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Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate

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Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate

#31

Post by [deleted] »

Scaevolus wrote: post #22
megaman22 wrote: post #4

This 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

[deleted]

Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate

#32

Post by ryanmarsh »

Shame on Amazon for hiring so many people in the Seattle area with good paying jobs.

How dare people blame the poor and beleaguered city government for not solving the city’s mental health problem. Record tax revenues? It’s still not enough.

Seriously though, isn’t this the deal? Business brings in good paying jobs and pays taxes, city lays down the infrastructure to support commerce. With record tax revenues the city government isn’t holding up their end of the bargain.

Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate

#33

Post by mrep »

darkengine wrote: post #19
akhilcacharya wrote: post #12

Earlier 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…

90% agree (homes don't look to cheap on the east side). I was recently team matching with google for the seattle area and my girlfriend and I were more interested in the kirkland office over fremont/soon to be SLU because of this.

Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate

#34

Post by aioprisan »

koheripbal wrote: post #5
akulbe wrote: post #3

One 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.

Quite the opposite: https://hbr.org/2017/11/a-study-of-1100-employees-found-that... https://www.inc.com/farmers-insurance/do-these-3-things-to-f...

Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate

#35

Post by taurath »

jwilliams wrote: post #29
foolfoolz wrote: post #16

> 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".

Meanwhile real estate prices have gone up 2-300% in the same timeframe, and they are building light rail to deal with the gridlock.

Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate

#36

Post by taurath »

AmericanChopper wrote: post #23
akhilcacharya wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 t…

Going to Vancouver with its far higher taxes to protest a $20m tax on a $xxxbillion company seems like a poor idea to me. Local government need not grovel to those that take advantage of its amenities to attract talent.

Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate

#37

Post by seanmcdirmid »

AmericanChopper wrote: post #23
akhilcacharya wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 t…

Back in the day (1990s), Seattle had hardly any tech scene at all and all of the area's tech action was in Bellevue, Kirkland, and Redmond. Today, things are quite changed, with more tech jobs being sought for in downtown Seattle than the east side it seems. It is a really a strange thing to see from a long time resident perspective.

Seattle is oversubscribed, I hope you are right that the companies/startups will move back east to take off the pressure. But somehow I doubt it will happen like that.

Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate

#38

Post by seanmcdirmid »

darkengine wrote: post #19
akhilcacharya wrote: post #12

Earlier 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…

The north and east side are the worst places to live in the Seattle area, however, if you are young and without a family. It is very much like comparing San Jose to San Francisco (I say this living in Bellevue and having grown up in Bothell).

Re: Seattle passes smaller ‘head tax’ on big companies after impassioned debate

#40

Post by _ptgt »

jwilliams wrote: post #29
foolfoolz wrote: post #16

> 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".

The expense-to-marginal-population curve shouldn't even be linear--it should be logarithmic. As a city grows, you would expect it to get better at accommodating population increases (by reforming regulation and from investment flowing into local infrastructure projects and making the building process more efficient, as well as workers gaining experience in building the projects).
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