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Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

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Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#131

Post by Omniusaspirer »

tinduck wrote: post #116

No New Orleans, Detroit, or Memphis. I really wished they considered a majority African American community that has the capacity to grow. This is just going to increase inequality. Sad really. Let's hope for Atlanta.

They can always move for work just like most people already do if they end up working for Amazon now in Seattle. There's also likely going to a serious spike in living costs within any reasonable commute around the headquarters, so the net impact on the statistically poorer African Americans population in these cities would be pretty unlikely to be a positive one.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#133

Post by justin66 »

graeme wrote: post #128
bryanlarsen wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If Canadian cities were in serious competition I think there'd be more than one of them on the list. There are a good number of American cities smaller than Edmonton, Calgary, Winnipeg and Ottawa/Gatineau on the list, let alone Montreal and Vancouver. I suspect that Toronto is the token Canadian city and won't get serious consideration. I don't blame them, in this era of Trump hyper-nationalism there'd be a huge blow…

Do any of those cities have good international flight options? I live in Montreal, the the options are very limited compared to Toronto. I expect Montreal would be completely ruled out because of the language laws, incidentally. Fine for a branch office, unacceptable for a second HQ. So, I'm not sure you're right about Toronto being a token candidate. I believe it's the best candidate in Canada. But, moving to Canada…

> I do wonder what kept Vancouver off the list though.

Housing crisis.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#134

Post by RKearney »

tinduck wrote: post #116

No New Orleans, Detroit, or Memphis. I really wished they considered a majority African American community that has the capacity to grow. This is just going to increase inequality. Sad really. Let's hope for Atlanta.

No Laredo, Brownsville, or El Paso.

I really wished they considered a majority Hispanic community that has the capacity to grow. This is just going to increase in-quality. Sad really.

Let's hope for Miami.

Or maybe let's not turn every corporate decision into a race war.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#135

Post by codeonfire »

freehunter wrote: post #108
codeonfire wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a desolate wasteland of economic strife. Why do you think 240 cities threw billions at Amazon? The culture has to be replicated, which most of America is not willing to do.

All those poor, broke cities like New York, Chicago, Denver, Miami, Pittsburgh, Austin, Los Angeles, man they look to Seattle like a shining beacon of economic prosperity and liberal ideas. If only New York had the kind of money that Seattle does, then things would be different.

Yeah there is a lot of money in New York. It is all dead money sitting in accounts and low risk investments. There is no new money being generated. Amazon feeds off of growth, not having wealth. Growth wise, those areas are doing...what exactly? Trying to get their politicians to get Amazon to put an HQ there. Having money is not a business.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#136

Post by maxerickson »

ghaff wrote: post #117
maxerickson wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oakland county to the north of Detroit and Washtenaw county to the west of Detroit are two of the wealthiest, most highly educated counties in the country. And the cities surrounding Detroit have a lot less problems than the city itself.

I think the parent's point still probably stands. Wherever they end up, assuming there really is a 50K HQ2 in the end, they have to convince a lot of people to relocate. And a lot of people would be: 1.) Detroit, no thanks or 2.) I can live with Detroit but when I end up leaving Amazon after 2 years like so many people do, I'd have to find a job in a different location. I imagine the talent question at least factored…

My point is that the problem is largely one of perception.

The hundreds of thousands of people in the area with technical educations aren't working at McDonald's.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#137

Post by itsdrewmiller »

justin66 wrote: post #133
graeme wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do any of those cities have good international flight options? I live in Montreal, the the options are very limited compared to Toronto. I expect Montreal would be completely ruled out because of the language laws, incidentally. Fine for a branch office, unacceptable for a second HQ. So, I'm not sure you're right about Toronto being a token candidate. I believe it's the best candidate in Canada. But, moving to Canada…

> I do wonder what kept Vancouver off the list though. Housing crisis.

More likely the same thing that kept Portland off - they want more distance between HQs.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#138

Post by corpMaverick »

planteen wrote: post #103
indescions_2018 wrote: post #75

Just visited Pittsburgh. There is indeed a renaissance happing in that town. The restaurant scene alone is phenomenal. And the addition of a FANG level HQ could cement its burgeoning international reputation as a destination. The idea is that CMU spits out about 200+ world class CS grads a year. If even 5% decide to stay in the area to start their own ventures. There would be potential for massive growth. the other d…

Denver isn't gaining 10K people a day - that would be insane! This article says 13K people in a year to Denver city & county: https://www.denverpost.com/2017/03/28/denvers-growth-spurt-s... It looks like Colorado's population is around 5.7 million with an annual growth rate of 1.4% - so about 80K people per year for the state. http://worldpopulationreview.com/states/colorado-population/

Do you know why is housing in Denver so expensive ?

It seems to have good density. Even small towns in Colorado look expensive.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#139

Post by hocuspocus »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #34
chollida1 wrote: post #3

Nice to see Toronto on the list, though game theory suggest that we're only here because having a Canadian Candidate has the potential to have all 3 levels of government involved rather than just state and city. I'm not really sure how to go about handicapping the finalists. Given the current political climate, Toronto is interesting because it's the only city that gives Amazon some escape form the US government. You…

If Canadian cities were in serious competition I think there'd be more than one of them on the list. There are a good number of American cities smaller than Edmonton, Calgary, Winnipeg and Ottawa/Gatineau on the list, let alone Montreal and Vancouver. I suspect that Toronto is the token Canadian city and won't get serious consideration. I don't blame them, in this era of Trump hyper-nationalism there'd be a huge blow…

Vancouver is de facto their current HQ2, no? Mostly used to funnel hires to Seattle through L-1 visas, but still.

Keep in mind Amazon is constantly looking for and hiring tons of tech workers. I live in Europe and I'd have a hard time taking their hiring events seriously if I could end up in Winnipeg (no offense). But the same is true for quite a few US cities on the list, though, and it makes me believe they probably aren't considering half of those locations seriously, like other people pointed out.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#140

Post by sweetishfish »

wyattk wrote: post #126

Something about this just makes my stomach sick... A massive corporation is pitting governments against each other for its own gain, often to no benefit of the local population. I'm scared to see the numbers of "incentives" that local politicians try and hand out to Amazon. There's little evidence that the public money used/lost will ever be recouped. One of the worst cases of this happening so far is the Foxconn dea…

With regards to your first point - it's not really costing taxpayers in Wisconsin $4.5B . At least for the tax credits portion, those are taxes that would not have been paid in Wisconsin otherwise.
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