Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2 • Hacker News Board

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#701

Post by dustinblake » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 5:51 AM UTC

elif wrote: post #553

williamsmj wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Atlanta, Raleigh and Dallas are all in states whose statewide electorate makes them a governor's veto away from passing "religious freedom" laws that would make hiring difficult. Maybe it would be good for Atlanta, but I don't think Amazon would risk it.

Georgia has some of, if not the most, employer-friendly right-to-work laws in the country. you can essentially hire and fire anyone you like for no cause with no notice.

Isn’t that something Georgia should be proud of! /s

I’ve never understood why people in those sorts of places are so excited about such regressive laws.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#702

Post by KidComputer » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 6:10 AM UTC

benwilber0 wrote: post #650

vkou wrote: post #599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's the cost of being economically successful. This is a cost disproportionately borne by low-income renters currently living in a city. If they have a choice, why should they pay it? > That's because there is more competition for workers which drives up salaries, and for living spaces which drives up their cost. Amazon workers will always outbid locals for housing. Unless 50,000 housing units will be built in t…

I'm not seeing the point that you're trying to make. Are you suggesting that Philadelphia (or any major metropolis) would not benefit from the sudden windfall infusion of 50,000+ high-paying jobs? I think every small business owner in Philly is probably drooling at the prospect of Amazon dumping tens of thousands of people with disposable incomes at their front door.

Small business owners are definitely not drooling at that prospect. They usually have very slim margins and their rent will sky rocket as the landlords get greedy. Only a select few will remain usually due to being hip local places that already have high foot traffic that can successful raise the prices of their 'famous' cheesesteaks or opening the property. But for the average small business owner running the typical depressed looking establishment they'll see their repeat customers disappear one by one. They won't have the necessary capital to reinvigorate their image or pay their tremendously higher rent when the landlord decides they want to attract Starbucks to that location. Look at Bleeker street, the lower east side, Chinatown, the east village all in NYC. All places I've seen personally change rapidly over the years. I've talked to many owners, the story is always the same, we're being forced out of our lease. Being in tech I'm certainly part of the problem. And to be honest most of the new places that come in, particularly restaurants, are often better than what was there before. But let's not say the existing small business owners are drooling, they're almost certainly filled with dread at the prospect.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#703

Post by closeparen » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 6:20 AM UTC

biocomputation wrote: post #698

JPKab wrote: post #678

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I'm saying that nobody is entitled to anything. I love how you bring up the race card. Please explain to me the system of who gets to suddenly stop a city from changing, and when? Your attitude is based on emotion and illogic. So if I'm talking about South Boston, where it is white Irish Americans being booted out by a much more racially diverse professional class, am I bigoted against whites? Again, you have an…

People who have been in an area for a long time have every right to fight back against overwhelming changes that have incredibly serious long-term implications for their quality of life. It's a sign of your argument's inherent weakness that you equate people's heartfelt sentiments about feeling overwhelmed by cost-of-living increases, and the resulting destruction of their communities, with Donald Trump's agenda.

The reverse side of the incumbent and established having unlimited rights to protect their quality of life is that the young have none.

The young are also feeling overwhelmed by the cost of living, and are starting to question whether tenure really confers a special moral status that makes the most superficial elements of your quality of life (perception of crowding, architectural taste, ease of parking) more important than the fundamentals of ours (access to employment, housing cost burden, ability to start families).

Socioeconomic vulnerability justifies additional protection, sure, but any community against any change? Come on.

I know, I know, kids these days are entitled. It would be fine to arrange housing as a delayed-gratification, wait-your-turn sort of thing. But the economic cards are stacked in my favor about as well as they can be, and I don't see any such path. So excuse me, but I'm going to fight for a world in which my generation plausibly gets jobs and shelter at the same time.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#704

Post by rdtsc » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 6:54 AM UTC

mozumder wrote: post #531

mathperson wrote: post #502

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is NOT a tax break....the immigrants and their families didn't spend years paying into the state tax base used to support the public university which the citizens presumably did and will continue to do in the future... edit: I am using immigrant-when perhaps one should use 'international student'

A lot of public universities only have 1 year of previous in-state residency requirement to gain in-state rates. People aren't going to pay $50k-$100k in taxes in one year to cover this benefit that citizens receive.

Because they lived in another state in the same country basically, and in theory people could just as easily move in the opposite direction.

But you're right that in practice it is taken advantage of with people renting an apartment for a year and doing the minimum necessarily to register as residents.

So overall you're still incorrect about it being a foreigner tax, implying perhaps they just hate non Americans and want to punish them.

Also same full tuition applies to non residents from other states.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#705

Post by cthalupa » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 6:54 AM UTC

chrisco255 wrote: post #700

unexpected wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't see Amazon moving to Austin. Austin is a very popular "2nd Campus" for tech companies, but it's not a great "HQ". 1) Poor airport connectivity 2) Seriously bad traffic options, with limited ability for build out 3) Not a lot of great public transit options 4) Limited ability for free land/property tax abatements/government handouts Austin is a strong candidate because of UT Austin, but UT Austin students prim…

Austin's airport is fine, if a bit small. It's got plenty of room to grow, though, and it does pale in comparison to Houston and Dallas airports. However, let's not lose the big picture: Austin is a hub of tech talent. Tech talent wants to be in tech hubs. Neither Houston nor Dallas are seen as tech hubs. Austin is. Austin has a critical mass of hardware companies (Intel, AMD, TI, NI, Dell) and software companies (Ap…

>Neither Houston nor Dallas are seen as tech hubs

Dallas isn't a tech hub? It's called the "Silicon Prairie". There's more tech jobs in Dallas than there are in Austin. TI? TI's headquarters are Dallas. IBM, Oracle, McAfee, HP, Intuit, Microsoft, Match.com, Nokia, RIM, Alcatel-Lucent, AT&T, Cisco, EMC, vmware....

Amazon has a substantial AWS office in Dallas as well.

>Austin is the fastest growing major city in the U.S

And Dallas is just behind them, 3rd fastest.

It could very well be Austin, but Dallas is actually a bigger tech hub than Austin is.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#706

Post by biocomputation » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 7:05 AM UTC

closeparen wrote: post #703

biocomputation wrote: post #698

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who have been in an area for a long time have every right to fight back against overwhelming changes that have incredibly serious long-term implications for their quality of life. It's a sign of your argument's inherent weakness that you equate people's heartfelt sentiments about feeling overwhelmed by cost-of-living increases, and the resulting destruction of their communities, with Donald Trump's agenda.

The reverse side of the incumbent and established having unlimited rights to protect their quality of life is that the young have none. The young are also feeling overwhelmed by the cost of living, and are starting to question whether tenure really confers a special moral status that makes the most superficial elements of your quality of life (perception of crowding, architectural taste, ease of parking) more importa…

This isn't about age, and I'm not sure why you're even framing it that way.

The crowding, costs, and congestion in Seattle have increased very significantly with Amazon. There have been very ugly social side effects as well.

Amazon's employees, most of whom are out-of-towners, don't need to live in Seattle as much as the people whom they're displacing. Basically, a lot of the Amazon transplants could work remotely or find jobs in other cities.

This was all entirely avoidable.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#707

Post by biocomputation » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 7:27 AM UTC

closeparen wrote: post #695

biocomputation wrote: post #674

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could always refuse to participate in the social and economic destruction of communities by simply not working at places that have a disproportionate impact on the surrounding community. Yes, it's that easy! Fixed that for you.

The size of your employer has nothing to do with your contribution to housing demand. A million employees of two-person startups have the same effect as a million Googlers, assuming similar budgets.

Interesting argument strategy. You pose something that will never happen in Seattle (a million employees of two-person startups) with something that actually has happened (Amazon).

If you're a transplant who works for Amazon, then it's because of a choice. You came from somewhere where you lived in a community with people you knew and who knew you. You don't need to be in Seattle.

People who are from Seattle need to live in Seattle. A lot of us don't want to leave our families or watch while our communities (or surrounding) communities are destroyed by waves of outsiders who know nothing about the area and who are only here for career/money.

Is that so hard to understand? How much should we have to accommodate? How many people? Should we sit idly by while people drive us out of our own neighborhoods?

Sorry, that's not going to happen.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#708

Post by biocomputation » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 7:32 AM UTC

JPKab wrote: post #670

wfo wrote: post #402

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is terrifying how this power is being wielded. Cities try to compete to see who can be more obsequious and subservient to corporate interests in the hope that they win some "victory" -- the company moving to their town -- which in the end does very little for the actual city or the people in it. It is just an impressive line item on the mayor's resume when they try to move up in politics, "I got Amazon!" Seattle h…

You act like the highly paid people you are whining about dont pay taxes. They do. You are also acting like you and the other "actual Seattleites" have an ancestral claim to the region. Are you a Native American? Doubtful. Your ancestors stole the land and now you act like your entitled to say who gets to live there? What a hypocritical, provincial attitude to have. And honestly, greedy as well. My family came to thi…

This is an utterly vacuous and false statement. There are mountains of empirical evidence to prove it if you could spend a few minutes in your favorite search engine.

It's not greedy to protect the area you're from; it's human nature. I'm sorry, but Amazon's tens of thousands of out-of-town employees don't need to live in Seattle. Most of them could work remotely or find jobs at other companies.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#709

Post by Angostura » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 7:47 AM UTC

nyokodo wrote: post #482

ashelmire wrote: post #340

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…

Unless Amazon is going to be paying $0 in tax or will be given tax credits in excess of any tax it will pay, neither of which I gather is the case, then how would this fail to deliver a net increase in tax revenue for the city? The 1000s of employees are not getting any tax breaks either so that'd also have to factor into the calculation. I don't think cities are acting against their own self interest in these negoti…

Would be better if there was national coordination and the cities had all simply said 'No - you want to come here, you pay tax'.

Re: Amazon announces candidate cities for HQ2

#710

Post by tallanvor » Fri, Jan 19, 2018, 9:10 AM UTC

lolsal wrote: post #390

tallanvor wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Racism is still alive in the south, though, even if it's not as bad as people from more liberal areas think. However, I can certainly tell you that as a gay man, I do not expect that I will feel comfortable living in any southern state during my lifetime. I lasted 3 years in Raleigh before I had to get out (and that was long before the bathroom bill).

This is really unfortunate. I worry it will take even longer for prejudice and intolerance to die in the south with this sort of attitude. I do try to understand your perspective - it's not your problem since you don't live in the south, so you aren't worried about it. For someone like me that grew up in the south and have seen the effort and changes in the last three decades, it hurts to see objectively false blanke…

Prejudice and intolerance is still my problem, because it's not limited to the south. If it was, we wouldn't have the embarrassment that is the current administration announcing a new "Conscience and Religious Freedom Division" to defend healthcare workers that object to having to do things like provide birth control, assist in sex change operations, care for HIV/AIDS patients, and will potentially even deny emergency care to LGBT people or other minorities that they claim they are obligated not to help due to their religious beliefs.

But the problems of the south go even deeper than just prejudice against minority groups. Look at which states have increased the minimum wage, and which states expanded medicaid coverage. Look which states have taken the lead on requiring some amount of paid sick leave (only 7 states and DC so far, but at least it's starting). Southern states are among those that also strongly resist bail and sentencing reform, legalizing pot, and other initiatives to reduce inequality.

If you think that you can make a difference in Texas by staying there, I think that's great, and I encourage you to do so. You're allowed to love where you live, even if you have to admit that it's not perfect. For me, though, Raleigh didn't have anything to tie me to the place and make me want to use my energy trying to change things there.