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NYT Op-Ed Argues Amazon 'Took Seattle's Soul' (bendbulletin.com)
New York Times columnist Timothy Egan was part of the paper's Pulitzer Prize-winning team in 2001. Now he's written an op-ed arguing Amazon "took Seattle's soul." An anonymous reader writes:
Since Amazon arrived "we've been overwhelmed by a future we never had any say over," Egan writes, with a message for cities competing to be the site of Amazon's next headquarters. Amazon now owns as much office space as Seattle's next 40 biggest employers combined, according to an analysis by the Seattle Times, "a mind-boggling 19 percent of all prime office space in the city, the most for any employer in a major U.S. city...more than twice as large as any other company in any other big U.S. city."
Egan notes Amazon is offering 50,000 high-paying jobs and $5 billion worth of investments, "a once-in-a-century, destiny-shaping event," but "You think you can shape Amazon? Not a chance. It will shape you... What comes with the title of being the fastest growing big city in the country, with having the nation's hottest real estate market, is that the city no longer works for some people. For many others, the pace of change, not to mention the traffic, has been disorienting... [M]edian home prices have doubled in five years, to $700,000. This is not a good thing in a place where teachers and cops used to be able to afford a house with a water view... As a Seattle native, I miss the old city, the lack of pretense, and dinner parties that didn't turn into discussions of real estate porn.
Wages have risen faster in Amazon's Seattle than anywhere else in America, and while Amazon changed the city's character, it also poured $38 billion into the city's economy. (Besides Amazon's own 40,000 employees, it also attracted another 50,000 new jobs.) "To the next Amazon lottery winner I would say, enjoy the boom," Egan concludes, "but be careful what you wish for."
Egan notes Amazon is offering 50,000 high-paying jobs and $5 billion worth of investments, "a once-in-a-century, destiny-shaping event," but "You think you can shape Amazon? Not a chance. It will shape you... What comes with the title of being the fastest growing big city in the country, with having the nation's hottest real estate market, is that the city no longer works for some people. For many others, the pace of change, not to mention the traffic, has been disorienting... [M]edian home prices have doubled in five years, to $700,000. This is not a good thing in a place where teachers and cops used to be able to afford a house with a water view... As a Seattle native, I miss the old city, the lack of pretense, and dinner parties that didn't turn into discussions of real estate porn.
Wages have risen faster in Amazon's Seattle than anywhere else in America, and while Amazon changed the city's character, it also poured $38 billion into the city's economy. (Besides Amazon's own 40,000 employees, it also attracted another 50,000 new jobs.) "To the next Amazon lottery winner I would say, enjoy the boom," Egan concludes, "but be careful what you wish for."
Arguably much better. Walmart pays bottom rung wages, while Amazon jobs tech pay really well. In my own field of videogame development, they've sucked up a huge amount of local talent with their new game studio, largely by paying better wages. This ends up driving UP wages elsewhere as well, if companies want to keep their best talent. Boosted wages means local families have more to spend, and that's a boon for the local economies and tax revenue, which relies on sales taxes.
You can look at other parallel situations in the area. Microsoft was a *massive* economic boon to the small city of Redmond. That arguably had a much more significant effect on a much smaller economy, and it's done quite well. Redmond has a lot of really nice local shops, boutiques, and public places in the area. Yes, housing prices tend to rise, but that's a single negative amongst a huge number of positive effects.
Bitching about prosperity. Talk about first-world problems.
Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
hen you must be Canadian or British. Our mortgages stay the same as equity rises.
When you make your mortgage payment, you're also paying your property tax. The bank collects it from your payments and holds it in escrow until the property taxes are due. Because banks really hate it when the city forecloses on the property for back property taxes (and they like receiving interest-free loans).
So that poster's mortgage payment likely went up due to the higher property tax payment. While calling the payment "my mortgage" is not pedantically correct, people generally drop "payment" when talking about such issues.
As a blue collar worker living in Seattle and currently looking to buy. I can tell you there is no way you can find a house in seattle for anything near $200k. You might be able to find a studio or one bedroom condo in seattle for around $250k but it's either going to be something the size of a cardboard box or have HOA dues in excess of $800 (often more than the payment will be). Actually anything within 1/2 hr driving to Seattle is quickly becoming the same. Houses are non-existent for >$250k. I'm actually just trying to find something like a one bedroom condo within driving range of seattle with a monthly payment of >$1500 because within a year the average rent will be much higher than that and the only chance anyone will have of being able to afford to live here unless you are making six figures will be near zero. Unless you want to live in a tent by the road.
I'm not blaming Amazon for this though. We expect progress, so when it arrives it's kind of pointless to bitch about it, but the same goes for those people needing my services. It costs a lot to live here so don't cry when you get my bill :)
once more into the breach