on top of the $18 billion we generated in sales taxes for states and localities in the U.S. Congress designed tax laws to encourage investment in the economy.”
The company added that since 2010, it has invested $350 billion in the U.S. economy and in 2020, added 400,000 new jobs across the country.
“And while you’re working on changing the tax code, can we please raise the federal minimum wage to $15?” Amazon asked Warren.
Giant corporations like Amazon report huge profits to their shareholders – but they exploit loopholes and tax havens to pay close to nothing in taxes. That’s just not right – and it’s why I’ll be introducing a bill to make the most profitable companies pay a fair share. pic.twitter.com/vPrmGbjUKW
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) March 25, 2021