41–50 of 103 posts
Sad to watch SF and SEA be the cause of their own slow-motion downfall.
In spite of all the bitching about California, more people come in than go out.
And, do those areas really care about the kind of jobs that actually could move?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
You also have things perfectly backwards. These companies are what is driving growth in Seattle, not the other way around. These companies are responsible for more than doubling local government revenue in the past decade. The companies create the growth, not the ‘amenities’ of Seattle city.
If you don’t like or don’t know how to manage economic growth, then by all means, make the environment as hostile as you can for businesses. You only need to look at Detroit to see how beneficial it can be when an entire industry leaves town.
I think the homeless problem should be tackled on a federal level since it is easy for them to move states but not countries. Thus, any non-federal government that spends tax revenue to help the homeless will likely just attract more homeless people from other areas worsening the local populations lives through the negative externalities and the costs which only reduce other local governments homeless expenses.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 mov…
I 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
A $21/month tax on each employee. Feels like Amazon could swallow this and might provide some incentive to hire outside the city core.
I know it makes people feel good, but honestly, the only answer to homelessness is a federal approach. Piecemeal approaches tend to attract people to homeless friendly places creating a positive feedback loop.
Why not go the whole hog and institute an “automation tax”. Tax companies for every job they automate which leads to an unemployed willing worker, avoiding the creation of a homeless pop. This would be less ridiculous.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
That said, it's better than nothing!
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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).
Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 mov…
In the long term, I can’t see how the east side could possibly fail to attract more businesses. Growth is already increasing in those areas, and there’s so much room for more. The quality of life is also arguably better over there. The more anti-business Seattle is becoming can only hasten this.
Course, Microsoft has a bunch of buses they use to move engineers from Seattle to Redmond, but like Google does between SF and Mountain View. I guess that could work, but it doesn't really make the traffic better.