Wow, $25.7 billion total employee compensation / 50,000 employees is $514,000 per employee.
Err, that's not all in one year, right?
Amazon to Build Second HQ in North America
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Re: Amazon to Build Second HQ in North America
#12> Why is Amazon choosing its second headquarters location via a public process?
Because Foxconn got such an amazing deal and we want to get some of those sweet, sweet tax credits, too
Re: Amazon to Build Second HQ in North America
#13Bezos: Alexa, buy me a city, we need new headquarters.
Alexa: City acquired.
It's so crazy to see a company make cities apply for hosting them, instead of them applying for space in a city. But I guess that given the size of Amazon, it's actually worth more than most cities in the world anyway...
Re: Amazon to Build Second HQ in North America
#14I actually hope this is a city where housing affordability is made more sustainable up front. Something to avoid the way New York and San Francisco have evolved into landlords and rent seekers drowning the wealth generation of incumbents
Something tells me housing will suddenly become a little less affordable after Amazon comes to town.
Re: Amazon to Build Second HQ in North America
#15It always amuses me how stunningly bad Amazon really is at making standalone pages on their web site. This one is totally unresponsive, has images for headings, and a slightly blurry image for the table. Here's Amazon Locker, which is even more dismal: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Click-and-Collect-with-Amazon-Locke... I guess they must have to produce all this stuff within the constraints of their CMS, but it really doe…
That page is actually responsive, just based on user agent rather than viewport dimensions
That is usually referred to as adaptive design.
Re: Amazon to Build Second HQ in North America
#16Let's say I'm the mayor of Detroit, and I want this. What incentives are in my power to offer, if I team up with the Guv'nor? Can I just gift them the land?
cost of land is probably the least of amazon's considerations in building a second HQ edit: to elaborate, what they care much more about, i'm sure, is ability to attract and retain talent in the area. which I'm not sure detroit could do much about. even if you could make it more desirable to live there there's so little talent in the area you'd have to spend a crazy amount of time and money relocating people
I think you are under-estimating the amount of tech talent that supports the automotive and satellite industries in the Midwest.
Re: Amazon to Build Second HQ in North America
#17Let's say I'm the mayor of Detroit, and I want this. What incentives are in my power to offer, if I team up with the Guv'nor? Can I just gift them the land?
I'd imagine it would be along the same lines of what movies / studios get to shoot in certain cities -- relief from various tax types, priority in various permits, etc
Re: Amazon to Build Second HQ in North America
#18Let's say I'm the mayor of Detroit, and I want this. What incentives are in my power to offer, if I team up with the Guv'nor? Can I just gift them the land?
cost of land is probably the least of amazon's considerations in building a second HQ edit: to elaborate, what they care much more about, i'm sure, is ability to attract and retain talent in the area. which I'm not sure detroit could do much about. even if you could make it more desirable to live there there's so little talent in the area you'd have to spend a crazy amount of time and money relocating people
> there's so little talent
Citation needed. For example, the University of Michigan's engineering school is well ranked in many areas, grants 3,000 degrees a year, and is an hour away:
Re: Amazon to Build Second HQ in North America
#19Wow, $25.7 billion total employee compensation / 50,000 employees is $514,000 per employee. Err, that's not all in one year, right?
Think the table is listing figures since 2010 for the Direct column.
Re: Amazon to Build Second HQ in North America
#20Bezos: Alexa, buy me a city, we need new headquarters. Alexa: City acquired. It's so crazy to see a company make cities apply for hosting them, instead of them applying for space in a city. But I guess that given the size of Amazon, it's actually worth more than most cities in the world anyway...
It's all about tax breaks. This is a blatant attempt by Amazon to get years of taxes abated in order to provide the increased regional economic benefit of... doing exactly what they'd do anyways if they didn't get the break. US city and state then competes against other US cities and states in a battle to provide the larger tax break.
It's an odious practice in my opinion, and I wish lawmakers would do something to curb it. But being able to tell your constituents "Hey, look at me, I got Amazon to come here!" makes for great campaigning.