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Facing Opposition, Amazon Reconsiders NY Headquarters Site: Report (washingtonpost.com)
Amazon.com is reconsidering its plan to bring 25,000 jobs to a new campus in New York City following a wave of opposition from local politicians, The Washington Post reported Friday [Editor's note: the link may be paywalled; alternative source], citing two people familiar with the company's thinking. From the report: The company has not leased or purchased office space for the project, making it easy to withdraw its commitment. Unlike in Virginia -- where elected leaders quickly passed an incentive package for a separate headquarters facility -- final approval from New York state is not expected until 2020. Tennessee officials have also embraced Amazon's plans to bring 5,000 jobs to Nashville, which this week approved $15.2 million in road, sewer and other improvements related to that project. Amazon executives have had internal discussions recently to reassess the situation in New York and explore alternatives, said the two people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to speak candidly about the company's perspective.
A billion here, a billion there-- it adds up
Good. Quit blowing politicians who need your jobs but ride to power trumpeting how evil you are.
Let the voters weigh the relative importance. That's why the pols are huffing and puffing in the first place.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Crystal City is the absolute worst place to put Amazon. Commuting there by any means is already a disaster.
Any city that offers tax cuts to a large corporation and than hosts that corporation should at least get money out of the deal for a top-notch and modern transit system.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
2.3 billion looks big and scary until you realize that NY State's total population is 20 million. That's about $115 per person. Total state budget is $168 billion, so that's about 1.3% of total budget.
The real problem downstate is that Albany controls NYC's purse strings. The subways would run much better if they were run by the NYC Department of Transportation directly, not subject to authority of clueless bureaucrats from Albany.
Sounds like a company town. Will it come with "jumper nets" for overworked employees, like Foxconn's factories in China do?
And, BTW, "techies" tend to like to live around other smart people, not in a company campus surrounded by frack fields and coal-rollin' pickups.
to Omni Consumer Products and move to Detroit. /s
They're hiring developers and business types in NY -- seems like a pretty good place to move to. TN has cheap land, it's a good place for a warehouse, but it lacks many of the aspects that attract techies to NY.
Techies tend to live where the jobs are, not where they want to. So many techies like to live rural when they can remote in for their jobs.
Jeff can probably pick it up for a song after he destroys the company and the management goes to prison.
TN has cheap land, it's a good place for a warehouse, but it lacks many of the aspects that attract techies to NY.
That depends on where in TN you are. If you're near Nashville, then it's got much of the same stuff; food, culture, relatively liberal politics. Neither one has reasonable cannabis laws, though. (Neither does California any more, oddly, but at least they are less unreasonable.)
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Amazon is so large they'd be surrounded by other smart people anyway. Techies tolerate living in campers to get jobs. They tolerate long commutes in horrific traffic to get jobs. They tolerate never being able to afford a home to get jobs. They tolerate having low disposable incomes to get jobs.
If you are rich enough to be picky by all means do so, but never confuse yourself with anyone else.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Politically the two areas are very closely related and neither are good for Amazon. No where can be as bad as Seattle is for corporations who tried to basically pass an "Amazon tax" which basically just targeted Amazon/Amazon employees. Luckily that got repealed as soon as they found out Amazon had decided to cancel it's construction of new buildings in Seattle and also was searching for two new HQ locations. New York may not be as socialist as Seattle's city council but it's still not as corporation friendly as many other cities.
None of those things are done "to get jobs." Those things are done to get jobs in an area where it's actually interesting and pleasant to live -- i.e. be around other interesting humans.
Money attracts people to NYC. NOTHING ELSE. The people are terrible, the traffic is terrible, the culture is obnoxious, the pizza is the worst in the US, and everything is dirty. If Amazon built their HQ in the middle of the desert, but offered NYC wages, a city would sprout from the dry earth around them.
"Prediction: within 10 years, Windows will be a Linux distribution." Me, 7-6-2016
Techies will follow the jobs.
Only to a limited extent.
I lived in upstate NY for a while. The area was a former manufacturing center that has been economically destroyed by the same things that hit the rest of the rust belt. The local politicians were sure the techies would follow the jobs, so they had several programs to try and recruit companies to the area. And hey, housing is really cheap so cost-of-living is low. So clearly techies would flock to the area.
It failed. The area is just too shitty now. The schools are awful, the roads are barely maintained, there's little to do outside your own house, drug use and it's accompanying problems are rampant and overall quality of life is bad. Recruiting and maintaining a high-tech workforce there is very difficult, even with NY city pay scales and rural cost-of-living.
Higher education system: many good universities within a few miles of each other. CUNY/Columbia/NYU/Pratt/Hunter/Cooper/CUNY Grad Center/Rockefeller. Public transport system is awesome; I love trains and not having to drive a stinking car daily is awesome. The people are awesome, BTW, once you stop hanging with rich suburban transplants.
California is probably as good as it gets in the US, since they allow home-grow for personal use. NYC's laws aren't reasonable, but there's progress towards reform and (frankly) weed is extremely available.
Nashville doesn't have: functional public transport, the same concentration of world-class research universities (other than Vanderbilt, what is there?), the same cultural diversity, easy access to beaches, etc.
California is probably as good as it gets in the US, since they allow home-grow for personal use.
California left it up to the counties, most of which have fucked it up completely. They want licensing and registration, there's all kinds of places you can't have it at all, you can only use it in a private residence in almost every county...
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Jobs created with, wait for it -- state funded incentives!
It reminds me of what my old bolshie Uncle Ivan used to say back in the 60s: "Kid, nobody believes in a socialism. Nobody believes in capitalism either. It's always 'socialism for me, capitalism for you!'"
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Man, this whole thing is starting to feel like a dating reality show where the star can't make up their mind on who they want to date. Amazon decided to do this highly public publicity stunt on who they'd pick, ending up with the two cities everyone thought from the beginning, while stringing along hundreds of communities desperate for the economic shot-in-the-arm those 50K (or now 25K given the split) would bring. If Amazon wants to be revolutionary and really help its community, place it in a rust-belt city in Indiana, Ohio, or Pennsylvania where it would spur a life-changing transformation in the community.
There's a right way and a wrong way to do incentives. Virginia was smart about their incentives - large amounts were deals to do additional investments in Arlington - reach X number of jobs, we'll upgrade the subway station, upgrade the light rail, etc. New York just gave them a giant bag of money.