Amazon.com Inc. is halting “AmazonSmile.” The decade-old charitable program let customers pick a charity to receive a donation from the company equal to 0.5% of their purchases.

The announcement, which coincided with a fresh round of layoffs that will affect 18,000 Amazon employees, showed how tech industry cost-cutting could ripple through the nonprofit world.

The company, which donated $500 million to charities over 10 years in the U.S., U.K. and Germany through Amazon Smile, said it spread donations too thin to have a meaningful impact. The average Amazon Smile donation was about $230 because Amazon spread the pot of money among some 1 million charities. The Amazon Smile program officially closes next month.

“The program has not grown to create the impact that we had originally hoped,” Amazon said in a Wednesday blog. “With so many eligible organizations — more than 1 million globally — our ability to have an impact was often spread too thin.”

Amazon said it will continue to support other philanthropic initiatives, including its Housing Equity Fund, which is investing $2 billion to increase the supply of affordable housing in communities like Bellevue, Washington, and Arlington, Virginia.

Amazon is No. 1 in the 2022 Digital Commerce 360 Top 1000 database. The Top 1000 ranks North American web merchants by sales. It is No. 3 in the Digital Commerce 360 Online Marketplaces database, which ranks the 100 largest global marketplaces.

Amazon fined for worker safety violations in three US states

U.S. federal workplace safety regulators fined Amazon more than $60,000 for putting warehouse employees at risk for lower back injuries and other musculoskeletal disorders.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) discovered the violations last year during inspections of Amazon warehouses in:

• Deltona, Florida
• Waukegan, Illinois
• New Windsor, New York

“Each of these inspections found work processes that were designed for speed but not safety, and they resulted in serious worker injuries,” said Doug Parker, assistant secretary for occupational safety and health. “While Amazon has developed impressive systems to make sure its customers’ orders are shipped efficiently and quickly, the company has failed to show the same level of commitment to protecting the safety and well-being of its workers.”

Similar investigations at other Amazon facilities continue in:

• Aurora, Colorado
• Nampa, Idaho
• Castleton-on-Hudson, New York

Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel said the company takes workplace safety seriously. She said it reduced injury rates nearly 15% between 2019 and 2021.

“We strongly disagree with these allegations and intend to appeal,” she said in an emailed statement. “We’ve cooperated fully, and the government’s allegations don’t reflect the reality of safety at our sites.”

The fines amount to a slap on the wrist for an enterprise of Amazon’s size but still represent a ratcheting up of pressure on the company. Amazon has pledged to reduce injury rates that are higher than its industry peers. In December, OSHA cited Amazon for 14 record-keeping violations during an ongoing probe of six facilities in Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois and New York. The unrecorded incidents included injuries to wrists, knees, backs and shoulders that resulted in employees missing work, OSHA said.

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