New York City To Amazon: Drop Dead

[appalachiablue]

Last edited Wed Nov 14, 2018, 08:30 PM - Edit history (3)

Source: The Guardian

15:33 ET. In Queens, opponents of second HQ say building plans bypass elected officials, will rip off taxpayers and harm neighborhood.

Politicians and advocates gathered in Queens on Wednesday to denounce a multibillion-dollar plan to bring a new Amazon headquarters to New York. One city councilman called the move "an assault on our democracy".

Rallying across the street from the Long Island City site where Amazon's new campus is set to rise, opponents called the plan - which will give Amazon nearly $3bn in tax breaks and subsidies from state and city - a ripoff to taxpayers that will stress the neighborhood's infrastructure while doing little to help local residents.

"The more we learn about this deal, the worse it gets," said state senator Michael Gianaris, who represents the neighborhood. "This is a bad deal, and the state and the city should both be embarrassed to be stand behind this deal. They got taken, plain and simple."

The plan, announced on Tuesday by New York's governor, Andrew Cuomo, and New York City's mayor, Bill de Blasio, will bring 25,000 Amazon workers to 4m square feet of office space on a waterfront Long Island City site, across the East river from Manhattan. -More...


Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2018/nov/14/amazon-hq2-new-york-protest-queens-long-island-city

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Read More:

Jeff Bezos Earns $191K Per Minute, NY & VA Give Amazon $3 Billion Corporate Welfare
https://www.democraticunderground.com/1017520421

Amazon Doesn't Want To Just Dominate The Market, It Wants To Become The Market, The Nation, 02/1018.
https://www.thenation.com/article/amazon-doesnt-just-want-to-dominate-the-market-it-wants-to-become-the-market/

[hibbing]

1. I read it is 48K per job the city/state is offering them n/t

[TexasBushwhacker]

8. $3 Billion divided by 25K is $120K per job

Now if that was 25K new, good paying jobs it might be worth it long term, I'm sure thousands of those jobs will just be transfers from the west coast. How many years will it take to recoup that $3 Billion that's being given away and how much is it going to raise the price of real estate in an already overheated market?

[4du]

28. I might be wrong but so far as I know

Amazon is not receiving money from New York, they are just not paying taxes they would otherwise be responsible for. More than 100 cities offered Amazon this type of tax break.

[TexasBushwhacker]

31. Of course. But Amazon will still be using the resources of the city

As do all businesses. Those resources are paid for with taxes. So when Amazon doesn't have to pay those taxes, they are getting a free ride. Since Amazon is an enormously profitable company and Jeff Bezos is personally worth over $200B, the question is WHY does Amazon need a free ride? What's the net benefit for the city?

[4du]

47. Amazon is a business, money is all they are allowed to care about.

If they do not maximize profit they can be sued by shareholders. If NY did not give them what they wanted, they had more than 200 possible choices

[Hoyt]

41. The benefits are also based upon Amazon bringing 25K jobs with an average salary of $150,000.

There is a reason 238 cities/areas vied for the new headquarters.


"New York state taxpayers will be on the hook for up to $1.525 billion should Amazon meet its 25,000-job pledge, pay an average salary of $150,000 and occupy at least 4 million square feet of space within the next 10 years, as promised."

https://www.democratandchronicle.com/story/news/politics/albany/2018/11/13/new-york-amazon-incentives-billion/1986979002/



I suspect with those jobs/salaries, new businesses, support employment, construction, etc., the $3 Billion will seem a bargain.

[NYC Liberal]

2. Amazon is one of the richest companies in the world. Giving them billions when

we already have plenty of other pressing issues is insane. Completely absurd.

Can’t find the money to fund infrastructure improvements but it magically appears when multi-billionaires like Bezos come knocking.

[dalton99a]

3. +1. The rich must get richer

at the expense of the poor

[NYC Liberal]

4. Bezos will get his private helipad paid for with taxpayer money, while the plebs are left

to suffer on a crumbling public transit system.

Link to tweet

[dalton99a]

15. Disgusting.

[still_one]

5. What a misleading headline

[Honeycombe8]

6. It's bringing a lot of jobs. Isn't that good?

Unless they don't need the jobs, which is possible.

But yeah...how are all those workers going to get to and from work? The subway system is already overloaded. Blasio says they're going to make some improvements to the subway system, and start a ferry service. They're looking at shuttle buses and a nearby train, for transportation for the workers.

Blasio says that even w/the tax breaks, they still will be getting a lot of tax revenue out of it.

[LisaM]

11. The jobs aren't for the people in Queens. They'll be transplants.

The net effect is displacement of the people who already live there. I live in Seattle. I see what happened here.

[Honeycombe8]

16. I see. Oh, my. Yep. It'll change the whole area, a big business like that. nt

[appalachiablue]

18. The son of friends took a job at Amazon in Sea 2 years

ago, one year out of college. He's from NoVa and moved to Seattle, parents are from India.

This move will not guarantee jobs for New Yorkers as De Blasio said in the article-- the 'talent' will be global as you say.

[DemocracyMouse]

20. Dev dumping happened in Williamsburg Brooklyn too

Development dumping should be outlawed. It squashes small, deeply immersed community businesses. Decentralized, neighborhood-friendly power structures are pushed out by crude centralized power systems. Dev dumping is the coroorate equivalent of an invading Roman army.

The usual argument is: those local people can’t possibly have a subtle, deeply rooted business culture of their own. They can’t possibly have any brains and any ability to start their own businesses or nurture relationships with customers. Well guess what? GIVE US LOCALS A YEAR OR TWO OF FREE SALARIES and see what we’re capable of. Every study on the topic shows that local systems do a lot more than make money. They generate complex, emergent, caring systems.

Why does every NYC mayor, even the ones who should know better like De Blasio, succumb to the f*ing dev dumping???

[onenote]

21. Why do you assume that?

While some of its west coast employees may move east, Amazon isn't planning on holding its employment levels static, but will continue to increase its total employment. Why wouldn't a considerable number of those employees come from the local employment market? And there will be employment opportunities -- local employment opportunities -- associated with the infrastructure and other construction projects associated with the new headquarters. And places for these employees to spend their money -- restaurants, grocery stores.

I don't claim to know the Long Island City area well, but I do know the Crystal City/Potomac Yards areas in Northern Virginia where Amazon will establish one of the new headquarters and I can't see how it does anything but help an area that has a high vacancy rate and is looking rather downtrodden these days.

[DemocracyMouse]

24. My friend, why not take the same pile of money and invest it locally?

Amazon is not just “jobs.” It’s a 1%ers wet dream for moving capital out of OUR pockets into their pockets.

[pnwmom]

25. I live in Seattle, too, but I think Amazon has been good for the economy.

And Microsoft and the other tech companies.

It's better than when we were so dependent on Boeing.

[LisaM]

30. I think it's a mixed bag, but as a renter, and a commuter

the net effect on me has been bad. My commute is really suffering. My rent is so high (and has gone up significantly in the last 8 years) that I'm at my wit's end. Downtown construction is wearing me down, and the empty storefronts are piling up (this is not entirely the fault of Amazon; it's the high price of real estate, but they're gobbling up as much as they can). The downtown hotel (Sixth Avenue Inn) that was affordable where my friends sometimes stayed is now those three large, ugly biosphere balls. The arts scene is fading - they want to knock down the Showbox for more apartments, the tech company workers don't support the local theatre companies (I've subscribed to the Rep for years, and they've put appeals in their programs for tech workers to support them and come to plays, but they have to give them these enormous incentives to even give it a try, like $10 tickets, even on their $150K salaries).

But the larger picture (at least I'm getting by) is the homeless. Evictions proceed apace; affordable housing is knocked down, it's not replaced, and the streets downtown (where I work) are a misery. In all the decades I lived here, I never saw open meth and heroin use on the street until this year, and I mean open, right on Third Avenue. I regularly see police dealing with people on drugs (and doing their best to de-escalate situations). When I went to vote a couple of weeks ago, I saw a man passed out at a bus stop, and this is not unusual. People are being forced out on the street, because the demand for fancy housing is so high. I think it's irresponsible of a company to strain the infrastructure of a city by adding so many jobs so fast. I don't see that all this supposed extra money for taxes is making the quality of life any better here.

[pnwmom]

33. Decades ago I remember open heroin use in the University area, and I also remember that sign

"Will the last person who leaves turn off the lights?"

So I don't know. Can we really blame the homeless problem on the fact that a city has added too many jobs too fast?

And I don't think the problems with the theater can be blamed on Amazon, specifically. Young people in general are turning away from forms of entertainment that their parents preferred.

[LisaM]

35. Yes, younger people aren't really theatre goers, agreed.

But I do think that the significant increase in homelessness is because so much affordable housing is being knocked down. I have friends who live in older apartments in Capitol Hill who are deathly afraid of eviction, because they can't afford it - and they work. I'm in a relatively new complex so I'm not afraid of eviction, but if the rent keeps going up.......there's got to be some balance.

As far as entertainment, maybe not so much plays, but the music scene isn't what it was when I moved here, either - joint cover for jazz at Pioneer Square, local bands making it big nationally.....it's not as vibrant as it was. I don't know the answer to that.

I don't want blight either, but it is true that there is a lot of displacement going on and by giving developers and huge companies these tax giveaways, it's only going to get worse. People in Long Island City are upset and I don't blame them.

[pnwmom]

38. Something similar is going on with the malls, with sports . . .

I don't think the problem is with Amazon specifically -- it's more related to our whole culture, where people are substituting online games and other online activities for social events that used to bring people together.

I don't know what the solution is, but the cause is a lot bigger than Amazon, unfortunately. (If it were just Amazon, we could figure out how to solve that.)

[LisaM]

40. Amazon is emblematic of it, though.

One of the problems I have with the loss of cultural vibrancy (and I'm including sports in that because I love spectator sports) is that we have fewer shared positive experiences. I suppose some of it has to do with schedules - people work longer hours and don't all have leisure at the same time - and the affordability of sports, just too expensive to see a game much of the time (dynamic pricing doesn't help), and so on, but I do think it's important for municipalities to have shared experiences, even if it's just going down to a local pub and gathering around to watch the Mariners or something. Seattle is actually particularly bad in that regard; I spend time in Detroit and Detroiters love a good game, and the same in Ann Arbor, and when I was in Ireland, heck, they were even lining up to watch amateur hurling (not that it wasn't a fun sport to watch, it was, but can you see that happening here?) Tech workers have a unique detachment with the world out on the streets, from my observation, certainly not a scientific one.

[appalachiablue]

36. Thanks for the thorough post on the changes & reality in Seattle

as ugly a picture as it is. Looks like we'll have these problems coming in East to NYC and NoVa. Suburban Md. was spared like other places, lucky them.

[LisaM]

37. Well, PNWMom is right that there were problems when Seattle was hit by blight, too.

It seems as if there should be some way to strike a balance. Part of the problem is what I've heard described as "inorganic" growth, a lot of growth all at once, and an infrastructure that can't keep up.

I do wish that Amazon wasn't such a tax-dodger, though (not that they're alone). I boycott them, it's as hilariously ineffective as most of my boycotts have been over the years.

[George II]

12. De Blasio.

[pecosbob]

7. Is there a city large enough and with enough balls to tell the corporate hucksters to F*CK OFF

This race to the bottom shit's got to stop. If I had my way corporations would be paying their taxes today and the one percenters would be talking about emigrating to Bermuda.

[drmeow]

10. Bezos is the biggest libertarian hypocrite of them all

He quite literally would not be rich if it was not for taxpayer funded infrastructure - Amazon would not exist if not for DARPA research funding and the space program. The taxes he should be paying should be viewed as the same type of return on investment a venture capitalist would expect to get. He's a pig. Unfortunately, my spouse doesn't seem to care and signed up for Amazon Prime!

[not fooled]

14. And

the USPS!

[drmeow]

29. Right!!

Plus all the infrastructure all the non-internet based companies rely on.

I really think we need to be talking about corporate taxes as corporate dividends rather than taxes given how the anti-tax people have made the word "taxes" so toxic.

[pnwmom]

39. What about the USPS? Are you going with the Trump view that Amazon hurts the USPS? It doesn't.

He hates Amazon because Bezos owns the Washington Post.

[not fooled]

43. Not at all

just mentioning that it has played a big role in Amazon's success.

[pnwmom]

44. I think Amazon has also been good for the USPS. n/t

[katmondoo]

13. I like Amazon and I need Amazon for the many items I use that are not available

where I live

[DeminPennswoods]

17. Like and patronize them as much as you want,

but they don't need taxpayer subsidies to expand their business.

[kacekwl]

32. So there will be jobs and

maybe some new business to the area but why can't these gazillionares ever pay there own way. Tax breaks, land price breaks, shipping breaks etc. How about you pay a wage that will allow those who work for you to be able to live in those areas they work. Hopefully some small businesses will benefit from all the extra people running around instead of a bunch of chain restaurants and mega stores.

[Tarc]

19. "I hate capitalism" is not a valid wing of the Democratic Party

Better to spread the Bezos money around New York rather than some deep red flyover country.

Let's ease up on the socialism zeal here.

[D00ver]

22. Socialism?

I don’t see this as socialistic complaints. It’s Amazon who is socializing their costs, while privatizing their profits. Large companies getting tax payer subsidization should be illegal. Amazon should have to sell more shares or take out loans and pay their fair share and for the infrastructure they need and use. This is wrong and laws need to be changed. Let companies pay for themselves.

[Squinch]

26. Exactly. Welcome to DU.

[AllyCat]

46. +1!

[NYC Liberal]

42. As a NY taxpayer, this includes me paying for a private helipad for Bezos

and importing jobs, not creating jobs for the people already here.

Screw That.

[Cal Carpenter]

48. Or maybe ease up on the red-baiting zeal

Your intellectual dishonesty is glaring.

[mastermind]

27. how dare they talk that way to a wall street darling

[not fooled]

34. Hell, yeah

and besides, NY is just subsidizing space exploration, which bezoar says he will fund because he can't think of anything better to do with his pile (I guess raises and humane working conditions for the warehouse workers never crossed his mind, especially since he is trying to replace them with robots ASAP).

So, funding space exploration--what's not to like? Of course, the locals might not be on board with that, but apparently they don't count.

[AllyCat]

45. Well, bring it to Wisconsin where Scott w

and the GOP would be happy to make a deal.