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

[PopeRatzo]

I have proof that Seattle had soul, at least at one time:

https://www.billboard.com/file...

Re:never had it

[andersenep]

amen. worst city i have ever lived and worked in by far.

Re:never had it

[turkeydance]

he knew and he left 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

[Dutch Gun]

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.

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

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope it's not about being born with a better brain.
If your parents are lawyers, or lawyer and businessman, or perhaps even doctor and cop etc. then you will likely make big money. You'll have connections, $1000 worth of clothes on your person, access to the family's business lawyer etc. even before your first job or before your schlong hair is fully grown.
Even if your parents divorce that'll just be twice the houses, twice the cars and twice the birthday presents instead of your parents and you descending into misery.

I think it's why the politics and media are so fixated on identity politics, racists, SJW, BLM, women equality and so on. You're conditioned into thinking only the genetics matter. This is so you don't consider social origins might have a say, and to sweep away the notion of class struggle.

Re:never had it

[93 Escort Wagon]

Haha, I thought it was gonna be Quincy Jones rather than Jimi Hendrix.

Re:never had it

[PopeRatzo]

Haha, I thought it was gonna be Quincy Jones rather than Jimi Hendrix.

Ah, Garfield High School's finest.

Also a great choice:

https://youtu.be/i9JO52grtMc

Re: never had it

[Uberbah]

Please I don't owe the poor sh**. I have worked my ads off to escape poverty

If that's actually the case then you've worked with no shortage of management who were born with a silver spoon in their asses. Yet you resent the poor more than the rich and bourgeois who were born on third base. Interesting.

Re: never had it

[ArchieBunker]

It also has the effect of turning a $200k home into a $2 million home.

Re: never had it

[ShanghaiBill]

Yes, housing prices tend to rise, but that's a single negative amongst a huge number of positive effects.

Indeed. I hated it when my house doubled in value.

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.

Re: never had it

[Mashiki]

Arguably much better. Walmart pays bottom rung wages

Seriously, stop with the bullshit on that one. Walmart pays over the minimum wage always has whether the state min. wage is $5 and they pay $7.50, or the province wage is $10.50 and they pay $13 they've always done that. Keep in mind that working at a big-box store was never meant to be a career, but rather something to help you along the path. Much like the current hipster whining that they can't survive with their gender studies degrees and working at starbucks.

Re: never had it

[Anonymous Coward]

You need an education in finance. They're currently paying a mortgage at much lower cost than the surrounding area's newcomers or renters need to pay. Thus they how has a financial advantage in their locale, and yes, if they want to move they can carry the equity to their next property. They can also significantly upgrade their next home if they decide to move to a lower cost area. They have a huge windfall here. You know nothing OolimPhon.

Re:never had it

[Anonymous Coward]

So, a company moves into town, provides a ton of jobs, and the lefty outlet finds a way to scare monger.. what a shock.

Re: never had it

[deathguppie]

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 :)

Re: never had it

[redmid17]

No fucking shit. That's why he typed his post.

Re: never had it

[redmid17]

What country doesn't have a property tax?

Re: never had it

[SocietyoftheFist]

LOL, you're funny.

Re: never had it

[SocietyoftheFist]

Same here. It is what movies and tv tell them.

Re: never had it

[SocietyoftheFist]

Huge down payment on the next house. No PMI. Lower interest rate. That is what it did for me. Double the square footage, quadruple the land.

Re: never had it

[SocietyoftheFist]

Sorry but supply and demand rules nature. Just like a lot of predators will die if there prey is in short supply, if 10 million people can fill a job, it won't pay a lot.

Re: never had it

[AvitarX]

Why do you say retail was never meant to be a career?

It seems like in the past it was a pretty decent career for many.

I've worked at a super market, and the previous generation were pretty well compensated and indeed saw it as a career.

Nobody was rich, and likely only the managers broke median income, but the bulk of people that were fulltime for over 5 years indeed had enough to live a reasonable life.

8 Million people are cashiers or retail sales, that's what, 6% of the workforce? all of those are supposed to be transient jobs?

Re: never had it

[The Cynical Critic]

Amazon may drive up tech wages, but those were high to begin with and the vast majority of the workforce isn't in the tech workforce. These higher paid tech workers can afford to pay way more for their housing and other services, which causes prices for these things to go up. For tech workers this may not be a problem, but for everyone else it is when they the cost of living goes up and they can't afford to live where they used to be able to and have to move further way from work, friends and relatives because of increased living expenses.

Only solution I see to this is increasing income tax progression to the point where tech workers don't have much more disposable income than everyone else and thus can't cause prices on everything to go up, but this is the U.S and that's never going to happen. Keeping the redistribution of wealth to an absolute minimum is practically a religion.

Don't even try to talk about the Amazon online store employees because they aren't well paid and they destroy jobs elsewhere due to the way online shopping is way more more labor effective.

Re: never had it

[getuid()]

You got lucky.

Others worked even more than you and still remained poor.

People tend to attribute success to their own efforts, and failure to "bad circumstance" or everybody else but themselves. But in fact both are wrong, it's both the same: part luck and chance, part hard work, part society and circumstance and everybody else.

So you worked hard *and* got lucky. (As did I.) Great, enjoy, and kudos to you, but that's no reason to be a schmug. Not everyone who's poor is so because they're lazy. Some worked even more than you, some nearly (or fully) killed themselves working, but lacked your luck. So they stayed poor, or worse: became ill, then poor, then remained ill, and will therefore remain poor regardless of what they do.

Be kind. That could have been you. (Or could become you, when your luck runs out.)

Re: never had it

[Anonymous Coward]

True, the reality tends to be that you can do your best to put yourself in a position where you can take advantage of opportunities that might arise, but there's no guarantee that an opportunity will ever arise for a particular person.

The best you can guarantee for yourself is that you're not screwing yourself over by making foolish decisions. But, at the end of the day, if you're not making at least slightly more than what you need to live, the likelihood of having any opportunities is pretty small.

A large part of the problem are the folks that make it and then insist upon destroying the ladder behind them so that nobody else can use that way of improving themselves rather than trying to figure out how to improve the situation for as many people as possible.

Re: never had it

[Uberbah]

Where is everybody working with born rich management?

Where was I only talking about the rich?

the rich and bourgeois

You don't have to be an investment banker to help your slacker son get into a good university - after he drank he way through high school - and then help him into a good job fresh out of college - after drinking his way to a BA. A job that an "up from mah bootstraps" shmoe would have to work ten years to get. A being lawyer or manager of your local Wells Fargo branch will do quite nicely.

And anyone who actually pulled themselves up by their bootstraps, busting their asses to get top grades and internships that turned into careers - will recognize those bourgeois babies a mile off.

Re: never had it

[Rakarra]

Meanwhile, those of us who came from little and tended to be a little more self-made tend to get more a bit offended when the implication comes along, over and over again, that we didn't do shit and everything was handed to us because of 'white privilege' or heteronormity or whatever is fashionable to say gives you all the breaks today. If you work hard, teach yourself, and get ahead, don't be surprised if we aren't in favor of getting dragged down again by the mediocrity that didn't bother with any of those things.

There is WAY too much victimization in society, this idea that if you're going nowhere, it's not your fault, it always has to be others holding you down.

Re: never had it

[Rakarra]

If your house doubled in price, that likely means that you'll have to pay double (or more) for your next house, too.

And later you sell that house for the value you bought it for, maybe more. Doesn't change the fact that your first investment doubled. That was operating on the assumption that housing inflation doubles everywhere. It doesn't.

Re: never had it

[Rakarra]

Sorry but supply and demand rules nature. Just like a lot of predators will die if there prey is in short supply, if 10 million people can fill a job, it won't pay a lot.

Yeast will multiply without bound in a sugar solution, until all the food is gone and they all die. Using primitive instinct as guidance is the road to extinction.

Yet somehow we've survived pretty well. Maybe the system works.

Re: never had it

[Dutch Gun]

Actually, you couldn't really find a decent house under $200K fifteen years ago, let alone now. My house cost just under $250K back then, and today it's worth a bit under $450K. I live in the Eastside, not in the city itself, so maybe we've seen less of a real-estate boom than in the city. After all, there's more space out here for growth.

I agree that Seattle is becoming an expensive place to live. But honestly, it's been that way for the past several decades since I've been here. I think Amazon just makes a nice target for people's ire.

Oh, and believe me, I know what the bills for blue-collar service work goes for. It's insanely expensive, but I don't bitch about it, because I know what it costs to live in this area. Fair is fair, right?

Re: never had it

[SocietyoftheFist]

Even when we throw bones to those that should be dying as the result of their lifestyle we thrive.

Re: never had it

[Mashiki]

Why do you say retail was never meant to be a career?

Because it wasn't. If you aspired to be a manager, that was a career. Being a cashier? Not a career, that's a part-time job. Being a butcher for the store? Career. Being a stockboy? Not a career.

8 Million people are cashiers or retail sales, that's what, 6% of the workforce? all of those are supposed to be transient jobs?

And almost all of those are part-time jobs, with a few fulltime positions where a person also has some type of manager overflow position. So yes, those are all transient jobs.

Re: never had it

[Mashiki]

You are a cunt if you think those are anything BUT bottom rung wages

You're the very definition of an entitled asshole who believes that the world owes you a wage. Grow up, get a trade, become a truck driver. If those are the "only jobs available" do what my parents and grandparents did: MOVE. Most often selling all their possessions(minus photographs) along the way to get from one side of the country to the other.

Re: never had it

[K10W]

Where is everybody working with born rich management? I've been an engineer (space physics engineering) for thirty years and can't recall a single person, management or coworker who comes from wealth. In fact it has been my experience to be the opposite. Most everyone is way over the top competitive and does end up well off.

yeah there is a large movement toward disadvantage for the succesful and harder working to make it equal for the less capable or the not as harder working folks by pulling the others down. It is considered that ALL discrimination = bad, yet it is only negative in some instances. Just like the women in tech thing, I personally know some who are VERY capable but they would have been hired regardless of pushing for "quality" by bar lowering. In fact they resent it more, my wife in particular is quite vocal about the issue and cannot argue with her they should be empolyed for their job competence NOT because they have a vagina, it is hard to argue with her. However we SHOULD be discriminating on the basis of competence, every social experiment to raise people up because their environment was keeping they down has failed. Seriously I've looked but cannot find one where it worked as the success stories are those who had the drive and ability to reach escape velocities in those situations anyway. Only time these things go unchallenged is when people do not challenge feelings and emotive thinking with rational thought and logic.

Re: never had it

[Uberbah]

yeah there is a large movement toward disadvantage for the succesful and harder working to make it equal for the less capable

In some alternate universe where this was a meritocracy, instead of a place where the #1 factor in how far you go in life is how much money your daddy has. Not how hard one works - else every elementary schoolteacher would be worth millions, while investment bankers would be cramming four bankers into an efficiency.

https://www.washingtonpost.com...

Re: never had it

[K10W]

yeah there is a large movement toward disadvantage for the succesful and harder working to make it equal for the less capable

In some alternate universe where this was a meritocracy, instead of a place where the #1 factor in how far you go in life is how much money your daddy has. Not how hard one works - else every elementary schoolteacher would be worth millions, while investment bankers would be cramming four bankers into an efficiency.

https://www.washingtonpost.com...

that is apples to oranges and the fallacy of only high paid positions are filled by the rich who come from money and their competence has naught to do with it. I know plenty with working class / blue collar backgrounds who got prestigeous educations, high company positions, even one who became a ceo before she was 30 all on the basis of competence. Plenty of those of average competence with money backgrounds compared to similar ability folks with less resources may have increased chances of sucess in some sectors and semi get handed stuff on a plate sure. They have to have some level of competence too though, and others CAN work their way up by putting the work in. In fact I've personally seen a few with such backgrounds and slightly below average competence go nowhere when it came to industry and get surpassed by poor background people who put the hours in. I studied at prestigeous university that has higher entrance grades than most and is known to have classist reputation of taking in more "rich" kids but of those I met who were incompetent went on to mediocrity and failure and the ones who did succeed their success was due to the work they put in. I'm not saying money isn't a factor and life is a pure meritocracy, and I understand nepotism is rampant in some industries. On the latter note I do know 3 in higher banking positions and 1 of those is due to who they know purely; funny enough all three are lower middle class backgrounds and 2 got there through hard work.

Re: never had it

[painandgreed]

Not sure what you consider "a decent house". I know friends of mine were able to buy a three bedroom house for about $200k just 3-5 years ago because they did in south Seattle and South Park. I was buying but a year ago the same houses were going for $350k which I was lucky to get. There were still some around $200k but the layouts were messed up with expansions and they were livable but needed to be fixed up. Still, even those were going into bidding wars with no chance of even getting them for that price and probably just to be torn down and rebuilt. The housing market certainly has been getting much hotter in the last two to three years as I was watching and shopping for a house in that time and could see it.

Still, this is the trend Seattle has been on since the .com boom of the mid 90's. Certainly didn't start with Amazon and probably won't finish with them either.

Re: never had it

[tsstahl]

Alaska. Maybe not a 'country', but it is a sovereign entity.

Re: never had it

[redmid17]

It is not.

Re: never had it

[david_thornley]

The hardest-working person I know is the guy who mows my lawn and tends the black raspberry bushes etc. He doesn't make anywhere near the money I do.

Re: never had it

[david_thornley]

Some of my relatives had careers in retail without aspiring to management. They didn't do too badly back in the day.

Re: never had it

[Uberbah]

that is apples to oranges and the fallacy of only high paid positions are filled by the rich who come from money and blah blah blah blah blah

Didn't look at the link, did you? All the working-class people you just hid behind wont make it a tenth as far as the scion of a wealthy family who drank himself through high school and university, based on his daddy's money and connections. Connections that got the drunk frat boy a better job fresh out of graduation than people who have spent ten years "pulling themselves up by their bootstraps" without any such help.

They know it and you know it. Why bother pretending otherwise?

Re:never had it

[dcw3]

This, this, this. Detroit was once the fastest growing city in the nation. It's been on the verge of bankruptcy for years...mostly due to corruption and mismanagement. But the downfall of "the Big Three" hurt more than anything else.

Re: never had it

[dcw3]

"Luck" is mostly being prepared when opportunities present themselves. And, in a big way, hustling to find those opportunities. I've been "lucky" enough to be prepared when people above me were fired, or retired a couple times, to be in line to pop up into those positions. I grew up poor in Detroit, to a single mom. I went in the military because we couldn't afford college, but I waited for nearly a year to get a computer technician slot in '76 because I saw that as a opportunity with huge growth. I went to night school and got my Associate's while I was still in, and then continued to finish my CS, focusing on software because I saw the writing on the wall that hardware jobs were going away in the mid 80s. I'm not clear on what part of it was luck, or privilege, but I eventually got lead and management roles, and now at 59 I'm nearing retirement, but witnessing my company (for many years now) giving extra pay/promotions to women and "persons of color", while they lay off the older high priced folks with severance (attached to agreements not to sue) which I see as blatantly unfair, but all I can do is suck it up because I've got the pension handcuffs on. All I can say is if you're a woman or minority with any decent tech skill, and unable to do well, it's on you because there are lots of opportunities. No, not everyone will make it, no matter how hard they work. Some won't have the proper attitude, and some just won't have the brains...nothing to do with luck or privilege there.

Re: never had it

[dcw3]

Fifteen years ago was more about the housing bubble than Amazon. I sold my townhouse in 2002 for $250k, only to see it be resold two years later for $500k...craziness.

Re: never had it

[dcw3]

For those of you who find this insightful, I'd urge you to learn what it means to have equity. For simplicity, I'll use nice round numbers here. If you bought a $100k place and put down 10%, you start out with 10k equity. If the value of that home doubles to $200k, you now have $110k in equity. Yes, if you move and buy a similar how, that now costs $200k, you could roll that $110k into it with 55% equity. You could take some of it as profit. You could get a Home Equity Line of Credit and use that to pay for things like a car, or your kid's education, and still write off the interest on your taxes as part of your home loan. You could take the once per person tax exemption on the capital gain, and as you suggested, and my wife and I will be doing...sell, move to a lower cost of living area, and downsize in retirement...it's part of my personal retirement plan. So it only "means absolutely nothing" if you plan to stay in the same area/size home for the remainder of your life and never make use of those profits...which is dumb.

Re: never had it

[dcw3]

Mine will be cut in half, even as my retirement home will be more expensive. I'm going to be moving from Fairfax Co., VA's tax hell hole to a suburb of Charlotte, where the rate is less than half what I'm paying here.

Another point that needs to be made is that many localities have tax relief for seniors, and others have tax relief for long term homeowners in high cost areas. My mother-in-law no longer pays property tax on her $400k townhome here.

Re: never had it

[dcw3]

I'm mostly with you on this, but...it depends. For example, you have a lot of people who find themselves (or get themselves) in tough spots. My mother was a single mom at 19. She took a cashier job for many years until she got me through high school. She got to be "head cashier", but that's about the limit of growth opportunity unless you become store manager. That was an 18 year career, at which point, she got into real estate, and did well for herself. Point being, a lot of people don't view those positions as temporary because they don't have the skills or time/funds to obtain skills to move into a better position.

Re: never had it

[wyHunter]

Good luck then having folks be tech workers - given the amount of unpaid overtime we as an industry already work, well, the actual hourly wage isn't that high.

Re: never had it

[cthulhu11]

Microsoft took the soul years before Amazon drove the last nail in the coffin.

Between the two of them they've created a class of haves and have-nots far beyond their hallways. A growing number of medical providers take only their insurance -- why go through the hassle of taking anyone else's when dealing with just one is an ample cash cow? That reduces the ability of others to get services.

My college had an alumni event on an Argosy cruise. I was denied boarding because I wasn't with Microsoft -- the cruise people heard "School of Computer Science" and wrote down "Microsoft". The inner party / outer party / proles segregation started long before Amazon, as did the inflation of housing prices. Fifteen years ago I read that King County was 4th in the country with millionaires -- 68000 of them. That does not benefit the rest of us, it just prices housing out of reach.

A small fraction of Amazon's employees, the few citizens they let in, are paid well, if they can survive long enough for their RSUs to start vesting. The rest, the h1-b grunts, not so much.

"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"

[Nidi62]

I don't live in SEA, but where I live, over the past 2 years the value of my house has risen about 10% and added about $200 to my mortgage. If their houses have doubled in value, then their property taxes have risen dramatically as well, significantly increasing their monthly payments. Government salaries rise slowly, so houses they could afford only a few years ago now put them in the red every month.

Re:"Not a good thing"

[Anonymous Coward]

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.

Seattle doesn't have the authority to decide how much to pay teachers; that's a state-level decision. In a state which education funding that got the state legislature held in contempt of court for being too low. This is the most egregious example, but in general, Seattle has been held back from government that makes sense for an urban area due to the state government (for similar reasons to federal government) being slanted toward the rural areas.

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.

Housing policy in the US is centered on two contradictory goals: everyone should own a home as their largest investment and everyone should be able to afford a place to live. You're right, for the people who had those houses as investments, this is great. But that's a tiny proportion of population that the benefit is going to. And because they are attached to those rising house prices, they are vehemently against any policies that would make housing less expensive. Which gets us to the local politics being a mess: a lot of local Seattle/King County politics can be seen as an argument between the home-owners and the renters (see: the current mayor race).

Re: "Not a good thing"

[Applehu Akbar]

"the value of my house has risen about 10% and added about $200 to my mortgage..."

Then you must be Canadian or British. Our mortgages stay the same as equity rises. But be careful, because they also stay the same if equity drops.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[jeff4747]

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.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[kamaaina]

Under certain circumstances you can get rid of escrow and pay principle and interest monthly and Taxes and insurance twice a year. The interest in the escrow is yours.

I think you cannot have more than 80% of your loan to value of your home, good credit and it never went down more than 25 points for the past quarter.

There are some other requirements as well, but I think those are the big ones.

Re:"Not a good thing"

[ShanghaiBill]

it is incredibly bad strategy to displace the workers who maintain it.

Working people are being pushed out by zoning laws and restrictions on the construction of affordable housing. Blaming that on Amazon is idiotic. If Seattle wants to be affordable to working people, they should approve a lot more building permits.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[Megane]

I'll rephrase what was stated in another reply. In the US, most mortgages pay the property tax and roll it into the monthly interest payments via an escrow account. This ensures that the property doesn't get repossessed for failure to pay the taxes.

Basically, a sharply increasing property value is only good if you both own the property outright and the property tax does not increase beyond your ability to pay it... or if you were about to sell it and move out of town anyhow.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[Megane]

The mortgage isn't increasing, but the property tax escrow is (usually) rolled into the monthly payment, and that is what causes higher payments. The property tax is based on a percentage of the property's value as assessed by the local (usually county) government, which may be higher or lower than its real value if it were put on the market, and which also may be subject to limits of how much it can be increased each year, such as 10% a per year maximum increase.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[Wrath0fb0b]

Which is why a lot of States limit the taxed value from rising more than a certain percentage each year, even if the assessed value skyrockets.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[Applehu Akbar]

But in the UK, isn't a change in prevailing interest rate reflected in mortgages already outstanding, rather than the rate being fixed at whatever it was when the mortgage was made? In a rising market with money getting tighter and rates rising, that would mean rising payments.

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.

Re:"Not a good thing"

[Imrik]

The funding level isn't really what got them held in contempt of court. People voted to require that education be "fully funded" without really considering what that meant. All the state government really had to do to meet the requirement was ban local levies to raise money for schools. The legislature was held in contempt of court because they didn't do that immediately and instead took the time to replace that money before ending the levies.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[rfengr]

The taxes don’t have to be put in escrow, that’s just how most do it. What’s scary is the interest rate tied to federal. Are most non-USA mortgages adjustable rate?

Re:"Not a good thing"

[deathguppie]

It's actually crazy easy to get a building permit in Seattle right now. (sic. My brother works as a building inspector in the area.) The fact is that why would anyone buy a crazy expensive piece of land and then build something "affordable" on it. That's insane. You can toss up one of those square box stick houses with 4 bedrooms and a postage stamp yard and sell it in a day for more than $750K. It isn't zoning and restrictions it's just the market working the way it's supposed to.

Now if you want to bitch about the city council.. I'm ready to sing right along with you. They've forced landlords to lower what they can screen for, for applicant's to a point that now more and more rental properties won't even offer you an application unless you can show a better than 700 credit score. 690 is a pretty good score, but not enough to rent many places in Seattle. Instead of making it easier for lower income people to find housing they've actually made it harder for the average working class person to find it.

Re:"Not a good thing"

[Lord Flipper]

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.

Somebody gets it. Thank you.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[jwdb]

It's not a separate check, it is the mortgage payment. The mortgage includes the escrow. It's part of the agreement between the homeowner and the bank.

Although it often will be, it doesn't have to be. My mortgage documents (California) had a box I could tick that indicated I would be entirely responsible for insurance and taxes, and that the bank would not collect and pay them for me. I did so, as I'd rather be aware of and manage those payments myself, and I'm financially knowledgeable enough to do so. My mortgage payment therefore only contains equity and interest, nothing else.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[jwdb]

... as well as discouraging people from selling their house, since even if they buy another of equal value it'll cost them more in property taxes.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[mapkinase]

There was a system in the past that people serving buildings had special living quater accomodations that came with the job.

It was not a bad system.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[AvitarX]

They lump them into the payment for primary mortgages usually, because if you stop paying property taxes the government gets priority over the bank in repayment.

If I buy a house, and stop paying property taxes, the bank is screwed, not the government. What they do is make you pay one year of property taxes when you sign the mortgage (also insurance) and put it into escrow. Then, a certain amount of your monthly payment goes into the escrow, and they pay out when the bill is due (with adjustments made if the bills change).

Now 10% = $200/month seems crazy high to me. I've owned houses in three municipalities spread between two states. the prices varied between .75% and 1.25% of purchase price. Two of those municipalities charges based on assessed value which was well under the purchase price, but could change. The third charges on purchase price which meant they would never change.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[AvitarX]

That's arguably OK though.

It gives a slight leg up to current residents over new ones, which I personally think is OK. It makes it harder to displace people through increased value.

I feel the same way about rent control.

Note, this is because I feel there is a non monetary benefit to people not being driven from their home, extended families forced apart, etc. It's an opinion, not a fact I suppose, but one I subscribe to.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[AvitarX]

Or you're in a municipality that uses purchase price for taxes (Philly used to be this way).

Re: "Not a good thing"

[jeff4747]

That's your house payment, not your mortgage payment. Semantics are everything.

Colloquial usage of language exists. You either deal with it, or you're the annoying person at the party complaining how everyone is not speaking properly.

Re:"Not a good thing"

[epine]

How can that possibly be a bad thing?

Some people win, therefore no people lose. Nice argument you got there, shame if something should happen to it.

You don't even seem to realize that families are multi-generational affairs.

In a free market, anyone can change their location at any time in response to changing economic conditions. But just try to take your spouse or your social network with you at the same time.

Winner: affluence. Loser: social cohesion.

There, was that actually so difficult to figure out?

Re: "Not a good thing"

[vovin]

Most locales today are ad valorem (taxed at market value). Here there is still a cap .. your market value is capped at 10% increase per yer. If you do any improvements to the property that cap is tossed.
Also the estimated percent of property taxes is 1% for a first ~100k (may have changed) and then 2% there after.
Also insurance is included int the mortgage* payment.
Mortgage includes: Interest + Principal + Property Taxes + Property Insurance + PMI**

* This all assumes your mortgage is with a bank or lending institution as opposed to a private party.
** Bank's repayment insurance .. if your equity to loan ratio is less than 20% [or 30% in some locations] of value.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[Rakarra]

When you make your mortgage payment, you're also paying your property tax

Weird. I've never lived in a city in the US that did it that way. I've always cut a check to the county property tax manager. I didn't know anyone else ever bundled it into the mortgage. Great if you like a steady payment that never varies, not so great if you don't appreciate having to pay money before it's due.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[Rakarra]

It gives a slight leg up to current residents over new ones, which I personally think is OK. It makes it harder to displace people through increased value.

More than just ok, it was the entire impetus behind those property tax increase limitations. :-D

Re:"Not a good thing"

[ShanghaiBill]

why would anyone buy a crazy expensive piece of land and then build something "affordable" on it.

You don't buy expensive land and build a small house. You build a tall apartment building.

So why aren't builders building affordable high density vertical housing?
Answer: Zoning.

Re:"Not a good thing"

[cyberchondriac]

Note that the article didn't say all houses for teachers and cops, it specifically stated those houses with a "water view": IOW, primo real estate.
If I were a teacher or cop, I don't think that I'd expect to be able to afford prime waterfront real estate, those are traditionally middle class paying jobs.

Re:"Not a good thing"

[painandgreed]

it is incredibly bad strategy to displace the workers who maintain it.

Working people are being pushed out by zoning laws and restrictions on the construction of affordable housing. Blaming that on Amazon is idiotic. If Seattle wants to be affordable to working people, they should approve a lot more building permits.

SF may have an issue with building permits, but certainly not Seattle. Block after block after block of new multi-story dual use aprartments have gone up all across the city. Even the low income complexes have been razed and rebuilt as nicer low income complexes with more units. I can look outside my work at see two blocks of apartment buildings that were built two years ago and see two more currently being built. Light rail went south and huge apartment complexes sprung up at all the stops along with more shopping. Seattle is building, building, building and studies show this is keeping prices from rising as much as they would have. Trouble is that nobody is going to build cheap places so all the new places are not just new but really nice and sell to people that can afford them. They replaced the rat traps that used to exist because those places couldn't bring in enough money to offset the rise in property taxes let lone what they could bring in with nice apartments. Those older apartments that aren't getting torn down are being remodled and rented for twice the amount. Rents are going up mroe and more if you haven't bought already and the city population has doubled in the last ten years with people who can afford nicer places.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[david_thornley]

Weird. Most of the mortgages I've known have had escrow payments for insurance and taxes. This requires some additional trust on the part of whoever's issuing the mortgage, so I'd imagine most first-time buyers would have escrow accounts.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[dcw3]

Here (Fairfax Co, VA), homes are assessed at market value, and there doesn't seem to be any such cap on increases. My home value has increased roughly 75% since we bought it in 2000, but my property tax has more than doubled. The assessors here are too lazy to actually check anything. I discovered on the that they had us listed with a finished basement, brick exterior and patio...wrong on all counts, two of which they could have seen just by driving by. This cost me a ton in taxes and wasn't discovered for a few years. Of course, they'd only reimburse me for the most recent couple. Now, they're at it again...increasing my assessment higher than many of my neighbors who's homes are worth much more than mine. Talk to me about big government...this is an example of what you get for all your extra money.

Re: "Not a good thing"

[dcw3]

FWIW, every one of the five locations I've lived in do it that way. But, I don't think it's necessarily the "city" so much as the financial institution you're dealing with.

A single giant corporation dominates the city?

[Cyberpunk Reality]

See my name.

Don't talk about economic outcomes in aggregate

[Anonymous Coward]

Seattle's homeless population is huge and growing.

Re:Don't talk about economic outcomes in aggregate

[iggymanz]

or in 90% of the cases maybe blame adult babies that don't take responsibility for themselves and expect a handout?

Re:Don't talk about economic outcomes in aggregate

[ChrisMaple]

Why are you posting on slashdot instead of using the internet to search for a job?

Re:Don't talk about economic outcomes in aggregate

[aaarrrgggh]

This isn't what causes homelessness; it is the fact that far too many live paycheck to paycheck, and can't survive "bad things" happening to them. It can quickly spiral out of control. Add in mental illness and addictive behavior and it only gets worse.

There are of course people that do choose to be homeless, but it is not a major percentage on a collective scale. (Places like the Haight used to be disproportionately this type of person, not sure about today-- but it is a local phenomenon.)

Re:Don't talk about economic outcomes in aggregate

[iggymanz]

wrong, you're merely spewing bullshit that sounds good. in most cases they were on welfare before

Re:Don't talk about economic outcomes in aggregate

[iggymanz]

we have the lowest unemployment rate since 2001 right now, you're doing something wrong

A 2nd HQ, or a smokescreen for an eventual move?

[Guppy]

Although Amazon has stated that they plan to establish a "2nd" HQ that is to be equal to their first, I have to wonder if the motivation is to set up an alternative location that could eventually surpass Seattle and become the primary HQ. It's apparent that there is growing resentment over Amazon's impact on the city, and maybe Amazon is planning ahead for a day when the local political environment is too hostile to support its continued growth.

If that happens, the locals anti-Amazon crowd may end up pondering the wisdom of being careful what you wish for.

Most teams at Amazon require Seattle Hundreds...

[Anonymous Coward]

and don't allow any vacation time off, so they're not better than the start-ups here the past twenty years or so. Never had a vacation my entire life, so I'm bitter working at Amazon where they let Indians take 3+ weeks off contiguous. Yes, their plane tickets home are expensive and take a lot of time to get there and back, but Americans should be allowed time off. Only had a single vacation day off the past six years here at Amazon, and that was to move so that wasn't a relaxing day obviously.

When costs rise, things tend to be good

[guruevi]

When costs for housing rises, the city gets more property tax income, criminal activity goes down and the city can give police officers and teachers their much needed raises while the schools get better. If Amazon built outside the city, like many companies at one point did (eg. the Google and Apple campus), then you complain about companies destroying the small towns with zero-tax deals and using land that was once grasslands and wildlife while not giving back to the community.

It doesn't stop the teachers and police officers that live there from continuing to live there and if they want to, they can sell the house for a tidy profit, get themselves into a better position, go live in the suburbs, get better educated or retire early.

We're also very sad the fish mongers no longer occupy the houses near the river or the horse buggy makers near the city gates.

Re:When costs rise, things tend to be good

[zzyzx]

Property tax doesn't work like that in King County. The amount collected is fixed and it's divvied up by figuring out your ratio of appraised value to the county as a whole. As my house has gone up in value, my taxes have gone up some years and down others, depending on how the year went.

Re:When costs rise, things tend to be good

[PPH]

Costs rise because demand rises. Demand rises due to a growing economy. Another time Seattle's economy grew this fast was during the Alaska gold rush. Seattle was the outfitter and jumping off point for the prospectors. And often where the wealthy ones brought their money back to.

This boom also attracted large numbers of unemployed people looking for opportunities that never materialized. These people ended up living along what was known as Skid road. Now they arrive, hoping for some of that Amazon gold, or a $15/hour job and pitch tents along I-5. History repeats itself.

Re:When costs rise, things tend to be good

[uvajed_ekil]

Property tax doesn't work like that in King County. The amount collected is fixed and it's divvied up by figuring out your ratio of appraised value to the county as a whole. As my house has gone up in value, my taxes have gone up some years and down others, depending on how the year went.

Tax revenue goes up when business boom, due to the increased income that companies like Amazon are being taxed on, while rates should more or less stay the same or fluctuate only slightly. In my neck of the woods, some communities offer far superior services such as schools, police and fire, recreation facilities, roads, etc., because they have large corporate tax bases, and often a lot of wealthy residents. In some cases, they are also able to keep rates lower because the per capita income they are taxing is so high. So the rich get richer, the poor are continually penalized, generally. The levy system is fairly convoluted and pretty screwy though. I can't believe that the situation in Seattle is all that bad, seeing as everyone seems to be willing to pay a premium to live there.

Re:When costs rise, things tend to be good

[uvajed_ekil]

When Amazon fully departs, Seattle will be become the Detroit of the NWP. Hahaha

Yeah, it sucks when a company's presence is responsible for revitalizing a whole city. Amazon is the behemoth, but it isn't like they are dying or leaving any time soon, or like there hasn't been a ton of collateral growth that will be perfectly sustainable. Detroit's decline was slow, and the city wasn't a paradise even when the big three automakers were booming. Seattle was trendy and had a lot going for it before Amazon became what it is today.

Re:When costs rise, things tend to be good

[ChrisMaple]

Unless the city government is corrupt, if the assessed value of all houses doubles then the mil rate falls by half, leaving total taxes constant.

Re:When costs rise, things tend to be good

[guruevi]

Only for people that BUY the houses. Existing property owners do not get reassessed. It also depends on how your taxes are calculated but typically, you're off pretty good as long as you hold onto the property.

Re:When costs rise, things tend to be good

[demonlapin]

Not everyone lives in California. In most states, reassessment happens whenever the county/city feels like it.

Re:When costs rise, things tend to be good

[Imrik]

Re do the calculation with the increased money going towards subsidizing homelessness.

Re:When costs rise, things tend to be good

[MountainLogic]

uvajed_ekil, note that zzyzx said that net property taxes for the county are fixed. As a resident of Seattle's host county, King, I can attest to that. I live in rural King county and as the Urban core's property values went way up mine remained relatively fixed despite a increase in the county tax due to new levies. My rural property valuation has just started to increase post recession so I am now seeing my bill go up. I don't know if Washington state is unique or not, but yes, property levies are indeed based on a fixed total to be collected per year divided by property assessments. If you live in a small town and your neighbor build a multi-million dollar house and their are no new levies then your tax bell should go down. This is one reason rural towns fight so hard to get anything expensive, like data centers built in their town even if it will bring few jobs.
vajed_ekil is right about other revenues as Seattle sales tax has boomed from Amazon and the tech boom. It is worth noting that Washington has a high sales tax rate to make-up for the fast that Washington has NO income tax. Because of the lack of an income tax property and sales taxes are high result in in one of the more regressive tax systems in the country. Believe it or not, even BIll Gates has been pushing for an income tax to make the tax system more fair.

Re:A 2nd HQ, or a smokescreen for an eventual move

[guruevi]

The problem is that they've grown too large to sustain their own growth. It makes more sense to set up second headquarters far away from there if the costs are lower.

So because of Amazon, costs have gone up for real estate and wages, but Amazon is also paying these costs, basically eating it's own tail.

Re:A 2nd HQ, or a smokescreen for an eventual move

[Sarusa]

The anti-Amazon crowd wouldn't mind if Amazon left and took half the tech jobs. Just makes it more of a 'hipster'* / counterculture paradise like Portland and Detroit - the inner bit, which is all that counts since that's where the non-brown people are.

* Provide your own definition since nobody can agree on one.

Amazon and Microsoft make Seattle MISERABLE.

[Futurepower(R)]

Amazon and Microsoft contribute to making Seattle a MISERABLE place to live. The world, not just Seattle, needs better city management. (Posting this again, with improvements.)

Amazon: Worse than Wal-Mart: Amazon's sick brutality and secret history of ruthlessly intimidating workers (February 23, 2014)

Amazon: Inside Amazon: Wrestling Big Ideas in a Bruising Workplace (August 15, 2015) Quote: "The company is conducting an experiment in how far it can push white-collar workers..."

Amazon: Amazon Under Fire Over Alleged Worker Abuse in Germany (February 19, 2013)

Microsoft: Microsoft Is Filled With Abusive Managers And Overworked Employees, Says Tell-All Book (May 23, 2012) The Microsoft headquarters is in Redmond, part of the Seattle metropolitan area.

Seattle: Together with Amazon, Microsoft, and inadequate city management, Seattle is an extremely miserable place:

Traffic: Seattle one of the worst U.S. cities for traffic congestion, tied with NYC (March 31, 2015) Quote: "An additional 23 minutes a day spent in traffic may not sound like much, but when it adds up over a year it becomes 89 hours." (Whoever wrote that must be accustomed to Seattle misery. An additional 23 minutes a day spent in traffic sounds HORRIBLE.)

Slow internet: Many areas of Seattle have poor internet connections. See the article, These places have the slowest Internet in the country. (June 25, 2015) Quote: "... Seattle ... CenturyLink (CTL) customers trying to access particular sites from 9 p.m. to 10 p.m. will have unbearably slow speeds."

Important questions for city managers and residents of Amazon's new city: 1) Do you want to invite a company to your city that has a history of abusiveness? 2) Could the managers of Amazon's new city manage Amazon's growth, or would it be almost completely out of their control?

Re:Amazon and Microsoft make Seattle MISERABLE.

[KC0A]

The August 15, 2015 article was a hatchet job. The Times reporters interviewed a handful of unhappy ex-employees and gave Amazon no opportunity to respond in the article. Amazon did respond later (https://medium.com/@jaycarney/what-the-new-york-times-didn-t-tell-you-a1128aa78931) and anyone who quotes the article should also mention the Amazon's response. Around Amazon HQ the article was considered laughable to the point that someone created a "desk-crying-interest" mailing list. Seriously, I've never seen anyone crying at their desk or anywhere else for that matter.

I've been around tech a long time. After three decades as a developer I was ready for a move to the West coast and got recruited by and then got an offer from Amazon. My experience has been good, and all in all it's one of the happiest places I've worked. No one is pretending it's perfect. We know there are thousands of things we can do better. We're trying.

Went from a Microsoft Culture to Amazon?

[mykepredko]

I never knew Seattle before Microsoft, but through the 90's and 00's, Microsoft (and maybe a bit of Intel, both of whom I was a customer of through this time) was a dominant force there.

Isn't this a case of one artificial culture replacing another?

Re:Went from a Microsoft Culture to Amazon?

[93 Escort Wagon]

I grew up about 40 miles to the south of Seattle, then lived in the city from 1978 to 1990. My wife and I decided to move out of Seattle at that point, after we decided to start a family (we weren’t fans of the schools). This was well before Amazon existed, but even back then locals were lamenting the loss of the Seattle we’d known. You can track down episodes of Almost Live from that time period (an iconic local comedy sketch show) and find others who grew up here expressing similar sentiments.

But, back then, we were complaining about the influx of guys like Egan - migrants from the east coast and (especially) California - who came here and fundamentally changed the city’s attitude. So it’s all a matter of perspective.

Anyway, to wrap it up - if you don’t know who J.P. Patches was, you are not in a position to complain about Seattle’s changes.

Re: Went from a Microsoft Culture to Amazon?

[93 Escort Wagon]

Remember, kids! Be like Billy! Behave yourself!

Portland, Oregon: Constant traffic and pollution

[Futurepower(R)]

" 'hipster'* / counterculture paradise like Portland..."

Portland is no longer the city it once was. Now there are constant traffic jams and the increased pollution caused by slow-moving cars.

Portland City managers are allowing the construction of large buildings with no parking.

It lost its soul

[nospam007]

when Frazier was cancelled.

Re:A 2nd HQ, or a smokescreen for an eventual move

[Frosty Piss]

It's apparent that there is growing resentment over Amazon's impact on the city, and maybe Amazon is planning ahead for a day when the local political environment is too hostile to support its continued growth.

The net effect of Amazon leaving Seattle would be like the auto industry leaving Detroit. There would be a mass exodus of hipsters, and in a sense the Amazon Bubble would pop leaving a significant number of losers.

And I'm all for it.

Times change

[Ayano]

So does the submitter suggest Amazon set up in the middle of a desert where there's no Impact? Does the desert have highly educated workers? A diverse environment and pool of talent to select from? Infrastructure? Proximity to Colleges?

The first rule of starting off or making expansions to any business to minimize the self cost by getting partners or investors. Amazon isn't going to set up in the middle of nowhere to build up from nothing like los vegas for the good of all, nor should it expect to.

Cascadia Subduction Zone?

[boudie2]

Earthquake insurance in a seismically active state like Washington is expensive. For a brick home, worth $500,000 the NW Insurance Council estimates rates could be as low as $3 for each $1,000 of the home's value to as much as $15. That works out to an annual premium of between $1,500 to $7,500 per year.

Re: Cascadia Subduction Zone?

[deathguppie]

As stated the area has a history of seismic activity. Earthquakes are not anything new to Seattle. Many of these brick houses were built in the 1920's and 30's and have been surviving earthquakes for nearly a century. To add to that these brick houses are often some of the most sought after properties because of their architectural uniqueness. Most people who own them at this point have retrofitted the homes to survive earthquakes by hiring a structural engineer and adding internal structure and tying things together. It's not nearly as crazy as it seems.

Asimov?

[Latent Heat]

So the First Amazon, on the farthest reaches of the American continent, was based on technology and engineering. The Second Amazon, its location kept secret but as far from the First Amazon as possible in the oldest American city, was based on persuasion and manipulating customers' minds?

And when the First Amazon fails/falls, the Second Amazon will already have taken over without anyone knowing about it. But then the whole thing will be proved a sham as everything was a scheme hatched by the first intelligent robot?

Re:Asimov?

[Megane]

But who was The Mule?

Re:Asimov?

[wyHunter]

If this is the case, then, the second Amazon has to be in New York City, the closest thing in the USA to Trantor :)

You don't need to displace them

[rsilvergun]

you just need to lower their quality of life substantially. You can get away with it to by getting each group (teachers, cops, cooks, mechanics) to blame the other group. It's been done this way for thousands of years with minimal side effects (you pay your cops bribes but it's still cheaper than a middle class salary). The system works... for the very wealthy. But the working class has fell for it since there was a working class.

Oh, this is what government is for, btw. You build a powerful government as a tool to balance the power otherwise held by the very wealthy. Sure, if you're not careful it gets abused, but the same thing can be said for any tool (fire, guns, cars).

Re:(Sigh) not a NYTimes Op-Ed

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the Bend Bulletin is republishing the op-ed that originally ran in the New York Times.

That's why the Bend Bulletin specifically credits it to the New York Times news service.

Re:A 2nd HQ, or a smokescreen for an eventual move

[RoscoeChicken]

Seattle is attempting to engineer implementation of income tax through a court challenge of WA State's laws forbidding such, arguing that the ban only applies at the state level. If the city succeeds, every county and state government in WA State will at least look at the possibity of levying an income tax.

HQ2 will either be in Texas, where Bezos owns a large rance, or Florida, where Bezos grew up. Both are staunchly anti income tax, with Florida's ban being part of the state constitution.

Why is the NYT obsessed with Seattle?

[tipo159]

The NY Times seems oddly obsessed with Seattle. I did a search on the NYT web site to see if I am imagining things, but there were a lot of stories there on events and trends in Seattle that I would think only matter to people who live in Seattle.

Re: A 2nd HQ, or a smokescreen for an eventual mov

[Dripdry]

Great idea. I would piggyback on that and ask whether it will be used as a bargaining chip instead of just an eventual move.

Re: Most teams at Amazon require Seattle Hundreds.

[uvajed_ekil]

My company (an international company with over 80k employees) has had IT positions open for 6 months on a perfectly liveable salary here,

Sure you do. What you really mean is you post fake jobs for 6 months. You don't fill the open positions, and you have no intention of ever filling the open positions. Your company never hires anyone. Why aren't you hiring?

That's a ridiculous thing to assert without having any real information, you anonymous coward. I know of another company there that has constant openings without pointlessly posting fake jobs. Why can't you understand that demand can be greater than supply? Sure, real estate and other costs are way up in places like Seattle, but so are wages, and not just in IT. I've looked there and seen some impressive openings but haven't found the right time and the right opportunity to pull the trigger on.

Re:Somebody feeling left out?

[jeff4747]

That is, in fact, a damn good thing for the cops and teachers who bought undervalued homes there in the past. Maybe their next homes won't feature the same prime locations, but they'll likely be bigger and nicer, or be paid for largely in cash

Because there are never any new cops or teachers.

Chicken Little

[konohitowa]

It's a good thing Chicken Little didn't get paid for clicks. I'm sure that more than the sky would have been falling.

So what about the Boeing collapse of the early 70's? http://www.historylink.org/Fil...

What about Seattle being named "Most Livable City" in the early 90's after which the Californication occurred?

The lack of perspective and knowledge from journalists does more damage than anything Amazon could ever do.

Re:The Left always complaining

[ChrisMaple]

Quod erat demonstrandum.

Re: Most teams at Amazon require Seattle Hundreds.

[ChrisMaple]

It's obvious why you can't get a job. Some day, if you ever grow up, you might try re-reading your post.

Re:Chicago can take 50k no problem...

[ChrisMaple]

When you look for a new large center for your business, one of the things you should actively avoid is a city with legendary levels of corruption. Chicago, New York, Boston, and New Orleans should be rejected without further consideration.

Re:Somebody feeling left out?

[suutar]

or renters

Yep

[ArchieBunker]

Shop around for a better deal on taxes. Moving the HQ to Pittsburgh makes sense because of how low the wages and cost of living is. All that money goes right back into the company's pocket.

Bangalore

[PixetaledPikachu]

Absolutely! Instead of Seattle, they should have taken their money and job opportunity to Bangalore

Re:Bangalore

[mr_mischief]

Isn't Bangalore overdone these days? I hear good things about second outsourcing centers in Hyderabad...

Oh, please, zip it already.

[Qbertino]

Its not just the Bro-grammers, the standard programmers who were neurotic anxious kids themselves are the main bullies in IT. They prefer to blame everyone and everything except themselves for their personal failures, and failure to understand the real world. They isolate themselves in commute buses and avoid interacting with "normal" city residents, instead creating a single "inner party" enclave in which they now belong fulfilling deep seated needs, and love throwing everyone they can out. Even to the destruction of the city, region, and nation that they live in. Fuck the geeks who never grew out of being childish idiots.

Oh, zip it already. Please.

Jejus HB Chrickey, how much I've heard this nonsense. Yes we were anxious as a kid. That's what lead me to Zen philosophy at the age of 14. Truth be told: We *are* smarter than many other people around us - especially when it comes to seeing how society works. That's because many a nerd was on the recieving end when it came to bullying. One of the scariest things for me to discover in my mid-40ies is that I was right all along. With 16 you think you're surrounded by idiots. Noticing at the age of 45 that that might actually really be the case is a really scary thing.

I would take a special bus. Not because I don't like to interact with people. I very much do. I just don't like them puking all over me because they spent the night getting drunk while I was at the local hackerspace talking new software kits or our social dancing with cute and sexy ladies that aren't dumb as a post.

Truth be told, the world would be a better place if it were run by smart people. Yes, Sergey Brin is a bit wacky with his AR glasses and both Steve Jobs and Elon Musk appear to have an ego bigger than the known universe, but they actually quite often know what they're talking about and have a track record to prove it.

Just look at the stupidity in the public intellectual and political debate (US, Germany, everywhere) and you need not wonder for a second why smart people leave it all behind, go into the desert and start a tech empire that rules the world. I can't really blame them.

And nobody blaming anyone for their personal faliures. Or flooring a city. This is ultimate non-sense. As far as I can tell Amazon at least is trying to build office buildings that aren't complete shite and adding way more cultural value to Seatle than any yet-another-mass-entertainment-arena or consumer temple/ shopping mall ever could.

The curve for humanity points upwards only because of science and technology. Tech wins. Maybe Twitter or Snapchat seem to be a step backwards, but what they actually do is illustrate to the majority that their priorities my actually be quite stupid. But in general tech wins and moves humanity forward faster than ever - that's a plain and simple fact. So, yes, being righteous about it might actually be justified.

Bottom line:
Chill. And think about wether the smart people might actually be right most of the time - especially when it comes to analysing, building and shaping the world
we live in.

My 2 cents.

Re:Oh, please, zip it already.

[Imrik]

Smart people in charge only works if their self-interest coincides with improving the world. As this is rarely the case, I would prefer stupid corrupt people to smart corrupt people.

Re:Oh, please, zip it already.

[redmid17]

Smarter when it comes to social things? Sure why not.

Re:Oh, please, zip it already.

[david_thornley]

Smart people in charge doesn't always work. Ideally, you'd have smart people in charge, but not all smart people should be trusted with running anything.

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Imagine if you didn't have Amazon

[Karmashock]

many places in the country are eager to have amazon because they know the value of what is being invested in their local economy... because they don't have it. Some areas take this sort of thing for granted. They forget that the paint can chip and the new houses can turn into crack houses.

Took your soul? Like the Auto industry took Detroit's soul or the finance industry took Manhattan's soul. Sure... and what do you have when they're gone. Tell me how happy you are when the money is gone.

What city doesn't want Amazon?

[EllisDees]

There are so many medium sized cities across the US that would love to have the problems that Seattle has. Growth? Check! Great jobs that aren't going away any time soon? Check! Rising income? Check!

Someone is going to complain no matter what happens. If nobody invests in your city (see Detroit), then it's been abandoned by the high tech economy. If they do, then it's taking away the soul of the city. Ridiculous.

What soul?

[drew_kime]

I live in Cleveland. They can have the soul.

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[account_deleted]

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HQ2

[LesserWeevil]

Put it in Dallas. Great transportation hub and it's trying really hard to buy itself a soul.

Re:HQ2

[KC0A]

Dallas has a soul, you just have to know where to find it. There's great live jazz in Dallas at various venues seven nights a week, and several independent companies doing excellent work.

Re:HQ2

[KC0A]

Independent THEATER companies.

Re:Most teams at Amazon require Seattle Hundreds..

[KC0A]

I'm skeptical. Amazon's vacation benefits are public information. Starting full-time salaried employees in Seattle get 6 paid holidays, ten days of vacation, six personal days, plus some paid sick time. The second year it's the same, but fifteen days of vacation. My teammates take their vacation. In my experience the company all but requires people to take their earned time off. If Amazon employees haven't used their vacation, their manager is automatically notified. My manager takes his and expects everyone on the team to take theirs.

You don't get to control other people

[TheSync]

You don't get to control other people. If a company and its employees want to move into a city, as long as they are making mutually agreeable free market transactions with private land owners to achieve that, tough luck!

If you have a problem, move. No one owns a city. You own your own property (so don't sell it/rent it to a corporation). If you rent, you own nothing, and are free to move when you want to.

Seattle's soul is buried.

[Hallux-F-Sinister]

I've been there. You can tour it. I forget exactly where, (it was over a dozen years ago,) but the town's soul is now literally underneath the modern city. Once upon a time it would flood there routinely, so to prevent future damage, the city raised the grade about a whole floor, 10 or 12 feet UP, and issued people ladders, but made them, property-owners, individually responsible for connecting an opening on the second floor of their buildings, to the new elevated grade. Many people died, they said on the tour, returning from a night of drinking and being unable to navigate the ladders, until finally all the holes around buildings were covered. BUT the underground, or portions of it, are still there, and it's a fascinating tour, and parts are illuminated by grates in the sidewalk above, or by inset pieces of glass that people above walk all over daily. If I were within less than a hundred miles of the place, (instead of across the country,) I'd go visit it again. Hmmm... road trip?

Re:You paid by Amazon too, eh?

[KC0A]

It clears every month.

Re: Don't forget the god complexes

[Rakarra]

One reason I'm very selective in who I teach things to. This violent transparency in IT where knowledge you accumulate is supposed to be freely shared is the bane of everyone's careers at some point.

The alternative only makes logical sense to the geek, but of it course, it ends up even much worse for him. The geek who "defensively" hoards knowledge gets the reputation of being unfriendly and hard to work with. It doesn't matter if you know the infrastructure inside and out -- employers are perfectly capable of hiring people who are just as capable of learning as you are, and they'll be happy to replace a bad employee with a good one.

Re:It's good to be a modern day bully.

[Rakarra]

$ helicopter > $ alfa romeo now who is poor?

Those step-parents don't own a helicopter, they ARE helicopters.