US president Joe Biden has called out Amazon for not paying federal taxes.

At an address in Pittsburgh, Biden talked about increasing taxes on multinational companies and raising corporate tax rates.

The president’s $2 trillion infrastructure plan, which was unveiled on Wednesday, includes increasing the corporate tax rate by 7 per cent.

Companies will now have to pay a rate of 28 per cent.

The new plan also changes the tax code to help close loopholes that enable companies to transfer profits to other countries.

In his speech, Biden said that Amazon was one of 91 Fortune 500 companies that “use various loopholes where they pay not a single solitary penny in federal income tax.”

“I don’t want to punish them but that’s just wrong,” he added.

According to Reuters, in response to Biden’s comments, an Amazon spokesperson referred to a tweet on research and development tax credits by Jay Carney, the company’s public policy and communications chief and a former White House press secretary under former President Barack Obama.

“If the R&D Tax Credit is a ‘loophole,’ it’s certainly one Congress strongly intended. The R&D Tax credit has existed since 1981, was extended 15 times with bi-partisan support and was made permanent in 2015 in a law signed by President Obama,” said Carney in a tweet.

The news agency said that after paying no federal taxes for two years, Amazon started paying federal income tax in 2019.

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