By Jody Godoy
Aug 4 (Reuters) – New Jersey sued Amazon.com on Tuesday, accusing the online retailer of abusing its market power over independent delivery drivers.
The state accused Amazon of using its dominance to impose low pay and poor conditions on drivers who deliver for the company via its Delivery Service Partner program. The lawsuit was filed in federal court in Newark, New Jersey.
The program is run by Amazon’s logistics arm and allows people to set up businesses to deliver packages locally. Those small businesses deliver 20 million packages a day for Amazon globally, according to the company.
The state alleges that Amazon punishes drivers who try to unionize and tries to keep independent businesses in the program from poaching each other’s drivers in violation of antitrust law.
A spokesperson for Amazon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Amazon is fighting other antitrust lawsuits brought by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission and the state of California accusing the company of illegally monopolizing online retail markets. The company has denied those allegations.
(Reporting by Jody Godoy in New YorkEditing by Nick Zieminski and Deepa Babington)
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