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NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

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Re: NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

#131

Post by chiefalchemist »

Let's be clear, the free market this is not.

It's yet another perfect example of government gone wild. It's one thing for to use taxpayer monies to create jobs and job opportunity (i.e., education). That's a reasonable expectation within the scope of gov's governing.

However, it's another thing for gov to buy jobs - and thus votes - by effectively subsidizing some mega-corporation. If Amazon needs money, that's what Wall Street is for. If Wall Street isn't willing to give Amazon et al money then that's a red flag and taxpayers should naturally stand clear.

Some might say, "But without such things Amazon would have to raise prices, and that's not good for consumers." But it's the consumers that paid the __higher__ taxes to supply the subsidy. The difference is, with the latter method the gov gets to skim some off the top.

Bottom line: The taxpayer / consumer loses. Politicians and Big Inc win.

Re: NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

#132

Post by boomka »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #71
boomka wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know who you are referring to as NYC, but citizens of USA as a whole are worse off. Pitting one USA municipality against another to extract subsidy for what Amazon would do anyways is just another mechanism for wealth transfer from the poor to the rich.

> to extract subsidy for what Amazon would do anyways I don't think they would. Big infrastructure in New York is expensive, financially and politically. Without Amazon's pressure, there is no way the new campus would have been developed, hooked up and approved as quickly as it has been.

They said they would build somewhere. The only question was which USA city.

Re: NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

#133

Post by tylerhou »

jondubois wrote: post #124
vdnkh wrote: post #32

1) Incentives are not given up front. They are given proportional to the results Amazon has achieved. Amazon must make a report each year detailing their progress before any award is given. 2) The city-level incentives are available to any business. State-level incentives (I think 300m) are not. 3) Amazon has pledged to invest in the local community as part of the deal. There are plans for an elementary school and te…

>> 1) Incentives are not given up front. They are given proportional to the results Amazon has achieved. Amazon must make a report each year detailing their progress before any award is given. What is progress? How do you measure progress? Many politicians claim that the past decade was progress. I don't see it. >> 2) The city-level incentives are available to any business. State-level incentives (I think 300m) are n…

> How do you measure progress? For the past decade, we've severely deteriorated as a society - Yet politicians will call it progress.

Citation? By most metrics we've improved as a society in the last 10 years.

Re: NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

#134

Post by Spooky23 »

CPLX wrote: post #85
rb808 wrote: post #7

This is such a great deal for NYC As the article says, they give up $1.5B over 10 years, but then get "Projected incremental tax revenue of more than $10 billion over 20 years." I dont know where that comes from but the payroll and property taxes paid by 25k employees dwarves the incentives. The most important part is it cements NYC as the main tech center on the East Coast. That is invaluable. EDIT: I wonder if NYC…

I beg to differ. New York City doesn't have a problem attracting jobs. Like not even a little bit. The idea that this is actually incremental revenue for the city is extremely debatable. New York City is a really big place. Midtown is the largest central business district in the country, and Lower Manhattan is the third largest, after Chicago. There are 1,700,000 jobs in Manhattan alone and 3,900,000 in New York City…

NYC needs more diversity outside of finance.

This potentially puts NYC on top for retail again. I think incentives and payments for this purpose is a meh idea, it if you’re going to do it, bet on a winner.

Re: NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

#135

Post by chrisseaton »

boomka wrote: post #129
chrisseaton wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not just money is it? It's also things like infrastructure they'll provide? Could that possibly make Amazon more efficient, and so employ more people who spend their salaries and so on, creating a net gain for the whole US?

All of that would be true in any other location. One could argue other locations actually need such infrastructure more. Amazon was not hiding the fact that they would build HQ2 anyways, and in USA. There was absolutely no need to donate them taxpayer money for it. And if you do, then taxpayer should own the infrastructure, with Amazon paying for use.

No I mean that the competition may have motivated cities to create better offers of infrastructure to compete. If they all sat back and said 'well Amazon will have to go somewhere we won't bother making any effort' that may not have happened, and Amazon would be less efficient and the whole country would earn less.

For example some cities were proposing building things like extra train stations, which benefit everyone, and aren't something Amazon could have done privately.

Re: NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

#136

Post by andjd »

In comparison, over the next 10 years, the MTA is projected to spend 6 billion extending the 2nd avenue subway a mere 1.5 miles to 125th st.

I don't know that I approve of the incentives to bring Amazon to NYC, but I suspect New Yorkers will see a better rate of return on that investment than on other government excesses.

Re: NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

#137

Post by xt00 »

fmmow wrote: post #113
vdnkh wrote: post #32

1) Incentives are not given up front. They are given proportional to the results Amazon has achieved. Amazon must make a report each year detailing their progress before any award is given. 2) The city-level incentives are available to any business. State-level incentives (I think 300m) are not. 3) Amazon has pledged to invest in the local community as part of the deal. There are plans for an elementary school and te…

Tech hasn't been kind to Seattle or SF. Maybe to the people attracted likely to be filling this jobs, but not to the people in the surrounding areas. LIC was mostly warehouses at one point and you're right a lot of the new units are housing for people moving away from Manhattan. But the concern is not just about LIC; it's about Corona, Astoria, Jackson Heights. These are areas with a lot of immigrant communities, com…

Not sure why you would say that tech hasn’t been kind to Seattle — nearly the entire history of Seattle and surrounding areas has been based upon 2 things: resources and technology. Resources like trees and salmon and otherwise don’t actually employ that many people in the modern era.. one person can log huge areas and it takes many years for this trees to grow back so there is an upper limit to how many people can be supported by it. Technology companies like Microsoft and you could also call Boeing a tech company in many ways are basically the reason 90% of the people are in the Seattle area anyway — so amazon and others are part of the latest wave of tech happening in the Seattle area and brings in zillions or dollars from around the world. Many many many people in Seattle area have become very rich from that. If people making money is not what you like to see there are plenty of parts of the country that are full of struggling people who wish they could find a job that pays more than $10 and hour. Maybe people get pushed out in certain areas but often a lot of those people sell their houses at a profit so it’s not horrible for them. Anyway, I just think broadly stating that tech has not been kind to Seattle is a bit of a narrow view for an area that has more to be happy about than many places. By the way, construction workers basically can write their own ticket in Seattle right now.. huge demand and way too few workers. Same thing for trades. Where do they get the work? 95% from people who work for Microsoft, google, amazon, and many of the other tech companies in Seattle / Bellevue area.

Re: NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

#138

Post by NoblePublius »

chiefalchemist wrote: post #131

Let's be clear, the free market this is not. It's yet another perfect example of government gone wild. It's one thing for to use taxpayer monies to create jobs and job opportunity (i.e., education). That's a reasonable expectation within the scope of gov's governing. However, it's another thing for gov to buy jobs - and thus votes - by effectively subsidizing some mega-corporation. If Amazon needs money, that's what…

Literally the opposite. The tax gains out number the tax breaks 3 to 1. Each one of these $150k jobs will net NY state $13.8k of income tax per year and (at least) $2500 of sales tax. The tax break per job is $4800 per year (the $48k figure you may have seen is over ten years).

Re: NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

#139

Post by kodablah »

jondubois wrote: post #124
vdnkh wrote: post #32

1) Incentives are not given up front. They are given proportional to the results Amazon has achieved. Amazon must make a report each year detailing their progress before any award is given. 2) The city-level incentives are available to any business. State-level incentives (I think 300m) are not. 3) Amazon has pledged to invest in the local community as part of the deal. There are plans for an elementary school and te…

>> 1) Incentives are not given up front. They are given proportional to the results Amazon has achieved. Amazon must make a report each year detailing their progress before any award is given. What is progress? How do you measure progress? Many politicians claim that the past decade was progress. I don't see it. >> 2) The city-level incentives are available to any business. State-level incentives (I think 300m) are n…

> How do you measure progress? For the past decade, we've severely deteriorated as a society

If you are unsure how to measure something, surely you shouldn't present a result.

Re: NY state tax break is $48k per Amazon HQ job

#140

Post by munk-a »

chrisseaton wrote: post #114
boomka wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know who you are referring to as NYC, but citizens of USA as a whole are worse off. Pitting one USA municipality against another to extract subsidy for what Amazon would do anyways is just another mechanism for wealth transfer from the poor to the rich.

It's not just money is it? It's also things like infrastructure they'll provide? Could that possibly make Amazon more efficient, and so employ more people who spend their salaries and so on, creating a net gain for the whole US?

This is a pretty weak point, essentially "Lets give that guy money, he might do good things with it, he's done good things with it in the past." except instead of being a personal investment this concerns tax payer money being funneled to a private corporation.

They'd be much better spending that money on their neglected public transit or their neglected public housing...

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