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Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

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Re: Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

#231

Post by Gpetrium »

I think a lot of us forget that there is an economic multiplier occurring when a company of Amazon's magnitude comes and sets-up shop. There are also clear benefits from having educated individuals setting-up shop in your city. Not accounting for all the other ways that taxes and commerce exist for companies of that size (E.g. Payroll tax, etc)

I agree that there are some negative factors that have to be accounted for that are not associated with the subsidies. I also find it unnecessary for a place like NY to be provide that degree of subsidies since it already has a quite robust environment full of successful businesses.

I think the US would be better off having Amazon's HQ2 in another area of the country (a combo of North Carolina/Virginia maybe?) to diversify the country's technological output from California & NY.

Re: Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

#232

Post by anth_anm »

cthalupa wrote: post #226
anth_anm wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> then break it down vs jobs No. No giveaways like this. None. Zero. If Amazon wants welfare for jobs, then tell them to screw off and let another company come in that will employ people without handouts.

2.5 billion of the "welfare for jobs" is open to any company coming that meets the requirements of the Excelsior program. So if you want companies to come in without tax incentives, you probably need to go to your congresspeople and get that program turned off.

People keep saying this like it's an absurd proposition that no one would be fine with.

Also you could restrict the programs a whole lot more, even if you think they should keep existing.

Re: Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

#233

Post by cthalupa »

hannasanarion wrote: post #14
barry-cotter wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd argue NYC rejected Amazon. Over 60% of NYC residents who had an opinion supported Amazon. Over 70% of Long Island residents supported them. This is a victory for some well organised political activists but to cast it as a victory for NYC is a bit much. At the very least it makes NYC a less likely competitor to the Bay Area. https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2019/02/am... > The Bay Area: NYC is n…

>At the very least it makes NYC a less likely competitor to the Bay Area. Nonsense. If the bay area were a competitor, that's where Amazon would have wanted put their new HQ, not New York. Amazon doesn't have an HQ in San Francisco. Nevermind the fact that New York has been experiencing a tech boom for the last decade or more, with Apple, Facebook, and Google all buying campuses similar in scale to Amazon's proposed…

Apple, Facebook, and Google all meet the requirements for the Excelsior Jobs Program ( https://esd.ny.gov/excelsior-jobs-program ) which is where 2.5 billion of the 3 came from for the Amazon deal.

I have no personal knowledge of whether or not the three are utilizing it, but it would seem unlikely to me that three smart businesses would not be taking advantage of some easy to quality for tax credits, which means it's likely they are taking 5/6ths of the same amount of tax breaks that Amazon was planning to.

Re: Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

#234

Post by Gokenstein »

ThomPete wrote: post #192
Tempest1981 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Simply the rate of change/growth, and the pressure it places on cities and long-time residents, are valid reasons for caution. You imply that these issues are easily solved, if people like NIMBYs "simply" change their mindset. But history shows that mindset-change is a slow and stressful process. Cautionary tales are a chance to study such issues, and find solutions, or at least strategies -- something that govt is u…

How is it putting a pressure on long-time residents exactly? New York is always changing it's a very expensive city to live in and it's getting more end more expensive. That's how it is for us living here. Everyone. I don't see the argument in what you are saying.

In Chicago I saw first hand how it turned the Mayor into everyone's favorite punching bag:

Housing prices go up. Developers move in and scoop up desirable properties, remodel the kitchen, paint it grey, and sell to a young tech worker for 3-4x what they bought the property for or demo a 100 year old beautiful greystone and put up a modern shipping container on stilts with 8 apartments and no parking.

Property values go up, long time residents are getting older. The ones who CAN move sell first and you get a runaway housing bubble. The ones who CAN'T move? They're on a fixed income. They need public services but they can't afford more taxes. Property taxes go up. Sometimes older people on fixed income can get a freeze, but taxes go up anyway. More people, more services.

People don't like taxes going up so either you put it off as long as you can while services atrophy and you make it the next guy's problem, or eventually schools start going bankrupt. Teachers go on strike, not enough police, not enough money to keep up transit and infrastructure, and you've got a lot of upper middle class people living in a very expensive post-apocalyptic hell hole.

That's Chicago.

Re: Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

#235

Post by nihonde »

whatok wrote: post #139
nihonde wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The $500M exceptional credit was the issue. That’s a lot of money.

No one opposing Amazon actually pieced out that portion of it as their reason for opposing it. Be honest. If the $500mm is the real beef with the whole thing then break it down vs jobs: $50mm/yr vs 25,000 jobs paying an average of $150k/yr for a total of $3.75bn of taxable income. At New York State's lowest tax bracket of 4%, that's $150mm. At New York State's highest tax bracket of 8.84%, that's over $330mm.

Take the $0.5B out of the offer and see what happens. I’m pretty sure you’d close the deal.

Re: Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

#236

Post by nihonde »

Velchronus wrote: post #166
nihonde wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The $500M exceptional credit was the issue. That’s a lot of money.

The 500M was for fixing up the eroding waterfront where they were building the campus. The alternative was allowing the damage to continue or fix it at a higher price themselves.

I don’t want to pay for that either way. Let other developers do it. LIC is gentrifying anyway.

Re: Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

#237

Post by joyeuse6701 »

untog wrote: post #185
weiming wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Over some years, Amazon was to pay some $X in taxes. But they were given a break to pay $3b less assuming some goals are met. The city receives $X - $3b. Now the city receives $0.

Well, not $0. NYC is a desirable place for many companies, and others will move in to the place Amazon intended to occupy. It might take longer and the companies may be smaller, but it's not like there is now a giant black hole in Queens that can never be filled.

I think many businesses will think twice about attempting a move to this particular part of NYC, who knows if your company falls into the 'acceptable' category of the government and it's representatives new ideology?

Re: Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

#238

Post by moate »

rlanday wrote: post #99
crispyambulance wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> this really highlighted the kind of leverage a big company can hold over even a huge metropolis. Agree, it was a gross display of cynical power. Amazon played a dozen large cities off each other, forcing each to bend over backward to offer up as much freebies as possible. In exchange for what? A tentative fungible "promise" to deliver 50000 high-pay jobs to the lucky city? In response, even poor cities like Philade…

Well, no, actually it turns out there’s only going to be one HQ2 after all. NYC got complacent.

By the original definition of the size, magnitude, there will be 0 "HQ2s" until Amazon announces that it's Crystal City location is going to be twice as large.

NYC didn't fall for a Foxconn style bait and switch.

Re: Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

#239

Post by cthalupa »

anth_anm wrote: post #232
cthalupa wrote: post #226

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2.5 billion of the "welfare for jobs" is open to any company coming that meets the requirements of the Excelsior program. So if you want companies to come in without tax incentives, you probably need to go to your congresspeople and get that program turned off.

People keep saying this like it's an absurd proposition that no one would be fine with. Also you could restrict the programs a whole lot more, even if you think they should keep existing.

I have no real position on whether or not it should exist. I don't know if the positive impact outweighs the cost.

But no one in here is making a strong argument for it either way, and neither are you.

People can say that Amazon has to go somewhere regardless, so everyone should band together and say no subsidies are ignoring the fact that the subsidies might be what makes it economically possible for Amazon to create these jobs in the first place. Maybe the government gives Amazon $5, they turn it into $30, and Amazon pays the government back $7.50. Or the sum of the economic development in the area results in the government getting back $7.50 for the $5 they spent. And by give, I mean 'Doesn't charge Amazon for come tax season'.

Or maybe the government doesn't give Amazon anything, and Amazon or the sum of economic activity still means the government gets $7.50, and they net the whole amount instead of $2.50.

I don't know, I'm not an economist or versed enough in the specifics here to have any real idea. But either option is possible, as well as a broad variety of others, but the a significant portion of arguments in here seem to be 'Businesses should never get subsidies because I don't think they should/Bezos is the richest man in the world he can pay for stuff" or "lol the stupid liberals shot themselves in the foot."

Re: Did New York Lose Anything with Amazon’s Rejection? It’s Complicated

#240

Post by cthalupa »

JJMcJ wrote: post #187

Somehow every other company in the universe seems able to locate in NYC without a multi-billion $$ subsidy.

Well, 5/6ths of the subsidy Amazon was going to receive is open to quite a lot of businesses.

https://esd.ny.gov/excelsior-jobs-program

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