Amazon’s algorithm is hiding the best deal from many customers

Re:Amazon’s algorithm is hiding the best deal from many cust... by briandh on Sunday September 25, 2016 @12:38PM (#12576033)

The quoted statement is highly deceptive. It is backed up with "Our average effective tax rate is 27.1% compared with 27.7% for the other 30 OECD countries, according to CRS", but 27.7% is the rate including the US, which is not a sensible comparison. According to the cited CRS report, the average excluding the US is 23.3% [edit, see below: note that these are GDP-weighted averages].

Additionally, the PwC study the CRS uses [1] provides a full list and ranking. The only OECD countries with higher effective rates are Japan, Germany, and Italy. So, the US effective rate is lower than that of only 3 of "our competitors" and higher than that of the other 26.

[1] http://businessroundtable.org/sites/default/files/Effective_...

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Re:Amazon’s algorithm is hiding the best deal from many cust... by cstejerean on Sunday September 25, 2016 @12:53PM (#12576100)

At a glance I feel like I am missing something. If the average without the US is 23.3% and the US average is 27.1% then how can the combination of the two lead to an average of 27.7%? That doesn't seem right.

I understand that including the US would raise the average, but it shouldn't take it from below the US average to above the US average.

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Re:Amazon’s algorithm is hiding the best deal from many cust... by briandh on Sunday September 25, 2016 @12:58PM (#12576138)

The average is weighted by GDP (another reason it is important to examine the rankings).

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