Question

Delivery services like Amazon and Doordash are adding hidden fees to their costs, causing things to be more expensive

Answer 1

This claim about delivery services like Amazon and DoorDash are adding hidden fees, making things more expensive, is partially true, the fees are not coming from Amazon or Doordash, they already have their own fees. these "secret" fees are coming from the government and are called doorstep fees. The CNBC article that was used to reference this states that these are taxes coming from the local and state governments. In different states, the fees can vary from 28 to 50 cents. The main reason legislators are implementing policies like these is to collect more revenue in states where traditional taxes dont bring in as much money anymore. The reason it looks like the companies are the ones charging extra fees is because they are the ones who collect them for government officals. the purpose of the fees is to allocate money for infastructure. The logic is that even though consumers are not going out to purchase items, the roads are still being used therefore deliveries should help pay for them.

Primary source/ Article used to refrence:

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/10/10/new-fees-government-taxes-on-demand-delivery-food-shopping-apps.html#:~:text=On%2Ddemand%20delivery%20of%20everything,fees%20as%20%22doorstep%20taxes.%22

Secondary sources:

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/doorstep-taxes-now-showing-delivery-124500609.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAHlTFKwIvhHQHOu8wJHyQumROROmTK6KQprc7cCnu1ztoEjDM9rTzXfhNBnbvh7xwG9tGdTNY5u8ijj14OZR1pKuPPn_3-X2l5mUiqzZU2j-J3wDPy3wyV1xJ4QCmEfZRgZ0LizrqNlMe1vElo6HJfO2lgdUjqR1r4PJo-d54Yh-#:~:text=Which%20states%20are%20including%20this,vehicles%20used%20in%20delivery%20fleets.%20(