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Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

governor.ny.gov

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Re: Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

#111

Post by zaroth »

joshuamorton wrote: post #71
zaroth wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what detractors of the deal keep saying. You can speculate on the organic growth rate of the NY economy all you want. But at the end of the day, there are 25,000 - 40,000 jobs which definitely won’t be coming to Long Island City now.

That's not obviously true. The land is still there. Other companies could use it. Unless everything Amazon might have purchased goes totally undeveloped, the impact is less than the 25k jobs. And given the time horizons involved, I'd take that bet.

Anyone else who proposes to develop at the scale that Amazon was proposing, would likely be achieving similar tax incentives as to what Amazon was offered. Particularly since the terms of the deal were made public, that becomes an anchor point for any similar discussions.

There is no question that organic growth will eventually create 25,000-40,000 jobs. But the net present value (NPV) of that future job creation is significantly reduced after applying the discount. So even the same number of jobs is not a comparable economic impact.

Re: Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

#112

Post by blacksqr »

pas wrote: post #104
blacksqr wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

tfw you can't make a profit renting housing in San Francisco.

Lack of a streamlined and efficient construction approvals process is really hurting (some ?) US cities. Or the real estate developer community is really spoiled there. And by streamlined I don't mean just rubber stamp everything. But instead have clear rules, and check the plans fast whether they are compliant with them. (Basic civil engineering stuff, fire hazard, environmental protection, noise, traffic management…

Sounds like there's plenty of stuff to blame besides low-income people wanting a place to live.

Re: Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

#113

Post by kortilla »

gcb0 wrote: post #94
k_sh wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm glad we're waking up to this fact. It's not enough to hold a belief... in our system, action is required. I think this is why young people are so frequently screwed by political decisions and policy - we are, uncoincidentally, the age group that votes least often.

believing in a system where you have to be vigilant 24/7 is very counterproductive. The fact that our system was corrupted to the point of requiring it is not a point to elate! it is a point to contempt. > the age group that votes least often. That's a very disingenuous argument that you yourself refuted in the first paragraph...If it doesn't matter only voting, does voting alone matters? At which point is political…

>because amazon deserves to pay zero since they did participate in politics, unlike me

Stop repeating this meme. Amazon paid no income tax because of carried losses, which has absolutely nothing to do with its involvement in politics and carrying losses is available to every business (including sole proprietorships).

Re: Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

#114

Post by chrismcb »

spamizbad wrote: post #40
Permit wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> * Most of these "deals" were put together secretly without input from the public. Millions (or in NY's case, billion+) of dollars were packaged and presented without community input or oversight > * State and local governments probably shouldn't be diverting billions of their citizen's tax revenue to lure corporations who will only impact a tiny subset of their citizenry. I haven't been following this closely. What…

Rezoning and eminent domain, resulting in massive windfall for Plaxall https://www.crainsnewyork.com/real-estate/plastics-company-a... (Yes, some of that land is being purchased in a private sale, but its value is now significantly greater because of the city's rezoning and ability to stich-together workable parcels through eminent domain)Long island City residents aren't terribly happy about that. Then there's the w…

Use of eminent domain is disgusting and that alone is enough to kill the deal IMHO. Using eminent domain for a private business is wrong. It seems like New York does that too often.

Re: Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

#115

Post by gcb0 »

kortilla wrote: post #113
gcb0 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

believing in a system where you have to be vigilant 24/7 is very counterproductive. The fact that our system was corrupted to the point of requiring it is not a point to elate! it is a point to contempt. > the age group that votes least often. That's a very disingenuous argument that you yourself refuted in the first paragraph...If it doesn't matter only voting, does voting alone matters? At which point is political…

>because amazon deserves to pay zero since they did participate in politics, unlike me Stop repeating this meme. Amazon paid no income tax because of carried losses, which has absolutely nothing to do with its involvement in politics and carrying losses is available to every business (including sole proprietorships).

the context is the ny deal and I extrapolated a little too be more realistic representative. do the exercise with your state tax, if it will help you not think this is a meme.

Re: Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

#116

Post by asabjorn »

presty wrote: post #38

Quote of the Day: "The seventy percent of New Yorkers who supported Amazon and now vent their anger also bear responsibility and must learn that the silent majority should not be silent because they can lose to the vocal minority and self-interested politicians."

Another favorite:

> You don't need to be the State's Budget Director to know that a nine to one return on your investment is a winner.

The politicians as well as activists involved in this train-crash showed what the consequence is of electing and pandering to people that think it is possible to be factually wrong while morally right.

You can't be morally right while lying, and lack of interest/humility in search for truths relevant to important responsibilities you are taking on is no excuse. Living with someone that believes in that is not a good life, and being governed by such people is even worse.

Re: Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

#117

Post by kortilla »

ddebernardy wrote: post #3

I suspect I'll never get why the notion of giving a tax handout to a company that's one of the most valuable in the world shouldn't be a non-starter. > Incredibly, I have heard city and state elected officials who were opponents of the project claim that Amazon was getting $3 billion in government subsidies that could have been better spent on housing or transportation. This is either a blatant untruth or fundamental…

>I suspect I'll never get why the notion of giving a tax handout to a company that's one of the most valuable in the world shouldn't be a non-starter.

Every company that would have built in Long Island city is eligible for the same tax credit program. Using the word “handout” is propaganda designed to make you think the government wasn’t still taking in more than was credited. Amazon did not get this without bringing in tens of billions more tax revenue.

>so, more infinite returns, and less 9:1 returns, please.

>Or is there something else at work here?

Yeah, those infinite returns don’t exist. Nobody else is building in LIC with that scale so there is no comparable thing providing “infinite returns”. Even if there was a company doing so, it would be eligible for the same tax credits. Amazon wasn’t getting an Amazon-specific handout.

Even if all companies weren’t getting it, I sure as hell would want 25,000 jobs that bring 70% of normal tax revenue for 10 years instead of adding a trickle of jobs at normal tax revenue that doesn’t even reach 25k jobs in 10 years.

Re: Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

#118

Post by tootahe45 »

spamizbad wrote: post #23
smallgovt wrote: post #2

I think it's sad that the vocal minority was able to alter this decision. As the letter mentions, the project would have brought $27b in revenue to the state. This magnitude of revenue is material considering the fact that the state only collected $76b in taxes in the last reported fiscal year. I think there's reason to debate whether large corps should be able to hold an auction like this, but given the place we fin…

I'm glad they dropped it. There are some grounded concerns: * Amazon is one of the most successful enterprises in human history and should not require support from taxpayers beyond their voluntary patronage of Amazon itself. * Most of these "deals" were put together secretly without input from the public. Millions (or in NY's case, billion+) of dollars were packaged and presented without community input or oversight…

This reads a bit like "we could've used that 3 billion to pay for teachers". This logic is flawed because the 3b is created by Amazon in the first place.

Re: Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

#119

Post by asabjorn »

ddebernardy wrote: post #3

I suspect I'll never get why the notion of giving a tax handout to a company that's one of the most valuable in the world shouldn't be a non-starter. > Incredibly, I have heard city and state elected officials who were opponents of the project claim that Amazon was getting $3 billion in government subsidies that could have been better spent on housing or transportation. This is either a blatant untruth or fundamental…

You are addressing the quote:

> You don't need to be the State's Budget Director to know that a nine to one return on your investment is a winner.

I think you are here making a moral argument of sorts. Why is it morally better to get 100% of nothing than to participate in a project with incentives that give you 9 times return plus create 24-40k jobs? I simply don't see a viable argument that this was morally right, and wonder what argument you have that the facts we know support this proposition.

So far the opponents have not provided a "morally better" alternative to provide Queens with 25-40k jobs, unionized secure jobs for vast amounts of families, and a tax base necessary to invest in Queens that has received very little investment in decades. They have "hopes and dreams", but destroy the only path we had to get there.

Due to this we can't improve the offerings of progressive government services for the people living in Queens. Real kids, families, elderly and youth seeking opportunity is affected by this. These facts seems to show conclusively that this what the activists achieved was morally wrong.

Re: Open Letter from New York State Budget Director Robert Mujica Regarding Amazon

#120

Post by morpheuskafka »

matchagaucho wrote: post #86

RWDSU... you really need to wake up. The Labor Union movement was making great progress with AMZN, raising the minimum wage of fulfillment centers to $15 hr. Negotiating is a series of compromises. AMZN basically reflected your brinkmanship strategy back into your face. While I wish corporate America was above this, the Unions are the ones that need to learn a lesson here. AMZN conceded to 11,000 Labor Union jobs for…

RWDSU didn't care about the construction jobs being unionized. Why? Because construction workers don't pay union dues to RWDSU. Unions are businesses. They exist to make money via dues, and do enough to benefit employees to get voted in. Once in, they benefit from laws that make it very hard to get them back out. RWDSU saw the dollar signs and looked to enroll new members--mostly people who didn't even live in the state yet and were not members of the local. Because NY is not a right to work state, they would be forced to begin paying dues to RWDSU without any vote or input.

A union's product is supposed to be advocacy for workers. But unlike lawyers or publicists, who are hired and fired by the people they advocate for, unions get voted in or established through hiring halls and high-level deals like these, and then they use the law to force workers to pay them for often unwanted or low-quality services.

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