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

nytimes.com

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

#161

Post by rchaud »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #64
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…

Anecdotal, but I'm a tech worker in NYC who was firmly against Amazon coming to LIC. I know many other people who were too. NYC tech isn't in trouble — people just want it to be A) ethical companies that B) support local communities and C) don't rely on corporate welfare. I also don't really understand why AOC is being scapegoated for this — this wasn't her district and she's not a state or city politician anyway.

> I also don't really understand why AOC is being scapegoated for this —

For the same reason the purple-haired woman screaming into Logic Man's face fuels millions of "SJW cringe" video views.

AOC for many people is a symbol of "snowflake socialist millennials who want the world to be handed to them". This is a narrative that persists even when it is Amazon that pays no federal tax and demands extra concessions despite already being highly profitable.

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

#162

Post by Scoundreller »

ticmasta wrote: post #157
Scoundreller wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Canada really isn’t a hard place to immigrate to if you have at least a half-specialized degree, a year or two of experience and can pass an English or French test. There are a ton of immigration programs. The current fed gov is letting in a ton of people. If you have a job lined up, go for it. It’s a better situation here than most places.

>> The current fed gov is letting in a ton of people. No judgement implied, but this is primarily on humanitarian and compassionate grounds. There has been little increase to economic immigration quotas since the last government. Also, very few new Canadians want to go anywhere outside Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal, which is understandable to a degree but not where the need for skilled, employment-aged people is mo…

Numbers/sources?

The official reports say that they’re expecting 60% of immigration growth to come from economic migrants.

And the proportion of new Canadians settling in BC/ON/PQ is down from ‘97. But who knows how many “settle” and move the next day.

They’re blaming processing times on any decline for economic migration, which I’d expect this government to rectify. People tend to vote for the people that let them in.

And if anything, the economic migrant categories have quotas. Less demand = less points required to win an invitation.

https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/co...

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

#163

Post by tivert »

kissickas wrote: post #147
wefarrell wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The median income of NY's 14th district is 52K. My mother in law makes about that working in a hotel in Manhattan and is an immigrant who has lived in the same apartment in this district for 20 years. In what way would Amazon moving in possibly be good for someone in her situation? I also live in this district but work in tech and have a market rate salary. Amazon moving in would be good for people like me, but the a…

Would your mother-in-law not rather work in a hotel closer to home? Not everyone has to work directly for Amazon in order to benefit from the investment. Increased numbers of high-paying jobs means increased spending and new businesses in the area, as well.

>> The median income of NY's 14th district is 52K. My mother in law makes about that working in a hotel in Manhattan and is an immigrant who has lived in the same apartment in this district for 20 years. In what way would Amazon moving in possibly be good for someone in her situation?

> Would your mother-in-law not rather work in a hotel closer to home? Not everyone has to work directly for Amazon in order to benefit from the investment. Increased numbers of high-paying jobs means increased spending and new businesses in the area, as well.

Sure, maybe she could work at a brand-spanking new hotel next to HQ2 in her former neighborhood -- after she's been driven out of it by rising rents caused by HQ2.

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

#164

Post by vonmoltke »

jakelazaroff wrote: post #117
vonmoltke wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Amazon pays $0 in federal tax Citation to actual financial statements needed. Their most recent 10-K indicates they paid $1.2B in total taxes. > demanded $3 billion in local tax breaks No, they didn't. At least $2.5B of that is on the table for any company that wants to build and office for 25,000 people in LIC. > offered very little enforceable things in return Not sure what you mean here. The majority of the tax…

Amazon paying $0 in 2018 federal taxes was widely reported. Here's one citation: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/feb/15/amazon-ta...

That article is citing the same ITEP report that was posted here, a report which does not cite its sources. I'm not trusting ITEP to be any more unbiased than the Tax Foundation.

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

#165

Post by vonmoltke »

CPLX wrote: post #126
vonmoltke wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Amazon pays $0 in federal tax Citation to actual financial statements needed. Their most recent 10-K indicates they paid $1.2B in total taxes. > demanded $3 billion in local tax breaks No, they didn't. At least $2.5B of that is on the table for any company that wants to build and office for 25,000 people in LIC. > offered very little enforceable things in return Not sure what you mean here. The majority of the tax…

> At least $2.5B of that is on the table for any company that wants to build and office for 25,000 people in LIC. Right. Leaving $500MM in cold hard taxpayer dollars to build a building for the richest guy in the world so he could promptly compete with local businesses. Which, to be clear, was not something a lot of those taxpayers were happy about.

$500MM is not $3B, and you don't get to lie about the amount just because you think its still a big number.

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

#166

Post by tivert »

forrestthewoods wrote: post #56
aetherson wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

People wanting to raise a family? How preposterous!

> People wanting to raise a family? How preposterous!

I know! People should be satisfied with the opportunity to change the world (and make me rich) at my startup. Asking for more is kinda greedy. /s.

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

#167

Post by carradjm »

wefarrell wrote: post #50
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…

Politicians (AOC included) represent their current constituents. Not future potential constituents who might move into their district, but people who live there now. The key issue here is rising rent, and this is something Local politicians (AOC in particular) campaign on. A significant portion of people here would see their rents go up without seeing any additional benefits. How would you expect an elected official,…

She represents them to the federal government. She has no legal authority and really shouldn't have any political authority to override or influence decisions that state and city officials make. She is a federal officer, and the deal with Amazon was a city / state initiative.

Her speaking out against Amazon was her speaking out against something that is not within her sphere of competence or within her elected sphere of influence.

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

#168

Post by dragonwriter »

carradjm wrote: post #167
wefarrell wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Politicians (AOC included) represent their current constituents. Not future potential constituents who might move into their district, but people who live there now. The key issue here is rising rent, and this is something Local politicians (AOC in particular) campaign on. A significant portion of people here would see their rents go up without seeing any additional benefits. How would you expect an elected official,…

She represents them to the federal government. She has no legal authority and really shouldn't have any political authority to override or influence decisions that state and city officials make. She is a federal officer, and the deal with Amazon was a city / state initiative. Her speaking out against Amazon was her speaking out against something that is not within her sphere of competence or within her elected sphere…

> She has no legal authority and really shouldn't have any political authority to override or influence decisions that state and city officials make.

She's a citizen of the state and city and, as such, should indeed have “political authority” to influence decisions state and city officials make.

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

#169

Post by rchaud »

pmart123 wrote: post #49
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…

The irony of this is that attitude has created pretty much zero startups that have transformed into sustainable, profitable, medium or large companies. While there have been a couple successful exits that later crashed and burned like Tumblr and Blue Apron, and a couple TBD like MongoDB and Jet (Wal-mart acquisition), many of the NYC startup IPOs and exits seem to be playing a game of hot potato by selling to the nex…

> that attitude has created pretty much zero startups that have transformed into sustainable, profitable, medium or large companies.

You are looking at modern day Amazon and comparing its profitability to startups, when Amazon itself consistently lost money every year until around 2004.

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

#170

Post by [deleted] »

vonmoltke wrote: post #165
CPLX wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> At least $2.5B of that is on the table for any company that wants to build and office for 25,000 people in LIC. Right. Leaving $500MM in cold hard taxpayer dollars to build a building for the richest guy in the world so he could promptly compete with local businesses. Which, to be clear, was not something a lot of those taxpayers were happy about.

$500MM is not $3B, and you don't get to lie about the amount just because you think its still a big number.

[deleted]
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