英语阅读：继苹果后，亚马逊成第二家市值突破万亿的公司

Amazon has become the second publicly traded company in the US to be valued at a $1 trillion, just weeks after tech giant Apple became the first to reach the historic milestone.

亚马逊成美国上市公司中第二家市值达一万亿美元的公司，仅仅几周前，苹果公司才迎来这一历史性里程碑。

In the 24 years since its founding, the company has capitalised on a growing demand for online shopping. It now generates $178bn in revenue each year.

成立24年以来，亚马逊充分利用不断扩张的网购需求。现如今，年收益高达1780亿美元。

The company has gone from being an online marketplace to a movie and television producer, e-book publisher, and cloud storage centre. It also created a popular, digital home assistant named "Alexa".

这家公司从在线市场演变成了影视制作人、电子书出版商及云端存储中心。它还创造出了大受欢迎的数码管家助手“Alexa”。

Amazon's success has also made its CEO, Jeff Bezos, the richest person in the world – something Senator Bernie Sanders took shots at during a Labour Day event.

亚马逊的成功也使得CEO杰夫•贝佐斯成为了这个世界上最富有的人——在一次劳工节活动中，这一点成了参议员伯尼•桑德斯抨击他的地方。

“We have one person whose wealth is increasing by $250 million every single day, while he pays thousands of his workers wages that are so low that they are forced to go on food stamps, Medicaid, and subsidized housing.”

“我们中有一个人，他的财富以每天2.5亿美元的速度增长，然而却对他数以千计的员工支付着低廉的薪水，低到他们不得不依赖政府粮票、公共医疗补助及补贴住房。”

The company hit back with a statement claiming Mr Sanders had spread "misleading statements".

亚马逊回击称桑德斯先生传播的是“误导性言论”。

"We encourage anyone to compare our pay and benefits to other retailers," the company said.

“欢迎任何人就我司的薪资福利与其他零售商作比较。”亚马逊如此回应。

It was not the first time the nearly 600,000-person company has been criticised for its employment practices. A 2017 expose from the New York Times revealed how even the company's white-collar employees are often worked past their breaking points. The company responded by calling the article "sensational" and saying it had misrepresented the company.

这家近60万员工的公司的雇佣状况，并不是第一次被人批评。2017年《纽约时报》的一篇揭露报道显示，甚至于这家公司的白领也常常工作到崩溃边缘。当时亚马逊回应说这篇文章是“耸人听闻”的，是故意对其做出错误报道。

Amazon has also found a frequent critic in President Donald Trump, who recently accused the company of failing to pay its fair share of taxes to using Mr Bezos 's ownership of the Washington Post to lobby for its interests.

还有一位活跃的亚马逊“批评家”——总统唐纳德•特朗普，他最近谴责该公司未按合理份额缴纳税款，因为贝佐斯先生拥有的《华盛顿时报》充当了其为公司利益游说的工具。