Amos condemns selling the righteous for silver and the needy for a pair of sandals. He also describes trampling the head of the poor, turning aside the way of the afflicted, and sexual sin that profanes God’s name. See Amos 2:6–8.
In Amos 2:6–8 Yahweh announces that Israel’s wrongdoing has piled up to the point that he will not hold back their punishment. The charges focus on how the powerful treat vulnerable people: they sell off the innocent for money, treat the needy as disposable, crush the poor into deeper humiliation, and block the weak from getting fair treatment. This unit sits inside Amos’s opening sequence of public accusations against surrounding nations and then Israel itself (Amos 1–2). The repeated pattern “for three… and for four” builds suspense and suggests a full measure of offenses, but Israel receives the longest, most detailed list.
Amos 2:6–8 presents Yahweh’s case against Israel in concrete, everyday terms. The wrongs are not abstract: vulnerable people are treated as commodities, the poor are pushed further down, and the normal paths to protection (especially fair process) are blocked.
A careful answer keeps the immediate passage, the book's argument, and the whole-Bible storyline together, so the question is answered in context instead of as a detached idea.
Start with Amos 2:6-8, then read the surrounding section so the answer stays connected to the passage's flow.
6Thus says Yahweh: For three transgressions of Israel, yes, for four, I will not turn away the punishment of it; because they have sold the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes
7those who pant after the dust of the earth on the head of the poor, and turn aside the way of the humble: and a man and his father go to the [same] maiden, to profane my holy name:
8and they lay themselves down beside every altar on clothes taken in pledge; and in the house of their God they drink the wine of such as have been fined.