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Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

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101–110 of 229 posts

Re: Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

#101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For some quality of life means being able to get a drink at 3AM. For others - house with a backyard.

You can literally have a house with a backyard and a less than 1 hour commute from Manhattan.

An hour is too much. Ain't nobody got time for one hour commuting each way.

Re: Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

#102
post #80
post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whoa. Bezos indeed has homes in NYC and Washington DC. (As well as Seattle, Beverly Hills, and a ranch in Texas. [1]) I can't find it now, but years ago The Economist ran an article about a study that said a key factor in corporate headquarter moves was where the CEO lives. Disappointing to see it play out like that on such a grand scale, and after such a pretense of a nationwide search. Yet another thing that convin…

Doubt it was a factor with Bezos. The guy is rich enough to live anywhere, and has houses everywhere, as you also observed. Somehow the office didn't land in Beverly Hills or the Texas ranch. I expect the fact that he already has homes in NYC and DC is related to the fact they are in fact important locations for his business.

Most CEOs are rich enough to move. But they are also powerful enough to get the company to move to a location more convenient or appealing to them.

Re: Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

#103
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is exactly what professional sports teams do often even if they've been somewhere a while and have no intention of leaving.

San Diego was one of the only ones to call that bluff in recent history.

Also the Patriots.

Re: Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

#104
In New York, at least, this is going to be quite a mess. Many within the city - politicians included - are against it. But Cuomo, the governor of the state, is all in, and is planning to remove the city council from the decision:

http://gothamist.com/2018/11/12/amazon_cuomo_city_council.ph...

As if it needed to be said, there are other cities that would be a lot more receptive, and would benefit a lot more. Even just over the river in New Jersey would be an improvement. Just go there.

Re: Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

#105
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

NYC has a lot of developers, more than the valley. It's already a 'draw' of sorts, this is an advantage. "DC, access to policymakers - but I see no real strategic advantages here." Amazon is going to become the #1 IT vendor of choice for the biggest government of the world AND reach their tentacles deep into the political arena for all sorts of other benefits. Military, FBI, CIA, Gov, Fannie/Freddie. All huge . Also…

Amazon is the new IBM

Sheesh, get with the agreed upon narrative. Microsoft was the new IBM, but then they got rescued by their new ceo Nadella. Then it was Oracle, but well hell, Oracle is still the new ibm. Google is trying hard to be the new ibm but they aren't quite there yet.

Re: Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

#106
post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Obviously Amazon was going to get a great bargain and bunch of info to boot - they have massive bargaining power. Not participating in the bid would have been suicide for the politicians of any major city save perhaps Kreuzberg, Berlin [1]. The amount of wealth creation and subsequent tax payments/land value boost that any FAANG company would bring with a new HQ is way too big to be ignored. [1] https://www.theguardi…

> they have massive bargaining power Wouldn't call it "massive" in NYC. The office size is projected to employ 25,000 people in total. Nice number, but not "massive" for a city of 8,623,000 people.

The average salary for these employees will be many x greater than the average NYC resident - you need to compare the relative size of the +25k employees to the ~200k subset of residents that make $200k+ in NY, not the entire 8M pop.

Not to mention the knock-on effects of the many jobs the HQ will indirectly create - cleaning, food prep, waste mgmt, facilities, security, transportation, etc.

But yes, I agree that NYC is probably the city with the highest bargaining power in the US due to its size and economic diversification. And yet they still submitted a bid, even while Mayor de Blasio was badmouthing the company [1]

It will be interesting to see what the incentive package was - that's when we'll know just how much Amazon profited from the whole bid/selection process.

[1] https://www.businessinsider.com/bill-de-blasio-amazon-hq2-de...

Re: Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

#107
post #69
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So does the state of New York.

New York doesn’t put Michelin star restaurants in strip malls.

No, but it does put them in plenty of of places that are just as unprestigious. As do plenty of other of cities.

Not all starred chefs are about chasing the high rent look or fine dining aesthetic. You don't have to be 11MP to get a star, or even three. Ko has two and is down an alley!

Re: Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

#108
post #6

I feel this choice is a mistake for the company long term, they're putting resources into two very hot housing and real estate markets, that have no real draw (in my opinion) for technical employees. Hew York is high tax (compared to Washington), unpleasant weather, overall high costs, and has a housing shortage, Washington DC, once described has having "Southern Efficiency, and Northern Charm" has similar issues of…

NYC has a lot of developers, more than the valley. It's already a 'draw' of sorts, this is an advantage. "DC, access to policymakers - but I see no real strategic advantages here." Amazon is going to become the #1 IT vendor of choice for the biggest government of the world AND reach their tentacles deep into the political arena for all sorts of other benefits. Military, FBI, CIA, Gov, Fannie/Freddie. All huge . Also…

This Quora response uses US Bureau of Labor Statistics to show there are 92,350 programmers in the whole SF Bay area, compared to 62,530 programmers in the entire NYC municipal area.

So about 50% more in the Bay.

https://www.quora.com/How-many-software-engineers-work-in-Si...

Re: Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

#109
post #33
post #6

I feel this choice is a mistake for the company long term, they're putting resources into two very hot housing and real estate markets, that have no real draw (in my opinion) for technical employees. Hew York is high tax (compared to Washington), unpleasant weather, overall high costs, and has a housing shortage, Washington DC, once described has having "Southern Efficiency, and Northern Charm" has similar issues of…

New York is literally the greatest city in the history of world civilization and the planetary capital of finance, media, business, fashion and culture. It’s easily the largest city in the country, and iconic globally. But you’re finding it hard to understand why people might want to live here? I’d post more but my New York life is veritable cornucopia of novel and enriching experiences and I’d better get back to it.…

I don't think people get you are being sarcastic.

Re: Amazon expected to announce NYC and Northern Virginia as new headquarters

#110
post #33
post #6

I feel this choice is a mistake for the company long term, they're putting resources into two very hot housing and real estate markets, that have no real draw (in my opinion) for technical employees. Hew York is high tax (compared to Washington), unpleasant weather, overall high costs, and has a housing shortage, Washington DC, once described has having "Southern Efficiency, and Northern Charm" has similar issues of…

New York is literally the greatest city in the history of world civilization and the planetary capital of finance, media, business, fashion and culture. It’s easily the largest city in the country, and iconic globally. But you’re finding it hard to understand why people might want to live here? I’d post more but my New York life is veritable cornucopia of novel and enriching experiences and I’d better get back to it.…

This has to be a parody..
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