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Amazon Threatens To Move Jobs Out of Seattle Over New Tax (theguardian.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Amazon has threatened to move jobs out of its hometown of Seattle after the city council introduced a new tax to try to address the homelessness crisis. The world's second-biggest company has warned that the "hostile" tax, which will charge firms $275 per worker a year to fund homelessness outreach services and affordable housing, "forces us to question our growth here."
Amazon, which is Seattle's biggest private sector employer with more than 40,000 staff in the city, had halted construction work on a 17-storey office tower in protest against the tax. Pressure from Amazon and other big employers, including Starbucks and Expedia, had forced councillors to reduce the tax from an initial proposal of $500 per worker. The tax will only effect companies making revenue of more than $20 million-a-year. The tax is expected to raise between $45 million and $49 million a year, of which about $10 million would come from Amazon. The company said it would restart building work on the tower but may sublease another new office block to reduce its tax bill.
Amazon, which is Seattle's biggest private sector employer with more than 40,000 staff in the city, had halted construction work on a 17-storey office tower in protest against the tax. Pressure from Amazon and other big employers, including Starbucks and Expedia, had forced councillors to reduce the tax from an initial proposal of $500 per worker. The tax will only effect companies making revenue of more than $20 million-a-year. The tax is expected to raise between $45 million and $49 million a year, of which about $10 million would come from Amazon. The company said it would restart building work on the tower but may sublease another new office block to reduce its tax bill.
They just come back. A midwest city tried putting them on a plane with a one way ticket to Honolulu. They won't die of exposure sleeping in a park. And they'll never scrape together enough money for airfare back. But Hawaii put a stop to that. Anywhere else is just a Greyhound bus ride away. And the homeless influx into Seattle is accelerating now that the city council has found more funds for them.
Have gnu, will travel.
Except Oklahoma and Arkansas are not low tax states. Florida, New Hampshire and Texas however are.
And Esp. FL and TX plenty of firms are moving to. You are correct that taxes aren't everything, but when they become onerous to the point of putting the firm at a competitive disadvantage. Then at some point the costs involved with moving are lower than staying.
A super-liberal company in a super-liberal city complaining about taxes for social programs. That's rich. I thought liberals wanted big government programs to take care of the down-trodden. Amazon is all for more social programs at the federal level, but they hire a truckload of lawyers to set up tax shelters and move money into offshore accounts to avoid paying their fair share of federal taxes. Someone else is footing the bill for those programs. Now the city introduces a more direct tax that can't be avoided and suddenly it's "hostile".
California is the biggest economy in the country and pays more taxes than they receive. They also have a homeless problem that a lot of states with less money don't have.
A big reason for California's large homeless population is the nice weather. If you are going to be sleeping in a park, Los Angeles is a lot better than Chicago.