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Amazon.com Inc has proposed a hiring spree of 7,000 jobs in California if state leaders put a recently enacted online sales tax on hold for two years.

A coalition of giant, brick-and-mortar retailers and their legislative allies have come up with a new strategy to try to head off Amazon.com's referendum to overturn the state's new Internet sales tax law.

The online retailer wants voters to strike down the California law requiring the company to collect sales taxes. Wal-Mart, labor groups and other opponents could wage a costly, noisy battle against such a referendum. Escalating its fight to thwart a new levy on Internet purchases, Amazon.com says it will ask California voters to overturn a state law requiring all companies with operations or affiliates here to collect sales tax.

Amazon.com Inc., the world’s largest Internet retailer, said it will sever ties with its affiliates in California if the state enacts a new law that requires the company to collect taxes on online purchases. California Governor Jerry Brown signed legislation yesterday mandating sales-tax collections by Web retailers, including Amazon, on purchases by state residents. The state’s pending budget plan counts on $200 million from the law. In an e-mail before the bill was signed, Amazon said the legislation was “unconstitutional and counterproductive.”

Amazon.com Inc. on Thursday said that, after less than four years of selling electronic books, it's now selling more of them than printed books. The online retailer said that since April 1, it has sold 105 e-books for every 100 printed books, including printed books for which there is no electronic edition. The comparison excludes free e-books, which would tip the scales further if they were included.

Amazon.com Inc reported that first-quarter sales rose 38.2 percent, above analysts' forecasts.

Amazon.com, apart from being a major online retailer of books, DVDs, music, games, apparel, and other merchandise, also has a small business of providing cloud and other Web services. It offers Web services like cloud computing and cloud storage service offerings, in which it competes with bigger players like Google, Microsoft and Salesforce.com. Amazon also owns and operates websites such as Audible.com, IMDB.com, and Shelfari.com.

Holiday online retail spending for the 47 days of the shopping season through December 17 totaled $27.46 billion, according to new data from ComScore, up 12% from the comparable period a year ago. Sales in the latest week were $5.15 billion, up 14% from the comparable week last year.

U.S. online retail sales through the first 40 days of the 2010 holiday shopping season are up 12% from a year ago, according to a Sunday update from ComScore.

Online retailers experienced a sales surge Monday, capping off a holiday shopping week in which more Americans than ever decided to skip the mall. Early estimates indicated overall sales gains of between 15% and 21% for "Cyber Monday," compared to a year earlier.