361–370 of 747 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I agree. Nobody seriously thinks they are going to pick Miami.
Jeff Bezos grew up in Miami, and his dad is Cuban. Miami has the largest Cuban (and Cuban-descent) community. If Bezos wants to give back to the place that made him who he is today, Miami is a solid contender. I know you don't drive a business with emotions and nostalgia, oh wait... He's already doing it with Blue Origin, we love you Bezos!
Part of me would love to have a big tech / infrastructure company like Amazon in Philly. But I take serious issue with the idea of the city paying millions or billions to bring them here, promising years of tax breaks (a free ride), and the tightening of an already very tight real estate and rental market. I don't think my fellow Philadelphians should have to pay to bring a company here that's just going to hire peop…
It irks me however when huge tax credits are handed out to already profitable companies to move in. It's just giving free services at the expense of everyone else.
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…
Considering they'll be hiring a lot of locals, and property values will most likely rise, and the associated peripheral startups will start flourishing due to Amazon expats, I don't see what your point is.
It's not like they're building a NFL stadium, which is almost always a huge boondoggle. Would you rather have Amazon HQ, a football stadium, or watch your city fade into irrelevance?
Part of me would love to have a big tech / infrastructure company like Amazon in Philly. But I take serious issue with the idea of the city paying millions or billions to bring them here, promising years of tax breaks (a free ride), and the tightening of an already very tight real estate and rental market. I don't think my fellow Philadelphians should have to pay to bring a company here that's just going to hire peop…
Creating jobs that don't exist for people who currently aren't residents (or don't yet exist) is the very definition of economic progress. If you don't want that then you just want nothing but the status the status quo unchanged forever. You can't have it both ways.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
I guess I also don't need to pay taxes anymore, because if I don't pay taxes those are just taxes that wouldn't have been paid otherwise.
Amazon would have the greatest impact in Atlanta. You could argue that Atlanta is the economic, cultural, and geographical center of the Southeastern United States. It has the busiest airport in the world and is a major rail hub. There are already dozens of major corporations headquaratered in Atlanta. There is no shortage of talent, with a top-5 engineering school in Georgia Tech. Yet there are things missing which…
Part of me would love to have a big tech / infrastructure company like Amazon in Philly. But I take serious issue with the idea of the city paying millions or billions to bring them here, promising years of tax breaks (a free ride), and the tightening of an already very tight real estate and rental market. I don't think my fellow Philadelphians should have to pay to bring a company here that's just going to hire peop…
Jobs are the goal for this competition. They're the prize.
Be thankful that governments are participating in this process. You can't make money without spending money. Don't be angry that your city paid $1 to earn $5. EVERY business has a cost-of-sales associated with it, and government is basically a really large business.
If your city wins, the local revenue from economic activity from these new employees will far exceed any costs and tax incentives given to Amazon.
Don't be the guy that thinks taxes is enough. Your own skills at business planning applies just as much to government. You got a lot of revenue via taxes, now what? How do you spend it? What causes the most tax revenue return and highest population satisfaction?
If you actually write down all of what these governments are doing in a business plan to win Amazon's headquarters, you'll find that it's as much a business plan as anything else, and that government's cost calculations are likely worth it. Business planning is never easy - it's far easier to screw it up - but nothing worthwhile is easy. Be glad that government is doing hard things, instead of easy things.
Edit: To give an idea on the kinds of business-plan data government needs to understand to determine if Amazon is worth it or not, consider that: Are Amazon R&D employees high-crime people? Do they murder other people a lot or die from opiates? Will the HQ create pollution and destroy the environment? Are there dangerous chemicals that might explode if stored unsafely? Will their operations cause birth defects?
Use this kind of data to calculate how much government services these people are going to need and to determine if their tax-incentive costs are worth it?
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…
> often to no benefit of the local population Not true. My first thought when hearing that a town not far from where I am made the 20 list was 'where can I buy property so that I can rent it to others that come as a result of the economic development and new desirability of the area'. Property values will increase and property tax will go up vacancies will be reduced. This would not happen for a smaller company that…
I understand what you are saying, but these things can be quantified and accounted for in economic models. We can wave hands all day about "I think the economy would do this" but that is often the enemy of applied economics (heavily mathematical) and progress. There is a point when the incentives for the company can turn negative for the community. There is also the consideration in the community that those taxpayers (and voters) do not want to subsidize a massive corporation's shareholders.
Politicians can be aware of this point, but with a massive corporation trying to pit them all against each other for its own gain, competition will erode those profits to or even past the point of neutral cost-benefit to the community. As Peter Thiel likes to point out "Competition is for losers."