Earlier quoted context omitted.
Somewhere that they get subsidies rather than taxes.
Mega cap tech companies need subsidies?
It's not a matter of need, it's a matter of them being able to get them.
Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate
21–30 of 103 posts
Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate
#22This seems a little silly - it's an irritation, but it's not big enough to amount to anything really. If anything, it hurts lower-end positions more than any other, since it's a flat head tax. If you're counting the beans closely, it starts to make sense to hire 9 people with the salary you might have allotted to 10, and so forth. All this would really seem to do is piss off Amazon and Microsoft and the other big pla…
Most Microsoft employees are in Redmond, which already has employee taxes at $106.90/yr, or $0.056/hr for part-time work: http://psbm.net/licenses-taxes/redmond.html
Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate
#23Sad to watch SF and SEA be the cause of their own slow-motion downfall.
Where exactly do you expect business to go?
To escape the lunacy of The Seattle City Council? How about Bellevue, Kirkland or Redmond? The industry in Vancouver is also steadily growing.
The council quite openly sees economic growth as the source of all it's problems, which they have mostly created for themselves. As they have no idea how to manage these problems, and as most of their attempts to do so have in fact made them worse, the only thing they can do to further shirk responsibility is to implement more taxes.
It's hard to see why a business today would plan to base itself in Seattle, or expand on operations there. If Amazon hadn't already completed so much of the construction on its latest building there, I can't imagine they'd be committing to finishing it. Which will all in turn make Seattle's problems even worse.
Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate
#24Sad to watch SF and SEA be the cause of their own slow-motion downfall.
Where exactly do you expect business to go?
If I knew I'd be moving there. The only thing keeping my friends and I in the bay area are each other and the lack of a clear alternative. If another locations starts to get serious traction I'd expect a phase transition.
Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate
#25One question comes to mind... I wonder if this will result in more companies allowing/encouraging remote work. Obviously, it won't work in every case. I just wonder if things like this will push companies more in that general direction.
For a company with multiple locations, they'll just shift jobs to the other locations. Working remotely has become very unfashionable in tech after many studies showed that remote employees are very inefficient.
As someone who has been working from home for the last 4 years, I couldn't disagree with you more.
More real work,
far fewer distractions,
5 second commute vs. 45-60 minutes each way.
That's just for starters.
Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate
#26I agree that this tax probably won't fix the homelessness problem. Whatever has happened to Seattle is much deeper then just homelessness. Amazon and the like have ravaged the city of it's ability to provide functional housing even to service and support workers. I know this is happening in every city, but it's very pronounced in Seattle. The city shuts down at 9PM because no one lives there and then the homeless spi…
Boston has a very active night life scene, as does Austin and SF... not sure why you think these are ghost towns at night
Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate
#27One question comes to mind... I wonder if this will result in more companies allowing/encouraging remote work. Obviously, it won't work in every case. I just wonder if things like this will push companies more in that general direction.
For a company with multiple locations, they'll just shift jobs to the other locations. Working remotely has become very unfashionable in tech after many studies showed that remote employees are very inefficient.
"Working remotely has become very unfashionable in tech after many studies showed that remote employees are very inefficient."
Considering there was a story on the HN front page not even the other day showing exactly the opposite of what you're saying.....
Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
Where exactly do you expect business to go?
Somewhere that they get subsidies rather than taxes.
But they have to stay in the bay/Seattle for the talent pool, by their own admission. I think the local government has a lot more power than they think. Which is wrong - the liberal livable areas attract talent, so companies flock to them, or the bottom line is more important so they should do it in a cheaper city? Seems like the former is winning by a mile in the past decade.
Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate
#29> City of Seattle revenues have grown dramatically from $2.8B in 2010 to $4.2B in 2017, and they will be even higher in 2018. This revenue increase far outpaces the Seattle population increase over the same time period. The city does not have a revenue problem – it has a spending efficiency problem
That quote (from Amazon representatives) implies that revenue is non-linear to population -- but that expenses should be linear. I don't buy into that view. Especially in a "boom".
Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Where exactly do you expect business to go?
In the case of Seattle, Kirkland and Bellevue are host to quite a few small and large tech companies already. The office space is plentiful and cheap on this side of Lake Washington, and there is less of a worry of being hit with poorly planned taxes and regulations that Seattle is, at this point, infamous for enacting. With the way the housing market is going, and the upcoming King County property tax hike, I wouldn…
Traffic from Snoqualmie isn’t great either, nor are the homes a lot less expensive.
The east side is as expensive as Seattle.