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Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

nytimes.com

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Re: Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

#961

Post by Declanomous »

seanp2k2 wrote: post #890
Declanomous wrote: post #822

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meaning donations, who gave them, etc? I'm a nonprofit fundraising professional, and I could probably talk about all the reasons why that is a horrible idea for 2-3 hours straight without repeating myself. I mean, at the very least, it's a bad idea for the same reason that exposing all the financials of every individual, or all other organizations, with the added benefit that you'd be opening people up to harassment…

While I agree with most of what you wrote, there are already countries where all individuals' tax returns are public https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/national/artic...

Publishing total income is way different than publishing all your financial information.

There is information in people's finances that should be 100% private. What if an employer looks at the financials of someone applying for a job and sees they claimed $100k in medical expenses last year because they had cancer? Companies will do that if they have the ability, and people will lose jobs because of it.

It doesn't matter if you make it illegal. I worked a recruiting agency for a while, and illegal hiring practices are incredibly common.

Re: Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

#962

Post by ApolloFortyNine »

meesterdude wrote: post #653
ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could easily argue it put Kansas City on the map. Kansas City is at least a well known name in the tech world now, when there's plenty of other midwest cities of similar size that rarely get brought up. Millions would be a steal for the revenue becoming a tech hub would bring in. Even if it does take a more than a decade to be realized.

News to me kansas city is popular in the tech world now.

I didn't say popular.

Cities of similar size: Albuquerque, Milwaukee, Louisville, Oklahoma City (and more).

Out of these, Kansas City comes up more often tech wise. I waste a good bit of time on sites like this discussing tech related matters, and not once have I read an article involving any of these cities.

This is why I said well known and on the map, not 'popular'.

Re: Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

#963

Post by vonmoltke »

SolarNet wrote: post #913
hopler wrote: post #569

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Property taxes are generally searchable online. Redfin will tell you residential real estate taxes for a property, for example.

The assessed property tax values of the property. What does that have to do with the actual amount paid? Tax breaks for an entity don't apply to the assessed value of property owned by them...

Every taxing district I have looked up property in shows the actual amount billed. They always show all applicable credits the property or its owner qualify for. I haven't tried to look up NYS records, but I don't think it's any different.

Re: Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

#964

Post by bogomipz »

vonmoltke wrote: post #564
bogomipz wrote: post #409

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"Ugh... any company moving into NY can get these same large tax concessions." Really? Let look at what was offered: 1 $897 million from the city’s Relocation and Employment Assistance Program (REAP) and 2 $386 million from the Industrial & Commercial Abatement Program (ICAP) 3 $1.2 billion in “Excelsior” credits 4 $505 million in a capital grant Yes the first 3 are existing programs. But the idea that those sums or…

> Yes the first 3 are existing programs. But the idea that those sums or anything remotely close to them would simply be made available to any company moving to NY is comical at best. > $897 million from the city’s Relocation and Employment Assistance Program (REAP) That works out to $35,880 per employee that Amazon promised. Per the REAP program website[1], the credits available are $3000 per employee for 12 years.…

It looks like you left out the 505 million dollar capital grant part.

>"In short, I do not see it as "comical" by any measure that any company offering to create 25,000 new jobs and redevelop hundreds of millions of dollars worth of property in designated areas "

It sounds like you aren't familiar with NYC. Long Island City has long since been "developed." That building boom started 18 years ago. The volume and velocity of luxury high rises appearing across the East River has been incredible. LIC does not need to be "redeveloped" nor is it some basket case "designated" area that requires incentives and credits to build there.

Re: Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

#965

Post by balls187 »

efitz wrote: post #794
balls187 wrote: post #714

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately it doesn't work like that. First, state income tax is exactly that, income tax imposed by the state, and governed by the state. There may be local jurisdictions that impose additional income tax but any savings there would be trivial. While sports are important to the local economy, my understanding is that they are relatively minor at the state level. Second, LeBron (and other athletes) earn playing in…

> ... but any savings there would be trivial Uh, state income taxes can approach 10%. This is not “trivial”. http://www.tax-rates.org/taxtables/income-tax-by-state

You misread my comment.

The original proposal was that star athletes attempt to negotiate tax incentives with cities, in the same vein Amazon did with NYC (and many other large corporations do).

City income taxes add a trivial percent to the total income tax rate when compared to the state income tax level. Thus, if you got incentives from a city, they would amount to trivial amount of savings.

Athletes would need to negotiate at the state level in order to have a material effect on their taxes.

I hope that clarifies my point.

I imagine Athletes pay accountants who are well versed in how to fill out those forms, and, at least in the NFL's case, a lot of players compensation may be in bonuses, and not necessarily game-day checks (which would be subject to local jurisdictional income laws).

Re: Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

#966

Post by balls187 »

vonmoltke wrote: post #953
will_brown wrote: post #941

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Second, LeBron (and other athletes) earn playing income in every jurisdiction they play in, not based solely on the jurisdiction that the team is based in. This means they are responsible for filing taxes in each of these jurisdiction. That’s pretty funny how well settled that area of Law is, and yet again Amazon thinks it’s pretty special in that regard also...historically they haven’t paid those taxes either (stat…

Merchants don't pay sales taxes, they collect them on behalf of the taxing entity. The tax is owed by the consumer to the entity regardless of whether the merchant collects it or not. Amazon was trying to give itself an advantage over physical retailers, but thus had nothing to do with Amazon trying to get out of taxes.

Which is a total gangster move by the states. Force merchants to do the dirty work.

Re: Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

#967

Post by balls187 »

vonmoltke wrote: post #954
baddox wrote: post #887

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a paid remote internship for about 6 months for a Texas company while I lived in Missouri. I had to file a Texas state income tax form, or at least my reading of the law indicated that I had to, and Texas gladly took the money.

From where did you get a form that doesn't exist? Texas has no income tax.

Perhaps the Texas company sent him the form for MO, as they DO have state-income tax.

Re: Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

#968

Post by fjp »

int_19h wrote: post #817
fjp wrote: post #567

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't you rather existing NYC residents build new companies to make it a tech center? You're just letting the giant school bully take over your neighborhood for below market value (due to the massive tax breaks) and declaring "Look! We're a tech center!"

> below market value (due to the massive tax breaks) I don't see how "below market value" follows from "massive tax breaks". Are you implying that the standard tax rate is somehow determined by the market? Because it's not, and "market value" is whatever the market is willing to pay for it. Unless they have someone other than Amazon offering the same benefits for less, then Amazon offer was market value.

Because they're essentially paying: market value - value from future tax breaks discounted to current value

Re: Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

#969

Post by stvswn »

anth_anm wrote: post #670
stvswn wrote: post #663

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Big ticket? Of the abatements, only $500M (the portion related to construction) wasn't available to any business that met the state's requirements. Giveaway? These are tax incentives that are part of the state's tax code -- taking less in taxes to incentivize a particular action is not the same as giving away money that could be spent elsewhere (to illustrate why it isn't the same, that money is not currently availab…

> NYC won HQ2 originally in spite of not giving nearly as much as other jurisdictions were willing to. Because the entire "competition" was a sham. Amazon was never going to park the future of the company into a place lacking talent. > The proposal was most popular among Black and Hispanic Queens residents and least popular among White Manhattan residents That's a good point, but the counter is that the Black and His…

So it's false consciousness, then? You know what's best for them?

Re: Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Campus

#970

Post by stvswn »

nihonde wrote: post #823
stvswn wrote: post #663

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Big ticket? Of the abatements, only $500M (the portion related to construction) wasn't available to any business that met the state's requirements. Giveaway? These are tax incentives that are part of the state's tax code -- taking less in taxes to incentivize a particular action is not the same as giving away money that could be spent elsewhere (to illustrate why it isn't the same, that money is not currently availab…

Of all the crummy talking points defending Amazon in this situation, the most odious is the idea that regular working New Yorkers lost an opportunity to get good jobs and upgrade their livelihoods. Amazon has an established record of being terrible to its workforce, and any fool knows that the workers in Amazon HQ2 aren’t going to be regular joes in Queens. At best, ordinary New Yorkers had a shot at serving HQ2 exec…

The "regular joe in Queens" may not get the SWE job in Amazon, but they most certainly can understand that with 25,000 well paid workers comes lots of other economic activity. Do you think that retail owners, restaurant owners, construction workers, etc. etc. etc. are too stupid to understand that they're not going to get hired as a UX designer? Maybe the people who run coffee and catering businesses would LOVE to serve execs their food, because they like new customers? I also find it remarkeble that your argument seems to be: "amazon treats their workers poorly, but also they're too well paid and they'll gentrify the place, but also regular Queens residents won't get the jobs anyway" -- so they're going to gentrify the area with their terrible jobs? Why would the Queens workers want to work there if it's so terrible?
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