Amazon was, in its entire history as a public company, profitable in every single quarter, except 5 (!). So no, they never spend all their money on growth (they did spend a lot so but never in unsustainable ways, which is the key here). Using Amazon as an example to spend everything on growth, and profits will come, is fundamentally wrong.

> That AWS is 10% or revenue and 90% of profits is not really impoetant

It's important if we're examining your claim that "Amazon was never profitable because they prioritized growth is a meme", because we're looking at the extent to which they reinvested gross profits from their core business.

I randomly had lunch sitting next to a dude, while I was waiting for a movie to start, I was 24, maybe 1 year out of college. The service was slow because a waiter just had to leave. We both had been to the place and weren't concerned about the time. Started talking to him, we he was retiring. I was just starting. Dude was selling his company for $195M in 2001. Turns out he did compressed air/etc, and competed with praxair, who he was selling to. I asked him what his strategy was. "I invest in Me, not the market, it's the only thing I understand or trust". He kept expanding his business when he could, got tons of certs and trainings to do everything in the industry he could. He started from it from quitting as a sales guy for another company he disagreed with.

Anecdata yes, but You can't really grow a business without investing in that business and that means taking some profits and putting them back into the business.

With infra, you still have the stuff next quarter and following quarters. With later it is already gone.