Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 203 posts

Re: It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

#31

Post by AznHisoka »

johnmarcus wrote: post #10
code4tee wrote: post #3

The NYC tech sector is indeed growing quite strong and is also quite grounded in the realities of business because of the diversity of NYC’s overall economy. Few cities in the world have the economic diversity that New York does. That drives the mindset to be noticeably different, mostly in a good way. At several meet ups recently the moderator wasn’t shy about warning Silicon Valley companies “I’d advise you to be c…

Which is why it will never really be Silicon Valley. No risk, no reward. NY is too expensive for anyone to sit around and take risks, likewise, it will never see the real reward.

What is this “real reward”? Housing is cheaper in NY (though certainly not inexpensive). Last I checked, we still have theaters, museums, clubs, etc too. Ok weather is a problem.

Re: It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

#32

Post by School-Cotton »

code4tee wrote: post #18
TuringNYC wrote: post #11

I realize the anti-Amazon movement was a limited (but loud) group of individuals, but if their level of influence has lasting power, NYC tech is in trouble. Consider NYTimes' own article on the amazon exit. Half the people angry at Amazon were commenting that Amazon wasn't going to pay living wages (thinking that corporate HQ2 jobs are fulfillment jobs.) The other half were angry that Amazon was going to pay too much…

The backlash was mostly about the tax breaks and government subsidies that would have been given. The argument was that New York is New York and doesn’t need to bribe companies to put big offices here.

That was one reason for the backlash, but it wasn't "mostly" about that. I guarantee that people like AOC would have been against Amazon HQ2, subsidy or not.

Edit to explain further: much of the backlash was about concerns like gentrification, or the inability of local infrastructure to handle 25k new residents.

Re: It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

#33

Post by neom »

TuringNYC wrote: post #26
code4tee wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The backlash was mostly about the tax breaks and government subsidies that would have been given. The argument was that New York is New York and doesn’t need to bribe companies to put big offices here.

They definitely didn't need to bribe Amazon. There was a time to argue against that. True leadership would have been to have these protests when the incentives package was put together, not later when we already bagged the win and would lose everything.

I don't think any leadership in the world could have made it so that Corey Johnson didn't try to prove a point to Blasio and Cuomo. I went to both council hearings and it didn't seem to me like any incentives or tax breaks would be acceptable for big business, even the very same current tax breaks any company of that scale could apply for and get in new york state.

Re: It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

#34

Post by aetherson »

code4tee wrote: post #28
arcanus wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the withdrawal of Amazon, didn't that invalidate the argument?

Amazon didn’t withdraw from NYC. They still have around 5k employees here. Meanwhile Google is significantly expanding their NYC offices and nobody had to bribe them to do it.

Are you sure about that? Giving tax breaks to large employers is pretty standard practice. What was unusual about the Amazon debacle was how public it was.

Re: It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

#35

Post by chiefalchemist »

Google? DoubleClick? Perhaps the more accurate headline would be: New York Became a Tech Town (Because SV Ran Out of Space and People)? Not a criticism, simply an honest observation.

But what industry doesn't have outposts in NYC? Why would we expect tech to be any different? Where is the story here? Where is the news?

Re: It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

#36

Post by maxsilver »

TuringNYC wrote: post #26
code4tee wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The backlash was mostly about the tax breaks and government subsidies that would have been given. The argument was that New York is New York and doesn’t need to bribe companies to put big offices here.

They definitely didn't need to bribe Amazon. There was a time to argue against that. True leadership would have been to have these protests when the incentives package was put together, not later when we already bagged the win and would lose everything.

> True leadership would have been to have these protests when the incentives package was put together,

Which is hard to do, since Amazon convinced most city leaders across the country to keep the majority of the incentives secret, and therefore no one could know how bad it was until it was already too late.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/05/technology/amazon-headqua...

There's a strong argument here that the protesters were the only people involved in this whole ordeal that actually did their job properly.

Re: It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

#37

Post by graeme »

code4tee wrote: post #28
arcanus wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the withdrawal of Amazon, didn't that invalidate the argument?

Amazon didn’t withdraw from NYC. They still have around 5k employees here. Meanwhile Google is significantly expanding their NYC offices and nobody had to bribe them to do it.

Amazon's still expanding in nyc too. But....not 25,000 employees. Does Google have 25,000 employees in NYC?

Re: It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

#38

Post by EnderMB »

I've been wanting to move to NYC for years. I love big cities, and since I was a kid I loved NYC. I went on holiday there a few years ago, and it only reinforced the idea of living there.

In practice, finding tech jobs as a Brit has been horrendous. I've applied for countless roles, including roles at all FAANG companies, startups crying out for people with my experience, and established medium-sized companies hiring (and offering sponsorship of work permits)...and nothing. Either immediate rejection, or emails saying "actually, we don't sponsor visas".

I don't know if this is an America thing, but I've had other companies more than happy to fly me over in other parts of the US California and Washington). Given how mixed the culture is in NYC, with so many immigrants throughout the city, I have been very surprised that it's so hard to get a job there.

This is purely from my experiences, and maybe it's just that all these companies hate me for some reason, but IMO you can't be a tech town if you're not willing to bring talent in, at least in the same ways other worldwide tech hubs will.

Re: It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

#39

Post by kharms »

TuringNYC wrote: post #11

I realize the anti-Amazon movement was a limited (but loud) group of individuals, but if their level of influence has lasting power, NYC tech is in trouble. Consider NYTimes' own article on the amazon exit. Half the people angry at Amazon were commenting that Amazon wasn't going to pay living wages (thinking that corporate HQ2 jobs are fulfillment jobs.) The other half were angry that Amazon was going to pay too much…

It's weird to me that there's so much attention given to AOC. She has no hard power in domestic NY politics. She didn't stop the deal. State politicians threatening the permitting process stopped the deal.

If NYC has a problem it's with Byzantine building codes and zoning.

Re: It Started With a Jolt: How New York Became a Tech Town

#40

Post by aetherson »

peruvian wrote: post #14

One of the reasons for this is that NYC is very livable with a tech salary. I’ve never been in the Bay Area, but here you can make just above $100k and live comfortably with a You won’t be able to buy a house and having a kid without a spouse with a similar salary may be tough, but for a single person it lets you enjoy the city and actually be able to save money.

You can do the same in the bay area. People who are complaining about how unaffordable the bay area is on six figure salaries are either wanting to be much closer than one hour from hot spots, owning a house, having a kid, or some combination thereof.
Post reply on HN