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."

Comments

never had it

[turkeydance]

can't take it

Re:never had it

[Dutch Gun]

Rich tech companies aren't new to the Seattle area (hint: Microsoft is just across Lake Washington in Redmond). It's just new to the city of Seattle proper. Far better to deal with the issues that come from a sudden boom than the opposite. Look at a city in decline to see how it *could* be.

Dramatic change always shakes some people up, even if it's generally positive change. Yes, there are some growing pains, but I think Amazon is going to be a huge long-term net positive for the city.

Re: never had it

[Anonymous Coward]

Please I don't owe the poor sh**. I have worked my ads off to escape poverty and if the poor do not want to be poor they can do the same.

Re: never had it

[OolimPhon]

You realize that means absolutely nothing, unless you are prepared to move out into a cheaper area?

If your house doubled in price, that likely means that you'll have to pay double (or more) for your next house, too. You gain nothing.

Re: never had it

[Kjella]

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

More importantly, Wal-Mart comes to take over existing local jobs in other retailers while a new game studio would expand the market.

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

Now that's a gross oversimplification. If you rise with the tide, everything is great. But a lot of people are stuck in jobs that pay minimum wage, are set by public authorities or don't see any increased competition for the jobs they offer. Or they have some other form of income or fixed amount of money like social security or retirement savings. There are a whole lot of people who will not see any additional income or new busniess/employment opportunities.

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.

Many low-income families rent because they either can't afford to buy or they have too unstable jobs to commit. Their rent goes up, which is a much bigger deal than if you own and taxes go up. And shop space becomes more expensive so prices go up, nice but costly hipster establishments replace cheaper ones. Out with Costco, in with Whole Foods. That corner pub where you could get a coffee, a beer and an meal for a few bucks is replaced with Starbucks, hipster clubs and fine dining. Nice places are nice if you can afford them.

For sure, it's great for the city's economy and you might argue that through trickle-down economics that'll fund improvements to all. But very often there's a displacement effect, in comes the rich people so the poor people are pushed out to new communities. Not everybody is going to be happy about that and they got legitimate reasons not to be. Your post comes away as a little condescending, there's lots of positives and one tiny negative so if you're complaining you're a whiner. But some people only get the short end of the stick.

"Not a good thing"

[SuperKendall]

From summary :
[M]edian home prices have doubled in five years, to $700,000. This is not a good thing

It's always stunned me that people continue to make this argument. It's not good for incoming cops/teachers, but what about all of the cops and teachers that had been living there already for decades before? It is a massive windfall for them. Growth like that is in essence stoking a huge retirement bonus for everyone living in a city now. How can that possibly be a bad thing?

Yes new incoming teachers and cops will have to pay more to live, and in smaller spaces. But some of that SHOULD be made up by significantly higher salaries for those positions as well, and if they are not getting said salaries that is a direct fault of the local government, and no-one else.

Remember kids; any time you argue against general prosperity and growth you come off looking kind of dumb.

Re:"Not a good thing"

[Jzanu]

All cities are dependent on complex support services to function, it is incredibly bad strategy to displace the workers who maintain it. Spatial relationships matter, that is what makes cities work. Pushing out the support layer means the city falls apart until budgets rise to cover increased costs from dis-agglomeration and scattering of labor increasing their costs in a vicious circle. The cop-out of blaming local government only works when the companies responsible for the bubble and especially their employees actually pay full and complete taxes, otherwise they only increase the demand on local services without paying for increasing capacity. That means less is available for everyone, if distribution were even. In practice distribution is not remotely even, so this directly means less for everyone else (the older residents), while the new rich few horde everything they can.

Re:"Not a good thing"

[xski]

Remember kids; any time you argue against general prosperity and growth you come off looking kind of dumb.

Ditto making simplistic statements on complex matters.

Re:"Not a good thing"

[Imrik]

Unfortunately, they'd prefer to raise the cost of new housing so they can finance construction of affordable housing. This results in less housing overall but allows the local government to control more of the money while also getting more residents that depend on the government and who will vote to perpetuate it.