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Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

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Re: Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

#91

Post by PKop »

aeorgnoieang wrote: post #84
refurb wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're arguing that the states are giving away money. What money are they giving away? If Amazon never comes, then there is no Amazon taxes and thus no tax breaks. Right now those towns are starting out at zero. If they are smart, they structure the incentives to make sure they are net positive. If they screw that up, well that's on them.

Why aren't cities and towns already doing this then? Every new business or new resident, of any size or wealth or income, is a potential new "net positive" contributor to their tax base.

What on Earth makes you think they aren't doing this? There's no single corp announcing a possible move to anywhere as big as Amazon to illustrate the incentive to compete, at almost any price.

In other words, construct a hypothetical move for a hypothetical corporation to some example town, and I'm sure that town could come up with an incentive package that would be beneficial to its citizens in place of having the company not move there. Do you disagree?

Re: Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

#92

Post by d4rti »

40acres wrote: post #35

I don't understand people who are conflating the search for HQ2 with Olympic bids and sports stadium bids. The Olympics are most likely a one time thing for a month, although in the future I could forsee it revolving around qualified sites, it takes a lot to convert facilities used for the Olympics into regular infrastucture (see Atlanta and LA). Stadiums I think overall have a better impact, as they can create or re…

Do you have any reputable sources on Stadiums being an economic benefit?

Everything I have seen suggests otherwise, eg. https://news.stanford.edu/2015/07/30/stadium-economics-noll-...

Re: Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

#93

Post by s73ver_ »

refurb wrote: post #71
zaroth wrote: post #28

I completely disagree with the “race to the bottom” framing of the idea that cities shouldn’t compete to provide the best services for the commercial enterprises which reside there. At the 50-75 year timeframe we are talking about at least hundreds of billions of dollars of economic value, if not trillions. The clustering effect of becoming Silicon Valley 2 cannot be overstated. My personal opinion is cities should b…

Completely agree. The reason why we have ever-more-powerful and continuously-cheaper electronics is because of the "race to the bottom". Doing things better and cheaper is the reason why our standard of living keeps increasing. I for one would love to live in a city that said "we need to do more with the money we currently have."

So how does Amazon coming in help a city get more affordable housing?

Re: Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

#94

Post by busterarm »

Kalium wrote: post #77
joeax wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At the 50-75 year timeframe we are talking about at least hundreds of billions of dollars of economic value, if not trillions. The clustering effect of becoming Silicon Valley 2 cannot be overstated. Back in 2004 when I was working at Microsoft, I remember sitting in a bar in downtown Redmond and tossing back some local brew IPAs. This guy sitting next to me was an older dude and longtime fisherman. He was going on…

Amazon doesn't want to spend ten years trying to remake a city into something that might serve its needs. I can see why. It's a huge investment with a very uncertain return. But, let's turn it around. Why would Amazon want to go to San Antonio, instead of a city like Atlanta?

They also don't want to do what the auto manufacturers did and make the host city completely dependent on them for the local economy.

Shreveport suffered quite a bit after the GM plant closure and drop in oil prices -- being so aligned to one sector was not in Shreveport's best interests.

Re: Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

#95

Post by refurb »

s73ver_ wrote: post #93
refurb wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Completely agree. The reason why we have ever-more-powerful and continuously-cheaper electronics is because of the "race to the bottom". Doing things better and cheaper is the reason why our standard of living keeps increasing. I for one would love to live in a city that said "we need to do more with the money we currently have."

So how does Amazon coming in help a city get more affordable housing?

Why is that on Amazon? If the city supports building more housing for incoming employees, then housing prices don't sky rocket and construction works make out like bandits.

I'm trying to understand why when a company like Amazon decides to create jobs in a city, suddenly they are to blame for everything wrong (homelessness, high housing prices, etc). It's absurd.

Re: Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

#96

Post by s73ver_ »

matchbok wrote: post #64
lucas_membrane wrote: post #59

Large corporations often make deals with other large corporations, and they prosper. Workers used to do better when a larger percentage of them collectively bargained. But somehow, the possibility that citizens, who are represented by various local governments, would use those governments to cooperate with each other across the lines on the map sounds like science-fiction and is disparaged as far-fetched and unworkab…

Homelessness is not Amazon's problem. Automation is good. Do you want us to ride horses to work? Agreed. Agreed.

"Homelessness is not Amazon's problem."

But it is the problem of the city. They absolutely need to keep this in mind while negotiating with Amazon, who has a reputation for driving housing prices sky high, thus exacerbating the homelessness problem.

"Automation is good. Do you want us to ride horses to work?"

Automation is neutral, as it does cost people jobs, not all of whom can be retrained for something else. It also drives down wages. Hell, productivity has been skyrocketing for the past 30-40 years due to automation, yet workers have seen a pittance in rising wages.

Re: Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

#97

Post by dumbfounder »

s73ver_ wrote: post #88
dumbfounder wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon workers are highly paid, thus bringing the average income up, and contributing to taxes, strengthening the housing market, and much more. That's interesting that you call it pollution. High paying tech jobs are pollution? That doesn't compute to me. Companies that compete for talent will be pissed, but for lots of others it's a huge win. The only way I see it as a "bad" thing is if you are in a small city that…

"Strengthening the housing market" Other than code for "making everything much more unaffordable", what does this mean? And yeah, it's pollution for those who don't have high paying tech jobs. There are more people living in those cities than Amazon employees; their interests and needs need to be taking into consideration as well.

I would rather live in a housing market that continues to increase rather than one that goes up and down with the wind.

Re: Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

#98

Post by [deleted] »

maxsilver wrote: post #52
zaroth wrote: post #28

I completely disagree with the “race to the bottom” framing of the idea that cities shouldn’t compete to provide the best services for the commercial enterprises which reside there. At the 50-75 year timeframe we are talking about at least hundreds of billions of dollars of economic value, if not trillions. The clustering effect of becoming Silicon Valley 2 cannot be overstated. My personal opinion is cities should b…

> Just because Amazon happens to be for-profit, their presence in your city is an extraordinary asset It's not though. You purposefully used examples of public or non-profit groups to make it sound like a benefit. But it's not. A more fair comparison would read: It's like someone came to your town and I said, "I want to build a $20m McDonalds, Mobile Gas Station, WalMart and a Best Buy". I would hope your town says "…

[deleted]

Re: Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

#99

Post by s73ver_ »

refurb wrote: post #95
s73ver_ wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So how does Amazon coming in help a city get more affordable housing?

Why is that on Amazon? If the city supports building more housing for incoming employees, then housing prices don't sky rocket and construction works make out like bandits. I'm trying to understand why when a company like Amazon decides to create jobs in a city, suddenly they are to blame for everything wrong (homelessness, high housing prices, etc). It's absurd.

Arguably they're trying to divert tax monies to be spent on themselves instead of the other problems the city faces, so it is on Amazon.

And they're blamed because they are largely a cause of exacerbating those problems. It's not just a pure good for them to come. Like I said, they cause housing prices to skyrocket. That's on them, and the increased homelessness that would result would be on them, too.

Re: Why Don’t the 20 Cities on Amazon's HQ2 Shortlist Collectively Bargain?

#100

Post by apercu »

Robotbeat wrote: post #68
apercu wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Devils advocate: It's possible that Amazon will be a drain on a region. The cost of housing goes up for everyone. The best and the brightest of the region get sucked back to HQ1 The startup ecosystem in the region gets drained to work at/for Amazon

Cost of housing going up also increases the wealth of homeowners in the area. This is not purely bad.

I guess. I live in an expensive area. My house has gone up hundreds of thousands of dollars in value in the last 2 years.

So what? My taxes go up and so do the costs of all the other houses nearby, so I don't net any more if I sell and buy a new house.

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