Amazon Threatens To Move Jobs Out of Seattle Over New Tax (theguardian.com) 522
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Amazon has threatened to move jobs out of its hometown of Seattle after the city council introduced a new tax to try to address the homelessness crisis. The world's second-biggest company has warned that the "hostile" tax, which will charge firms $275 per worker a year to fund homelessness outreach services and affordable housing, "forces us to question our growth here."
Amazon, which is Seattle's biggest private sector employer with more than 40,000 staff in the city, had halted construction work on a 17-storey office tower in protest against the tax. Pressure from Amazon and other big employers, including Starbucks and Expedia, had forced councillors to reduce the tax from an initial proposal of $500 per worker. The tax will only effect companies making revenue of more than $20 million-a-year. The tax is expected to raise between $45 million and $49 million a year, of which about $10 million would come from Amazon. The company said it would restart building work on the tower but may sublease another new office block to reduce its tax bill.
Amazon, which is Seattle's biggest private sector employer with more than 40,000 staff in the city, had halted construction work on a 17-storey office tower in protest against the tax. Pressure from Amazon and other big employers, including Starbucks and Expedia, had forced councillors to reduce the tax from an initial proposal of $500 per worker. The tax will only effect companies making revenue of more than $20 million-a-year. The tax is expected to raise between $45 million and $49 million a year, of which about $10 million would come from Amazon. The company said it would restart building work on the tower but may sublease another new office block to reduce its tax bill.
Homelessness (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem with the homeless in Seattle is there is no cheap housing. The way to fix that is to rezone a whole lot of real estate to be multi-family / apartments. The way to NOT do that is to subsidize the expensive housing.
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Causation (Score:4, Insightful)
The median home price in Seattle is $722,000. I'd say, at the very least, it's a factor.
https://www.seattletimes.com/b... [seattletimes.com]
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Re:Causation (Score:4, Insightful)
Even if the houses were $10k it wouldn't make any difference in homelessness.
There are lots of reasons people are homeless but even so, if they were that cheap, it would make a large difference in homelessness.
Re:Causation (Score:5, Insightful)
if they were that cheap, it would make a large difference in homelessness.
When I first moved to Silicon Valley, I could not afford a home, and I was "homeless". I lived in a van, which was worth about $10k, in my employer's parking lot. I had a gym membership, and took showers there. I got a $200 a month bonus for being "on call" and in the machine room within 5 minutes of notification.
I lived this way for two years. So sure, if housing was $10k, I would not have been homeless. But when people talk about "homelessness" they are not talking about people like me. I was employed, earning good money, and had a clear (but not immediate) path out of my situation.
Money can make a difference for short term homelessness, caused by a job loss or healthcare issue. These are often families with a single (usually female) parent. These people just need a roof over their head and some groceries till they get back on their feet. They don't have the mental issues and substance abuse problems.
For hardcore homeless, usually adult males, living on the street, with no steady income, often with mental health and substance abuse issues, even $10k is out of reach. Even shared housing doesn't work, since they are often belligerent and uncooperative. Homelessness is a difficult problem, and there are no simple solutions. Almost any idea you can imagine has been tried, and nothing has worked.
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Lets no lie, want to solve homelessness, it is all to easy, you just have to spend money. Social support should all be done on a federal basis and not by the state or local communities. Problem with states and local communities attempting it is, well, psychopaths, rather than trying to solve problems they just use law enforcers to drive people out and force them on other communities and on the tax base and social support services, overloading them, a real cunt act, no better way to put it.
So done on a fede
Re:Causation (Score:5, Insightful)
pick those people up and put them in protected housing.
Good luck getting the courts to authorize you to compel innocent people into confinement. If you think the homeless will voluntarily go into your "shelters" then you know nothing about the history of homelessness policy.
Generally monitored and controlled one person studio style apartments
In what NIMBY free neighborhood will you place these studio apartments? Prepare for the political fight of your life. NOBODY will want these people anywhere near their homes. They don't want to deal with the drugs, broken glass from booze bottles, vomit, urine, etc., nor do they want their kids to have to walk past that on their way to school.
Also what are you going to do with the homeless guy that takes a claw hammer and smashes holes in all the walls to get the demons out? You could try to build the walls out of solid concrete instead of drywall, but good luck getting a building code variance for that.
Re:Causation (Score:5, Insightful)
Having heard hundreds of stories from a mental health professional who works with the homeless in a "transitional housing" facility... the real problem doesn't seem to be lack of federal social programs for homelessness.
There are a significant number of clients with "successful exits," meaning the client finds permanent housing, subsidized or otherwise.
The sticky part is the ones who are unable or unwilling to work on actually getting permanent housing. In a lot of cases it seems to be mental health or substance abuse issues that keep them from succeeding at stuff like keeping a job or not smoking meth.
I'm about as socially liberal as you'll find, but having the window I have into that world I really, really, really think that throwing money at it addresses only a symptom -no income- as opposed to the fundamental problems from which long-term no income situations arise.
I don't have firm numbers around it, but anecdotally psychosis, PTSD, and drug addiction seem to be the main reasons for unsuccessful exits. So if you want to fix homelessness, let's see better social programs to address these underlying causes.
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Yeah, it wasn't a good exchange. Definitely should have put more thought into it before emptying out the insane asylums.
The theory was that newly developed anti-psychotic medications solve much of the problem.
In practice, anti-psychotics have some very negative side effects (tremors, weight gain, etc.), and people don't take them if they aren't supervised. Think about it: If in your mind you are the king of the world, and a pill could bring back a reality of poverty, no friends, an alienated family, and little hope, would you take it?
Re:Causation (Score:5, Informative)
California is the biggest economy in the country and pays more taxes than they receive. They also have a homeless problem that a lot of states with less money don't have.
A big reason for California's large homeless population is the nice weather. If you are going to be sleeping in a park, Los Angeles is a lot better than Chicago.
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Giving home to homeless people worked in a city in canada. There's a discussion on this in this BBC podcast (30 min length): https://www.bbc.co.uk/programm... [bbc.co.uk]
Some of it makes a difference (Score:5, Insightful)
People aren't wandering the streets because they can't afford a $722k house! Even if the houses were $10k it wouldn't make any difference in homelessness.
Um. No.
There are many people who can make a $700-$800 payment monthly, but ask them to pay more or give them one bad medical problem or car accident plus recovery time and they can no longer do that. If the labor market doesn't provide a job that lets them earn enough to pay for local housing, or even if they can't find the job because of inefficiencies in the market, they become homeless.
Some programs mitigate that very slightly--emergency shelters are NOT great but it's cold outside in the winter, and subsidized housing can help if the list eventually gets to you--but there's nowhere near enough of it to match the need.
Addressing homelessness requires addressing numerous problems--actual physical health is one part of it. Mental health is one part of it. Training is one part of it. Having someplace you can take a shower, receive mail, and/or sleep while you try to get a job is one part of it.
So yes, plenty of people would still be homeless if the cost of a house was lower, because there are other issues involved in homelessness than just the cost of housing. But of course the two things are related, because people become homeless for the first time when they cannot pay for a home.
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You know what follows house prices? Rent prices.
Do you know what happens if you can't afford your rent anymore?
I *live* in Seattle. I'm fortunate to be paid high enough to afford it, but one bedroom apartments in Seattle currently go for almost 2k a month. Real fun squeezing your family into one of those. The last studio apartment I had was $1900 a month.
You need to be making 6 figures to get by here anymore.
Re: Causation (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: Causation (Score:5, Interesting)
It's the other way around. After 3 months homeless you're about 90% likely to start suffering from symptoms of mental illness. Insecurity tends to desocialize people. Drug use pops up as either a coping mechanism or a consequence of losing employment and access to addictive pharmaceuticals (e.g. I was on Eszopiclone for 12 days; it wasn't working, and I took a day off work while going through horrendous withdrawal that began with a minor myocardial infarction and mostly involved anxiety and a sensation like having sunburn everywhere)--in either case, becoming addiction due to uncontrolled dosage adjusted largely to counter tolerance.
Many shelters also will refuse to board people who can't show a state ID or other documentation, or who don't get in by a curfew. That's a problem here due to public transportation being crap and people often ending up on the other side of town trying to find DHR assistance or a job--the homeless basically have to huddle around the homeless shelter and not do anything if they want to be housed.
Re: Causation (Score:3)
Thatâ(TM)s true of the most derelict homeless which are most visible on the street. But there are many homeless living in cars, or otherwise situated, who are clean cut, working, and for whom the problem is, in fact, affordable housing.
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Correct, 722,000 ave cost and I would also guess very rents is causing homeless. No one wakes up on a park bench and says "Wow, what a great night sleep, glad I am homeless".
How to solve, easy, build lots and lots of residential buildings, apartments and houses, saturate the market. A gov. should not have to create a subsidy for cheap housing.
So why isn't this being done, people, large rental companies and more importantly politicians do not want house prices to drop due to a supply increase. So we will
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Well, supply and demand is a great force. If prices rise, there is incentive to create more supply..
This works great for cars, computers, clothes, and silverware.
The problem is that you can't import more land from China, like you can with other goods. If every acre of land is already taken in town, then you have to build out. But to the east of Seattle is water, so that way is blocked off. How many miles out of town do you have to travel to get affordable housing, and can you handle the commute
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But to the east of Seattle is water
West isn't a lot better ;)
To answer your question, though, about 15 miles. And your commute will be significantly less than 3 hours.
Houses are affordable to the north and the south. Lake Stevens area, Kent.. even nice homes. Anywhere around Lake Washington is pretty damn well fucked, though.
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you can't import more land from China, like you can with other goods.
True. But there are tradeoffs you could make. Maybe a rich guy with a family wants a huge mansion with a yard, but maybe a 20-something who rides the bus would be happy just to have a space all her own, even a tiny one, at a rent she can afford. So build micro-housing, where the same amount of land has many more apartments, and thus the rent per apartment is lower!
Seattle was actually where micro-housing first started out. And Seattle.
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The only other (reasonable) cause for homelessness would be chronic unemployment. Seattle has 3.6% unemployment which is below the national average of 4.1% so that's not a reasonable cause for chronic homelessness.
However, Seattle's unemployment rate had been in steady decline until recently when it flattened out. The recent introduction of a $15/hr minimum wage has impacted employment negatively [washingtonpost.com].
So basically everything Seattle is doing to supposedly help the lower classes is having the opposite effect --
Re:Homelessness (Score:5, Insightful)
There are many reasons for homelessness, not just two. Contributing factors can include:
- poverty
- unemployment
- personal crisis
- mental illness
- substance abuse
The next time you see a homeless person, keep in mind that they might very well have been once like you, but reverses in life put them where they are now.
Re:Homelessness (Score:4, Insightful)
Personal crisis? Put on your big girl panties. Life is tough. Life is unfair. Get over it, deal with it, and quit expecting the almighty Hand Of Government to come to your rescue. Christ, if these limp-wristed wimps were all we had to work with back when Seattle was first being settled there would be no Seattle. They'd have been too terrified to head west.
A personal crisis can be many things, including things beyond the control of the individual. I've been rear-ended at a stop light. There was nothing I could do about it. I was lucky that I didn't have to spend months in recovery. It's not pretty when a Corolla gets slammed into by a Jeep Grand Cherokee traveling at highway speeds. Had I been in the hospital for an extended recovery or otherwise unable to work, how the hell would I pay my rent? And don't assume the other person had insurance - there's plenty out there without it. But thanks for your empathy and compassion.
Mental illness? Sure would mean a lot of crazies in Seattle which, come to think of it, may not be far off base given the composition of the city and state governments.
In other places too I've seen it: people who would otherwise have been treated in state-run mental institutions were let out on the streets instead because the gov't needed a quick way to save money.
Substance abuse? Sorry, not my problem, nor anyone else's except those who are abusing. Responsibility for your own actions comes along with being an adult. Apparently a lot of grown-up kids in Seattle.
You realize that some who are in poverty and unemployed or underemployed use drugs as a means of coping with their shitty situation right? Then try to get a job, as many entry level ones require a drug test. And consider how long THC will stay in one's body.
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I'm pretty sure that Ramon would object if you tried to eat him, not to mention cannibalism laws...
Didn't stop Jeffrey Dahmer until after his feast.
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rezone a whole lot of real estate to be multi-family / apartments
That will play right into the hands of developers who will just build high rent units targeting the techie hipsters.
Seattle wants to build and operate their own subsidized housing [wordpress.com].
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Or it will be filled with students going to graduate school.
Perhaps. But many universities operate or subsidize undergrad/graduate student housing. Specifically to separate themselves from hot rental markets. What Seattle wants to build probably won't be available to students.
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That will play right into the hands of developers who will just build high rent units targeting the techie hipsters.
Probably, but that's not entirely bad. Any increase in housing supply will drive down costs all down the line. If developers build high-end housing, some hipsters will move out of their grunge studio apartments and free them up for other people.
Will that be enough to ensure there's enough supply so Starbucks baristas can afford their own place? Probably not, at least not until you build a lot of units. The low end is probably going to be the last market filled when there's a huge unsatisfied demand. But may
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hipsters will move out of their grunge studio apartments
Grunge studio apartments often rent for a premium.
The problem with trying to flood the private market is that the private market isn't stupid. They won't build in an oversupplied rental market. So the city will do it. But if the city puts their stuff into the general market, the private developers will still pull out. And the city will just get grief for subsidizing rents for better off people. So the city will restrict their supply to the homeless and low income. But you'd better stay low income, or no mo
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Grunge studio apartments often rent for a premium.
Fine. That's not my main point. Sure, there are edgy grunge hipster studios in the heart of the urban district which rent for a premium. There are also a lot of apartments (like the one my daughter rents in Berkeley) which are expensive and a dive. The landlord charges an arm and a leg because that's what he can get right next to the college campus.
(I kinda suspect people started with dive apartments because that's all they could afford (just like people wore jeans with tears because they couldn't afford to
Re: Homelessness (Score:3)
Subsidized housing is a paternalist welfare state crock of shit.
What we need is a huge increase in housing units. Sufficiently huge to impact regional market prices. We want housing that is affordable for the average working stiff. Not "affordable housing" where ordinary people aren't allowed to live.
Okay, sure, Capitalism/Financialism is doing a shit job building enough housing for the people. So fuck "private enterprise" - let's charter a municipal construction company, seize under-developed land all over
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What kind of person, when confronted with a city where homes are so expensive they cannot afford them, will live on the streets and prefer being homeless over moving to some other area that has housing they can afford?
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What kind of person, when confronted with a city where homes are so expensive they cannot afford them, will live on the streets and prefer being homeless over moving to some other area that has housing they can afford?
Moving costs money, which they don't have.
Cash Grab (Score:4, Insightful)
You know the majority of that money will go towards slush funds and other private projects. Giving the government more money is like giving booze to an alcoholic.
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One would think that the ever increasing population and skyrocketing property values would generate more income than needed.
Re: Cash Grab (Score:2, Insightful)
Parents have an obligation to feed and house their children.
The government does not have an obligation to feed and house adults.
Do you really think your relationship to the government is analogous to the relationship between a child and his father?
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You got the analogy wrong. Amazon is the abusive one spending all the money, refusing to hand over money for needed public services such as streets, mass transit, fire protection, schools, and assorted other services needed in a modern society which Amazon benefits from. Amazon has the money, but dumps the costs of the services it uses onto those who can't afford it. Amazon is a parasitic freeloader.
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You do realize there is a point at which taxes become gratuitous and overbearing, and that politicians can be every bit as greedy and money hungry as corporate fat cats? Amazon is under no obligation to stay there, certainly, but I found it just amazing that Jeff Bezos is also owner of the progressive Washington Post but when it comes time for his company to support higher taxes, it's "oh those rules don't apply to me".
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Amazon. Door meet ass.
Willing to take the infrastructure that the city provides but not willing to provide to it.
Typical.
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They aren't paying what you and I are paying. Did you not know that? What did you think corporate tax lawyers are for? Most large corporations don't pay a lot of taxes due to loopholes and incentives. NYT pegs Amazon's effective rate over federal, state, local, and foreign to be 13% last year. Fox reports that they didn't pay any federal at all last year (but that could be state propaganda). Face the fact that businesses would rather pay no taxes at all, even as the world fell down around them. That is wher
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> slush funds
That's already happening. Even the homeless, who are getting money and paying nothing, are demanding answers to where all of the money is going:
http://kuow.org/post/homeless-people-also-want-know-where-seattles-money-going [kuow.org]
The logic is painfully twisted. (Score:5, Insightful)
The reasoning behind this tax is the idea that big employers like Amazon are creating high salary jobs in the community which are driving up the price of housing. Therefore, the homelessness is, at least in part, Amazon's fault, and they should pay to "fix" the problem through a special tax, aimed exclusively at those businesses which are bringing so much money into the community.
With this kind of insane logic, the city will doom itself. Companies like Amazon should leave and set up shop elsewhere. We'll see if that fixes the problems in Seattle's economy.
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Offer low cost power.
Has fast internet.
Supported students who passed on merit and who want to work.
Can make moving to their state very attractive.
Can make staying in their state much better long term than a "Seattle" with a social homelessness "tax". Seattle becomes a generational story of tax and risk.
A warning to operations to really consider the politics of any area of the USA before they invest in.
Re:The logic is painfully twisted. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Why stay in a city with a tax and the same services other parts the USA can offer. With no new tax.
That would welcome new brands to their state.
That could offer long term support for anyone investing in their state?
A state where productive effort can go to making a profit. Why spend band money and time on the city politics of new taxation?
New taxation thats just going to demand more and more.
Move to
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Homeless encampments?
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Amazon has profited from the infrastructure that the Seattle taxpayers have provided for them over the years, including an education system that has provided the workers that have been the engine that has driven Amazon's wealth. And now that Seattle is asking Amazon to give a tiny percentage back to help the community that fostered them, they threaten to leave.
This is the kind of selfish short-term thinking that will destroy this country.
Re:The logic is painfully twisted. (Score:5, Insightful)
Amazon has profited from the infrastructure that the Seattle taxpayers have provided for them over the years, including an education system that has provided the workers that have been the engine that has driven Amazon's wealth. And now that Seattle is asking Amazon to give a tiny percentage back to help the community that fostered them, they threaten to leave.
This is the kind of selfish short-term thinking that will destroy this country.
Amazon already pays taxes like everyone else. This is a new, special tax which punishes only the most successful companies, i.e. those that are bringing the most wealth into the community. I think its highly counter-productive.
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So Seattle will have no issue if Amazon choose to no longer profit from its infrastructure. Thank you for the clarification!
Re:The logic is painfully twisted. (Score:5, Insightful)
And now that Seattle is asking Amazon to give a tiny percentage back to help the community that fostered them, they threaten to leave.
This argument would be more compelling if Seattle didn't already collect taxes from Amazon. Amazon already pays quite a lot in taxes. The Seattle city government basically said "We've decided we need even more money, you have money, so hand it over."
When even the extremely liberal Starbucks is complaining [kiro7.com], maybe Seattle has gone too far.
Amazon doesn't like this, but it's really going to hurt low-margin businesses like fast food hamburger restaurants. The iconic local hamburger chain, Dick's Drive-in, will never open another location in Seattle, according to [king5.com] the founder's grandson Saul Spady.
But at least Seattle didn't already do something crazy like pass a $15 per hour minimum wage law! Oh wait... yes they did. [cnbc.com]
If a city council giving orders truly leads to prosperity and happiness, then Seattle will be prosperous and happy. I fear it doesn't work that way.
Re: The logic is painfully twisted. (Score:2)
What percentage of employees at Amazon do you think were educated in Seattle?
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There is an old saying: if you want to discourage something, tax it. If you want to encourage it, subsidize it. What Seattle is saying is "success is bad, therefore we will tax you for it! Homelessness is good, therefore we will subsidize it!" Only in a socialist worker's paradise like Seattle could such economic idiocy even be proposed much less seriously considered.
Come to Atlanta. We have cheap power, cheap gas, cheap office space, low taxes, plenty of skilled workers, and a climate much nicer than
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Don't raise income taxes (Score:5, Interesting)
As European -used to high taxes everywhere- i'd say that worker's income is the stupiest thing to tax. It increases the cost of labour, thereby slowing down economic growth and increasing the unemployment issue, leading to poverty.
I know, you'd have to tax something. But politicians usually pick the easiest thing to tax, disregarding consequences. You should tax where the costs are: vehicle tax for highways, housing tax based on property value, true costs for water, electricity and sewer etc. But stay away from raising income, and to a lesser degree sales taxes.
Don't do what Europe does - with 35-50% income tax (and thats' exclusing social insurances like retirement, unemployment and healthcare insurances) and 20% sales tax. It artificially makes everything expensive, especially labour intensive work, and has no added value apart pumping round money and making expenses less transparent.
2 cents.
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Except for healthcare and education, right? Those are just a bit less expensive, I've heard.
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Say you tax vehicles to cover road maintenance and pollution costs. All you have done is price some percentage of people off the road.
Income tax is the only fair, progressive tax. Everything else is just reserving public spaces for the rich.
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Regardless of whether 100% of taxes are income taxes, or 100% of taxes are corporate taxes, the only
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Your little * there is supremely important. ALL taxes modify behaviour. And that is why it actually matters quite a lot where the taxes come from.
Your reasoning is correct in that on average, actual purchasing power will remain roughly constant with a shifting around in taxes. But that is not the point. The point is where the purchasing power gets distributed. And that is why placing taxes in the right places matter quite a lot.
Fuck them (Score:2)
Red Queen thinking (Score:5, Interesting)
One of the major complaints about the head tax, beyond simply driving business away, is that it demonstrates the mayor's and city council's "Red Queen thinking": "Funding first, plan afterward!", and "Off with their heads!" [seattletimes.com] if others don't agree. As this local editorial [seattletimes.com] points out (quote below), the city has not been able to show that they are able to reduce homelessness with the resources they've applied so far, partly due to inept management. So they're demanding more money with no evidence that they are capable of using it effectively.
From the editorial:
... Seattle is just starting reforms based on a 2016 study that found its homeless programs suffer more from weak management and lax contracts than funding shortfalls. Now, before showing any reduction in homelessness, the council is more than doubling funding over 2016 levels by adding the head tax.
How about Seattle fix the lack of inventory.. (Score:2)
Obvious (Score:3)
A super-liberal company... (Score:4, Informative)
A super-liberal company in a super-liberal city complaining about taxes for social programs. That's rich. I thought liberals wanted big government programs to take care of the down-trodden. Amazon is all for more social programs at the federal level, but they hire a truckload of lawyers to set up tax shelters and move money into offshore accounts to avoid paying their fair share of federal taxes. Someone else is footing the bill for those programs. Now the city introduces a more direct tax that can't be avoided and suddenly it's "hostile".
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I guess scAmazon is labeled "liberal" because they provide ambulances at their fulfillment centers to take away the prostrate workers?
feel free to leave (Score:2)
thank you for building some nice buildings and bringing a larger number of entitled overpaid idiots to downtown and suburban seattle. but if you are going to generate such an influx and expect to not have to support the infrastructure that you are successfully straining, get the fuck out. take the expensive glass balls with you if you like.
interesting that the company as a whole represents the average sense of entitlement of their stereotypical employees.
Relocate homeless to affordable areas? (Score:2)
If in fact homelessness is caused mostly by Amazon raising the home prices, wouldn't it be more efficient to relocate the homeless somewhere where there is no Amazon or other large corporations inflating housing prices?
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No, she's going to Gitmo.
All the invoices for upgrades to Gitmo and all the increased flight traffic confirms it.
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Bat meet shit.
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Re:How about moving the homeless (Score:5, Informative)
They just come back. A midwest city tried putting them on a plane with a one way ticket to Honolulu. They won't die of exposure sleeping in a park. And they'll never scrape together enough money for airfare back. But Hawaii put a stop to that. Anywhere else is just a Greyhound bus ride away. And the homeless influx into Seattle is accelerating now that the city council has found more funds for them.
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Local news. They interview the new arrivals from time to time for public interest spots.
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Some Canadian jurisdictions have done this as well. One Alberta government was in the habit of giving welfare recipients one-way bus tickets to BC.
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At most this would cost Amazon $11 million. Yawn.
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Actually, it's a $20 million dollar hit right now.
If Amazon adds employees, it goes up even more. The socialist city councilwoman (Yes, she ran as a socialist) said that Amazon can easy play double, triple, or quadruple this tax. Smart money says the city council doubles the tax in five years because, why not?
Why should the city say "You know what? We've mismanaged our funds so you pay us $20 million a year to start."
It's wrong.
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Read some articles about this and you'll see that the city council has zero gratitude for Amazon
They really don't need to have gratitude to Amazon, that's sick.
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Read some articles about this and you'll see that the city council has zero gratitude for Amazon
They really don't need to have gratitude to Amazon, that's sick.
Where do you think the city gets its money from? Taxes. If Amazon leaves, that's a huge hit in revenue.
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Hear hear. Other close by cities are already suggesting a move to their city would benefit Amazon. Bellevue, just across Lake Washington, says they are "open for business." And Bellevue's quality of life is a whole lot nicer, not to mention safer. The thing is, this isn't just about Amazon, though you would never know it from the news. Several low profit margin businesses in Seattle technically qualify for this tax and will likely move or go out of business. Seattle was once a nice place, but sadly, it's no
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If it was anyone other than Amazon I might agree with you.
Fuck Bezos.
There's a better way to fuck Bezos. Buy stuff from Target, Walmart, Netflix, or Apple instead of Amazon. Hit him where it hurts, his wallet.
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Yes, this. I wish I hadn't posted so I could mod up.
The ONLY times, twice, that I have put money in that cocksucker's pocket was when some random eBay seller was reselling for scAmazon, and I left negative reviews both times.
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Seattleite here -- that is my dearest wish as well. Our economy was fine before Amazon was here, and will be fine long after they leave.
Don't be so hard on Mr. Fudd^WBezos - the poor guy can't even afford hair!
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The prices of housing would not drop if Amazon left... I say this as one who lives in a city that has a housing price crisis far worse than Seattle.
All that will happen is that the housing market will slow down a bit, but it will not create a significant dip in price, because most people will not be willing to sell their homes for less than they were worth when they bought them. Developers will stop making new builds as a consequence of the slowed demand, and the rate of housing price increase will slow
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No, you are assuming that housing is a commodity which behaves like a Free Market good. It isn't. If people, banks, holding companies etc. are not getting the price they on they often just take the house off of the market for a year or two and wait for the market to recover. There is no tight supply and demand linkage.
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One idea was to build a lot of new low cost housing in poor areas.
A lot can be done with not much new money and a lot of poor people get a home.
Slums result. Location and isolation keep the crime problems to a small area of a state and city.
Another idea is for a government to buy expensive housing in wealthy areas and put poor people into good housing.
That a poor person now in a wealthy area will become like the wealthy people due to a
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Re:Let them leave... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Except Oklahoma and Arkansas are not low tax states. Florida, New Hampshire and Texas however are.
And Esp. FL and TX plenty of firms are moving to. You are correct that taxes aren't everything, but when they become onerous to the point of putting the firm at a competitive disadvantage. Then at some point the costs involved with moving are lower than staying.
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I'm sure there's a suburb close enough that they can keep the same emplyees.
I live in a suburb near Seattle. Amazon could easily move to one or more of the nearby suburbs: Redmond (where Microsoft is), Kirkland (where Google has their second-largest campus after their headquarters), Bothell (not sexy or famous but has lots of business park space, and people are increasingly moving there because it's equidistant from Seattle and the rest of the suburbs), Bellevue (if you like skyscrapers, that's second afte
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But they do not have a plan.
And you did not read what I wrote: "... my response would be 'Absolutely! And let's make sure there are very intelligent and highly qualified people overseeing those programs, and a citizens' advisory council, and rock on'."
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True in Econ 101. In real life, it can be more complicated.
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Right, 'cause that's going to pass muster at any level of our court system.
You know the Seattle City Council isn't an oligarchy, able to just do anything they want, right? It has to actually be legal and within their limited powers?
How about instead they just pass a law saying you personally need to take care of every homeless person in Seattle. Problem solved, and just as legally, with negative impacts to only one single person instead of a