2020 Letter to Shareholders

[ … ] Not shown: The 1997 letter’s hopes and figures, recalled.

We’ve come a long way since then, and we are working harder than ever to serve and delight customers. Last year, we hired 500,000 employees and now directly employ 1.3 million people around the world.¹ (Fact note 1)Fact · 1With hindsightThe hiring did not run in one direction. In January 2023 Andy Jassy told staff Amazon planned “to eliminate just over 18,000 roles”, mostly in its Stores and People, Experience, and Technology organisations, adding: “Companies that last a long time go through different phases. They’re not in heavy people expansion mode every year.” Amazon announced a corporate reduction of “approximately 14,000 roles” in October 2025 and a further one of “approximately 16,000 roles” in January 2026.SourcesAmazonUpdate from CEO Andy Jassy on role eliminationsJan 2023AmazonAn update from SVP Beth Galetti on Amazon workforce reduction28 Oct 2025AmazonA message from Amazon on recent layoff28 Jan 2026

[ … ] Not shown: Prime, Marketplace, Alexa, AWS, and wealth created for shareowners.

Create More Than You Consume

If you want to be successful in business (in life, actually), you have to create more than you consume. Your goal should be to create value for everyone you interact with. Any business that doesn’t create value for those it touches, even if it appears successful on the surface, isn’t long for this world. It’s on the way out.

[ … ] Not shown: Value created for shareholders, measured as 2020 net income.

How about employees? This is also a reasonably easy value creation question to answer because we can look at compensation expense. What is an expense for a company is income for employees.² (Editorial note 2)Editorial · 2Known at the timeThe table adds up: $21 billion, $91 billion, $25 billion and $164 billion make $301 billion. But the four lines measure different things. Shareholders get accounting net income and sellers an internal estimate of profit. Customers get savings built on stated assumptions, such as time valued at $10 an hour and AWS’s unmeasured benefits set equal to its cost savings. Employees get gross pay and benefits, not what they gain over their next-best job. Counting wages as value created turns a cost line into the table’s second-largest contribution.SourceAmazon2020 Letter to Shareholders15 Apr 2021 In 2020, employees earned $80 billion, plus another $11 billion to include benefits and various payroll taxes, for a total of $91 billion.

How about third-party sellers? We have an internal team (the Selling Partner Services team) that works to answer that question. They estimate that, in 2020, third-party seller profits from selling on Amazon were between $25 billion and $39 billion³ (Fact note 3)Fact · 3Known at the timeThe memo claims that Amazon’s Selling Partner Services team estimated third-party sellers’ 2020 profits from selling on Amazon at $25 billion to $39 billion. We have not found an independent source for the figure or for the method behind it.SourceAmazon2020 Letter to Shareholders15 Apr 2021, and to be conservative here I’ll go with $25 billion.

[ … ] Not shown: Estimated time saved for Prime members; AWS customer savings.

Adding AWS and consumer together gives us total customer value creation in 2020 of $164 billion.

[ … ] Not shown: A table of value created for each group.

If each group had an income statement representing their interactions with Amazon, the numbers above would be the “bottom lines” from those income statements. These numbers are part of the reason why people work for us, why sellers sell through us, and why customers buy from us. We create value for them. And this value creation is not a zero-sum game. It is not just moving money from one pocket to another.

[ … ] Not shown: How relationships with shareholders and employees differ.

Does your Chair take comfort in the outcome of the recent union vote in Bessemer? No, he doesn’t. I think we need to do a better job for our employees. While the voting results were lopsided and our direct relationship with employees is strong⁴ (Fact note 4)Fact · 4Known at the timeThe NLRB counted the Bessemer, Alabama ballots on 9 April 2021, six days before the letter was published: 738 votes for the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union and 1,798 against. The NLRB described these as “uncertified results”.SourceNational Labor Relations BoardNLRB Announces Results in Amazon Election9 Apr 2021, it’s clear to me that we need a better vision for how we create value for employees – a vision for their success.

[ … ] Not shown: News reports, an employee survey, breaks, goals and coaching.

Earth’s Best Employer and Earth’s Safest Place to Work

[ … ] Not shown: Pride in operations leaders and jobs for people without degrees.

Despite what we’ve accomplished, it’s clear to me that we need a better vision for our employees’ success. We have always wanted to be Earth’s Most Customer-Centric Company. We won’t change that. It’s what got us here. But I am committing us to an addition.⁵ (Fact note 5)Fact · 5With hindsightOn 1 July 2021 Amazon added two Leadership Principles, bringing the total to 16. The first is titled “Strive to be Earth’s Best Employer” where this letter says “We are going to be”, and asks leaders for “a safer, more productive, higher performing, more diverse, and more just work environment”; neither principle repeats “Earth’s Safest Place to Work”. The second, “Success and Scale Bring Broad Responsibility”, ends: “Leaders create more than they consume and always leave things better than how they found them.”SourcesAmazonAmazon announces two new Leadership Principles1 Jul 2021Amazon2020 Letter to Shareholders15 Apr 2021 We are going to be Earth’s Best Employer and Earth’s Safest Place to Work.

In my upcoming role as Executive Chair, I’m going to focus on new initiatives. I’m an inventor. It’s what I enjoy the most and what I do best. It’s where I create the most value. I’m excited to work alongside the large team of passionate people we have in Ops and help invent in this arena of Earth’s Best Employer and Earth’s Safest Place to Work. On the details, we at Amazon are always flexible, but on matters of vision we are stubborn and relentless. We have never failed when we set our minds to something, and we’re not going to fail at this either.⁶ (Editorial note 6)Editorial · 6Known at the timeThe vision comes with no date and no definition of best or safest. The letter gives inputs, such as safety staff and spending, but its only target for success is Amazon’s own survey: 94% of fulfillment employees recommending Amazon, against an aim of 100%. Bezos places himself, as Executive Chair, beside the operations team on the work; the letter does not say what the incoming CEO will own.SourceAmazon2020 Letter to Shareholders15 Apr 2021

We dive deep into safety issues. For example, about 40% of work-related injuries at Amazon are related to musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs), things like sprains or strains that can be caused by repetitive motions. MSDs are common in the type of work that we do and are more likely to occur during an employee’s first six months. We need to invent solutions to reduce MSDs for new employees⁷ (Fact note 7)Fact · 7With hindsightOn 19 December 2024 the US Department of Labor announced a corporate-wide settlement with Amazon over working conditions “leading to serious lower back and other musculoskeletal disorders”, resolving cases from inspections at 10 Amazon facilities; Amazon agreed to pay a $145,000 penalty. Days earlier, the Senate HELP Committee chaired by Bernie Sanders released a report that, the committee said, found Amazon warehouses “recorded over 30 percent more injuries than the warehousing industry average in 2023”. Amazon said the report was “wrong on the facts”.SourcesUS Department of Labor (Internet Archive copy)US Department of Labor announces settlement with Amazon requiring corporate-wide ergonomic measures at facilities across the country19 Dec 2024US Senate HELP Committee, Chairman Sanders’ newsroom (Internet Archive copy)NEWS: Sanders Releases Sweeping Report Exposing How Amazon’s Obsession with Speed Injures Workers at Unprecedented Rates16 Dec 2024AmazonAmazon responds to Senate report on injury data and workplace safety16 Dec 2024, many of whom might be working in a physical role for the first time.

[ … ] Not shown: Body-mechanics coaching and algorithmic job rotation.

Our increased attention to early MSD prevention is already achieving results.⁸ (Fact note 8)Fact · 8With hindsightJassy’s first letter as CEO put Amazon’s US recordable incident rates at 6.4 against 5.5 for warehousing peers, and 7.6 against 9.1 for courier and delivery peers: “This makes us about average relative to peers, but we don’t seek to be average.” Amazon’s later posts compare its warehousing rate with the BLS average “for employers our size (>1,000 employees)”, and in March 2026 it reported that its global recordable incident rate “has improved 43% over the past six years”.SourcesAmazon investor relations2021 Annual Report2022AmazonAmazon’s 2023 workplace safety performance shows annual improvement8 Mar 2024AmazonAmazon invests $2.5 billion in workplace safety, reduces workplace injury rates12 Mar 2026 From 2019 to 2020, overall MSDs decreased by 32%, and MSDs resulting in time away from work decreased by more than half.

[ … ] Not shown: Safety staff and planned safety spending for 2021.

When we lead, others follow. Two and a half years ago, when we set a $15 minimum wage for our hourly employees, we did so because we wanted to lead on wages – not just run with the pack⁹ (Fact note 9)Fact · 9With hindsightJassy’s letter in the 2021 annual report said Amazon’s “average starting hourly salary is currently over $18”. In September 2025 Amazon said average pay for its US fulfillment and transportation employees was “increasing to more than $23 per hour”. Both are Amazon’s own figures; neither page compares Amazon’s pay with other employers’.SourcesAmazon investor relations2021 Annual Report2022AmazonAmazon raises pay, lowers health insurance costs for US fulfillment and transportation employees17 Sep 2025 – and because we believed it was the right thing to do.

[ … ] Not shown: A university study of the $15 wage’s local effects.

And we’re not done leading. If we want to be Earth’s Best Employer, we shouldn’t settle for 94% of employees saying they would recommend Amazon to a friend as a place to work. We have to aim for 100%. And we’ll do that by continuing to lead on wages, on benefits, on upskilling opportunities, and in other ways that we will figure out over time.

[ … ] Not shown: Customer focus kept; climate change and The Climate Pledge.

Amazon is making progress toward our own goal of 100% renewable energy by 2025, five years ahead of our initial 2030 target.

[ … ] Not shown: Renewable projects, electric vans and climate funds.

Differentiation is Survival and the Universe Wants You to be Typical

This is my last annual shareholder letter as the CEO of Amazon, and I have one last thing of utmost importance I feel compelled to teach. I hope all Amazonians take it to heart.

[ … ] Not shown: A passage from Richard Dawkins and reflections on distinctiveness.

The world will always try to make Amazon more typical – to bring us into equilibrium with our environment. It will take continuous effort, but we can and must be better than that.

[ … ] Not shown: The 1997 letter’s close, and thanks to Andy Jassy.

To all of you: be kind, be original, create more than you consume, and never, never, never let the universe smooth you into your surroundings. It remains Day 1.

[ … ] Not shown: The 1997 letter to shareholders, reprinted in full.