Billionaire Jeff Bezos Slammed After Thanking Amazon Workers For Funding His Space Flight
Tuesday was an exciting day for Jeff Bezos and his rocket crew who successfully made it to space on his Blue Origin rocket.
After landing, the Amazon founder held a press conference to talk about his amazing experience. While speaking, he thanked his employees and customers for subsidizing his Blue Origin spaceflight, during which he and three others spent 11 minutes inside the “New Shepard” capsule after lifting off from the desert in Van Horn County, Texas.
“[I] want to thank every Amazon employee and every Amazon customer because you guys paid for all this. So seriously, for every Amazon customer out there, and every Amazon employee, thank you from the bottom of my heart, very much. It’s very appreciated.” Bezos’ comment rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. Stars & Stripes journalist David Choi even retweeted the video of Bezos’ comments, remarking “I’d like a refund.” Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts ripped into the billionaire, repeating her call for a “wealth tax” and accusing Bezos and the company he founded, Amazon, of paying no taxes.
“Jeff Bezos forgot to thank all the hardworking Americans who actually paid taxes to keep this country running while he and Amazon paid nothing.”
Another said, “I will never get over how Jeff Bezos went to space while Amazon employees are using GoFundMe as healthcare.“
Now, labor groups and Amazon workers have claimed that the company offers its hourly employees not enough break times, puts too much work on them and has unsafe working conditions. Robert Reich, former secretary of labor under President Bill Clinton and a professor of public policy at University of California, Berkeley, wrote on Twitter that Bezos has crushed his attempts to make things right for decades:
“Amazon workers don’t need Bezos to thank them. They need him to stop union-busting – and pay them what they deserve,” Mr Reich wrote.
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