I agree with the federal point - it needs to be solved there. The mom and pop businesses that get hurt though are hurt far more by Wal-Mart et al, not Amazon.
Yes and no. In some places, certainly. In lots of urban California, not at all. Not a Wal-mart in sight, but lots of local shops and plenty of Amazon customers. As a rational shopper, your best course of action for anything over $100 that you don't need today is to check it out in the local store and then buy it from Amazon. Kinda sucks for the folks stuck maintaining storefront and inventory to have to do so with an almost 10% handicap.
