Grapevine, TX bidding for Amazon Headquarters

Actually, I bet the number of permanent jobs will be diminutive in deed. Amazon uses lots of automation. Lots of construction jobs to build the thing.
 
And for a large population center, they also have their own logistics (delivery) company. I see them advertising at the job fair.
 
Yea for more cars than the newly overhauled roads can support and property taxes continuing to skyrocket!
 
AggieMike88 said:
And for a large population center, they also have their own logistics (delivery) company. I see them advertising at the job fair.
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Yes (AMZL - I get deliveries from them all the time), but again, it won't apply. This is a headquarters - which is basically a Software Development center. Keep in mind that Amazon is the largest web hosting provider in the world - bigger than Google. This requires tons of development work.

Honestly, I think Amazon would be better of to create a center outside the U.S. It's very difficult to hire U.S. talent - it would take a decade to staff up 50'000 U.S. Software Engineers.

Congress would also rather lose the tech industry completely than allow companies to bring in more foreign tech workers. Anti-immigration has won out over Pro-business as a value for representatives on every side of the political spectrum so this won't change in the foreseeable future.

Given all that, logistically, Vancouver Canada would work the best. You can still have people drive from one center to another for meetings. However almost everybody they hire would have to be relocated. So for a quicker start, Toronto may be the best bet and thereafter you can bring in the best and brightest from all over the world, and Canada would welcome them.
 
EVERYONE is bidding for the Amazon HQ. Amazon is just looking at the different subsidy offers before they decide.
 
This baby here was born in Grapevine.:D
 
deonb said:
I went camping at Grapevine Lake a couple of months ago. Lovely place. Took some pictures:
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Went scuba diving in Lake Grapevine once.... Took some pictures:

1.jpg
 
deonb said:
Yes (AMZL - I get deliveries from them all the time), but again, it won't apply. This is a headquarters - which is basically a Software Development center. Keep in mind that Amazon is the largest web hosting provider in the world - bigger than Google. This requires tons of development work.

Honestly, I think Amazon would be better of to create a center outside the U.S. It's very difficult to hire U.S. talent - it would take a decade to staff up 50'000 U.S. Software Engineers.

Congress would also rather lose the tech industry completely than allow companies to bring in more foreign tech workers. Anti-immigration has won out over Pro-business as a value for representatives on every side of the political spectrum so this won't change in the foreseeable future.

Given all that, logistically, Vancouver Canada would work the best. You can still have people drive from one center to another for meetings. However almost everybody they hire would have to be relocated. So for a quicker start, Toronto may be the best bet and thereafter you can bring in the best and brightest from all over the world, and Canada would welcome them.
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Yeah. Send those jobs/money/experience overseas. We don't need it. We're destined to sit around and do each others' laundry.
 
MadseasoN said:
Yeah. Send those jobs/money/experience overseas. We don't need it. We're destined to sit around and do each others' laundry.
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More like - We don't want to have them.

Trump dislikes Amazon in particular, but even if it wasn't for that - congress and tech companies are always at odds - no matter which side is in power. Republicans don't support tech worker visas. Democrats don't support capital repatriation.

Opening a dev center in Canada is a great way for Amazon to get around both of those. As a shareholder I'd want them to do that.
 
deonb said:
Trump dislikes Amazon in particular, but even if it wasn't for that - congress and tech companies are always at odds - no matter which side is in power. Republicans don't support tech worker visas. Democrats don't support capital repatriation.
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Both parties have gotten intense dislike for the tech industry. Even Steve Case weighed in lately. Partly because of the "wealth" that's out there, partly because the investment dollars are not spread around to other parts of the country, partly because of the influence, partly because of the seeming bias in social media, partly because they industry takes offense to giving the Feds unfettered access to personal data, partly because the industry has not kow-towed to the importance of the politicians, partly because... well, you get the idea. Bottom line is that both parties are increasingly disliking the tech industry for a variety of reasons, and it doesn't bode well for the future.

As for the Amazon headquarters, I was in the audience yesterday as the CEO of a fairly good sized REIT described his thoughts - he thinks Boston and maybe Denver are prime for the HQ, and that most midwest cities & those without a robust public transit system are not high on the list. YMMV
 
SEATTLE — Wanted: A place with a million people, a diverse population, good schools and malleable lawmakers. Room to accommodate up to 50,000 workers. Canadian provinces also welcome to apply.

I'm sure Amazon will come up with a good "cost of buying lawmaker to return on investment" ratio.
 
wsuffa said:
Both parties have gotten intense dislike for the tech industry. Even Steve Case weighed in lately. Partly because of the "wealth" that's out there, partly because the investment dollars are not spread around to other parts of the country, partly because of the influence, partly because of the seeming bias in social media, partly because they industry takes offense to giving the Feds unfettered access to personal data, partly because the industry has not kow-towed to the importance of the politicians, partly because... well, you get the idea. Bottom line is that both parties are increasingly disliking the tech industry for a variety of reasons, and it doesn't bode well for the future.

As for the Amazon headquarters, I was in the audience yesterday as the CEO of a fairly good sized REIT described his thoughts - he thinks Boston and maybe Denver are prime for the HQ, and that most midwest cities & those without a robust public transit system are not high on the list. YMMV
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That makes a lot of sense. More than anything else the tech industry is where the private market is bringing incredible progress to mankind and the internet is the last free and mostly unregulated territory. It has resulted in the greatest advance in social development since the invention of writing, and the most accessibility between individuals that has ever existed. It has eliminated information barriers between potentially all 7 billion of us. From any politician's standpoint, that can't be good.

What is a politician more than anything else? It is someone who wants to control. An unfettered private industry bringing directly to all people the tools to bypass borders, rules, controls and restrictions is going to be hated by anyone seeking to stay in power because that is what political structure and government is: having the power to control others.

I'm not saying that's bad or good; it's both. Some government is necessary. But I think technology is advancing so fast, government feels they aren't in the driver's seat, and they're right, they're not, and they hate that.
 
It should tell the loons that run Seattle something that even Amazon is looking for a way out.
 
luvflyin said:
SEATTLE — Wanted: A place with a million people, a diverse population, good schools and malleable lawmakers. Room to accommodate up to 50,000 workers. Canadian provinces also welcome to apply.

I'm sure Amazon will come up with a good "cost of buying lawmaker to return on investment" ratio.
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It's kind'a funny living in Seattle right now. Half the ads I see are for mayors of other cities trying to woo Amazon to open up here.
 
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Will be interesting to see what the eventual "winning" city will give Amazon as far as concessions? Tax reductions? Infrastructure upgrades for them?

I'm all for getting people employed and this would bring many, many jobs into the area, but as a independent retailer myself the thought of a ever expanding Amazon keeps me up at night. Imagine how much small business would succeed if cities and towns gave the same concessions that they do to the big boys.

I'm a free market capitalist by my very nature so I believe the consumer will decide who offers more value in the long run, and I'm confident that my business offers more value than the faceless Amazon- but I just cant hide my contempt.

Not a day goes by where I don't have a customer pulling out their phone and checking Amazon's pricing on the same item I have. Invariably after they get all our advice and expertise and get to try and feel the product the customer will say they can get it cheaper on Amazon. I try to explain to them that it does cost money to keep the lights on and the employees paid and I'll be here if you have any problems with your item and stand by my products. I explain I can't do all that and operate on the 1% margins that Amazon works off of. Many people will understand but many people don't. There honestly hasn't been this much of a threat to small business retailing since Wal-Mart.

Be good to your local business and shop local!

Ok, I'll get off my soap box now.
 
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weilke said:
It should tell the loons that run Seattle something that even Amazon is looking for a way out.
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Amazon is not going anywhere - everything already in Seattle will stay in Seattle and Amazon will even expand their Seattle campus by 50% over the next 5 years. However, Seattle is just physically too small to facilitate further expansion than that. Amazon already rents 50% of all of available commercial space in Seattle and they own 10% of all property in Seattle. If they want to expand it any further than that, they're going to have to start building man-made islands.

I know they're advertising that they're looking for a "second headquarters", but it's really a dev center. The reason they're calling it a "second headquarters" is now they have 100 cities throwing incentives at Amazon. That's actually pretty smart. Microsoft also opened a big dev center in Silicon Valley, and Google opened one in Seattle area, but nobody really took notice. If they however called it a "second headquarters" at the time, they would have been able to reap up some sweet incentives in the process.
 
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wsuffa said:
he thinks Boston and maybe Denver are prime for the HQ
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Yes, amongst all US cities of more than 1 million, those two best match Amazon's announced criteria.

Whichever of those two offers the most incentives will get it. I'd bet on Denver.
 
neilw2 said:
Will be interesting to see what the eventual "winning" city will give Amazon as far as concessions? Tax reductions? Infrastructure upgrades for them?

I'm all for getting people employed and this would bring many, many jobs into the area, but as a independent retailer myself the thought of a ever expanding Amazon keeps me up at night. Imagine how much small business would succeed if cities and towns gave the same concessions that they do to the big boys.

I'm a free market capitalist by my very nature so I believe the consumer will decide who offers more value in the long run, and I'm confident that my business offers more value than the faceless Amazon- but I just cant hide my contempt.

Not a day goes by where I don't have a customer pulling out their phone and checking Amazon's pricing on the same item I have. Invariably after they get all our advice and expertise and get to try and feel the product the customer will say they can get it cheaper on Amazon. I try to explain to them that it does cost money to keep the lights on and the employees paid and I'll be here if you have any problems with your item and stand by my products. I explain I can't do all that and operate on the 1% margins that Amazon works off of. Many people will understand but many people don't. There honestly has been this much of a threat to small business retailing since Wal-Mart.

Be good to your local business and shop local!

Ok, I'll get off my soap box now.
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I consider it really slimy to purposely use local stores to peruse merchandise with the deliberate intent of buying it online later. I am an avid Amazon user. I love that I can sit in my house and have stuff mailed to me in two days. But I have a personal code of ethics. Maybe it's just me but if I go out to a store to view the merchandise in real life, and I find the right item, then I buy it from that store. I consider it fair that if I want to buy something online I should do the look see and choosing online too.
 
deonb said:
Amazon is not going anywhere - everything already in Seattle will stay in Seattle and Amazon will even expand their Seattle campus by 50% over the next 5 years.
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Lol.
 
neilw2 said:
Not a day goes by where I don't have a customer pulling out their phone and checking Amazon's pricing on the same item I have. Invariably after they get all our advice and expertise and get to try and feel the product the customer will say they can get it cheaper on Amazon. I try to explain to them that it does cost money to keep the lights on and the employees paid and I'll be here if you have any problems with your item and stand by my products. I explain I can't do all that and operate on the 1% margins that Amazon works off of. Many people will understand but many people don't. There honestly has been this much of a threat to small business retailing since Wal-Mart.
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Amazon is doing more for small businesses than anything that came before it. There are 2 million 3rd party sellers on Amazon. 70'000 of those have sales of over $100k per year. Nowadays you can be a kid in a garage designing a new circuit board and have it sold on Amazon for a couple of hundred dollars of investment. Compare that to 20 years ago trying to get your product to be stocked by Radio Shack. Amazon is great for small businesses. It's just not great for yours.

The thing is - consumers don't know the difference between a 3rd party seller and Amazon - when they look up the price on their phone, they just see it as Amazon. But odds are, you're not competing with Amazon - you're competing against someone exactly like you who owns a small business and who just happened to open an Amazon store. So the question is - why aren't YOU opening one?


Rushie said:
I consider it really slimy to purposely use local stores to peruse merchandise with the deliberate intent of buying it online later. I am an avid Amazon user. I love that I can sit in my house and have stuff mailed to me in two days. But I have a personal code of ethics. Maybe it's just me but if I go out to a store to view the merchandise in real life, and I find the right item, then I buy it from that store. I consider it fair that if I want to buy something online I should do the look see and choosing online too.
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I do agree with this. If I need a storefront to make a decision, I will support the person who spent the money on creating the storefront. For me it's less about the money, it's about the inconvenience of buying something from a store and then having to carry it home vs. ordering it online and having it arrive on my doorstep. But I'm more than willing to do that if I really needed the storefront.
 
weilke said:
Lol.
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What bit of insider information do YOU have that is more telling than the dozens of cranes in Seattle right now working on their Denny Triangle expansion?
 
The thing I find amusing about this whole mess is that these mega-tech companies(which, let's face it, Amazon is a tech company now). Who exist partially because other companies don't want to own servers or have physical infrastructure are the very ones who don't allow their employees to work remotely at a large scale.

Amazon is basically saying, "Hey, cities, we need a new place to screw up traffic and drive up housing prices." They should be going to employees and saying, "You can live anywhere you want with a good internet connection and the ability to come in to a regional office and meet your team one week per month." Drop some small regional team meeting offices near big airport cities and you've now reduced payroll since employees won't have to live in high cost cities unless they want to, you've reduced your office space needs by 75%, and you've given your employees back 10+ hours a week depending on their previous commute.

Yea, I know it won't happen, micromanagers need to be able to manage by wandering around and sticking their head in your cube asking how it's going every couple hours, you won't have lock-in on employees when they move somewhere and realize if they need to change jobs they have to move again or have an even longer commute.
 
chartbundle said:
The thing I find amusing about this whole mess is that these mega-tech companies(which, let's face it, Amazon is a tech company now). Who exist partially because other companies don't want to own servers or have physical infrastructure are the very ones who don't allow their employees to work remotely at a large scale.

Amazon is basically saying, "Hey, cities, we need a new place to screw up traffic and drive up housing prices." They should be going to employees and saying, "You can live anywhere you want with a good internet connection and the ability to come in to a regional office and meet your team one week per month." Drop some small regional team meeting offices near big airport cities and you've now reduced payroll since employees won't have to live in high cost cities unless they want to, you've reduced your office space needs by 75%, and you've given your employees back 10+ hours a week depending on their previous commute.

Yea, I know it won't happen, micromanagers need to be able to manage by wandering around and sticking their head in your cube asking how it's going every couple hours, you won't have lock-in on employees when they move somewhere and realize if they need to change jobs they have to move again or have an even longer commute.
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I worked like that for the last 2 decades, and I've also experimented with variations of that style on the team level. We even had a regional office in Hawaii for a while while I was at a mega-tech.

It works for very senior people - it doesn't work for junior people. At all.

So we figured, ok... let's build a team exclusively out of senior people (and automate everything that junior people do - generally testing). Except, test automation is a ridiculous thing. It never works. Whether it's built by high school interns or technical fellows, it doesn't work. You need real people to do grunt work, to do actual product testing. Seniors refuse to do this, and juniors need guidance and offices. Thus - you're always going to need juniors on your team.

Now maybe you figure just stick the junior people in large office parks and have the senior people roam. At least that won't drive up real estate prices that much... Tried that as well. Built a big campus in India under that principle. That doesn't work either. You need senior people around in order to guide the junior people...

In the end, it goes back to the mega-campus since it's the only thing that works. You can have a few star employees who work in a satellite office, but it doesn't scale to a company at large. I wish it did.

A second contributing factor to this, some people use an office for a surrogate social life. Since this tend to be people at the managerial level, they can surround themselves with surrogate friends by edict.
 
deonb said:
Amazon is doing more for small businesses than anything that came before it. There are 2 million 3rd party sellers on Amazon. 70'000 of those have sales of over $100k per year. Nowadays you can be a kid in a garage designing a new circuit board and have it sold on Amazon for a couple of hundred dollars of investment. Compare that to 20 years ago trying to get your product to be stocked by Radio Shack. Amazon is great for small businesses. It's just not great for yours.

The thing is - consumers don't know the difference between a 3rd party seller and Amazon - when they look up the price on their phone, they just see it as Amazon. But odds are, you're not competing with Amazon - you're competing against someone exactly like you who owns a small business and who just happened to open an Amazon store. So the question is - why aren't YOU opening one?
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Interesting argument. Let me ask you this- what does more for the local economy- a brick and motar retail establishment or a "kid in a garage" to use your example?

My company pays taxes, hires employees, donate to local causes, volunteers to the local school for a job fair, etc.

I know many people have made a business out of selling on Amazon Marketplace. I would feel if my company did it we are lowering the overall brand value. My business isn't about offering the LOWEST price.

It is about offering customers a knowledge experience where we wont oversell you, and you can come to us when you have questions or concerns. We will put the item together if it requires assembly and even deliver and install it in your home if you chose. Im open 7 days a week, 365 days a year and stock many items so you don't have to wait for delivery. I offer all this at a FAIR, competitive price. I'm not the cheapest- Amazon Marketplace businesses can beat me as their operating costs are certainly lower, but I'm definitely not the most expensive either.

Like I said before the market will dictate the winners and losers here. Many, many people (including my wife) love the convenience of online shopping. It is not going away- far from it. Our society puts a premium on less human interaction and great efficiency. People want to spend less time buying and more time living. Amazon will continue to grow, and will outpace brick and motar retail sales growth for the foreseeable future. Doesn't mean I have to like them- they are my competitor :)

I own a independent retail pharmacy with a large medical supply front store. Chain pharmacies cropped up 30-40 years ago. Before that there were corner drug stores on every block in urban America and every town square in rural. Many, many independent pharmacies went out of business- most of which tried to beat the chains at their own game (absolute lowest price, cosmetics, greeting cards, convenience store items, etc) . Unlike most chains my retail business consists of selling medical products and devices that patients use every day to live their life to the fullest (ie. wheelchairs, hospital beds, etc). My pharmacy offers home delivery and suite of specialized services to help patients follow their medication regimen that you wouldn't find at your local chain drug store.

Now you see the pharmacies that were able to change and adapt were able to prosper and are actually growing again as customers are yearning for that local pharmacy feel. I trust the same will happen with many retail industries.

I'll take my chances not getting into pricing wars while offering no added benefit to consumers. I'll keep selling things at a competitive price with a different customer experience. I'm betting the consumer will see the benefit. I do think, however, it would be nice if locales kept it on a open playing field so Amazon has no more advantage over the little guy.
 
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Amazon is being enabled by technology including the internet and it is having a negative impact on many retailers. That sucks if you are the business that can't compete and therefore suffers. I don't think brick and mortar is dead but it needs to adapt to survive. Some will, some won't.

On the other hand, many small businesses and individuals are being empowered by much of the same technology. Small local restaurants can benefit greatly by having a webpage and getting positive reviews on sites like Yelp. Uber and AirBnB and similar would not exist if it wasn't for the internet and smartphones. These help many individuals to develop an additional revenue stream from their car or extra bedroom. eBay helps people sell their old stuff rather than tossing it in the trash or having to hold a garage sale.

Yes, some businesses suffer. Some prosper. Overall the consumer benefits and that really is the bottom line.
 
deonb said:
What bit of insider information do YOU have that is more telling than the dozens of cranes in Seattle right now working on their Denny Triangle expansion?
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Thats where they consolidate their Seattle ops after they let all those existing leases expire.

I work for an outfit with 'two headquarters' (result of a 'merger of equals' ;-) ). But oddly enough, you can't get a room carpeted at 'headquarter 2' without 'headquarter 1' signing off on it.

I only laughed because you provided a verbatim reproduction of the PR Amazon has been feeding the Seattle politicians.
 
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deonb said:
Amazon is doing more for small businesses than anything that came before it. There are 2 million 3rd party sellers on Amazon. 70'000 of those have sales of over $100k per year.
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Wow, SALES of 100k a year. How many of those resellers make a full-time living out of their web store ? Sure, there is a good margin on reselling dayglo dogleashes from China, but 100k in sales isn't the mark of a successful business.
 
neilw2 said:
Interesting argument. Let me ask you this- what does more for the local economy- a brick and motar retail establishment or a "kid in a garage" to use your example?
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Oh, the kid in a garage by far. He represents the Engineering and Manufacturing sector, which used to be the backbone of our economy and it's only a good thing when more of those jobs are created. More than that - he sells his products to people outside the community. Distant dollars are far more valuable than local dollars when it comes to growing a community.

neilw2 said:
My pharmacy offers home delivery and suite of specialized services to help patients follow their medication regimen that you wouldn't find at your local chain drug store. Now you see the pharmacies that were able to change and adapt were able to prosper and are actually growing again as customers are yearning for that local pharmacy feel. I trust the same will happen with many retail industries.
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And this is the right way to compete, you moved into the service industry. Service industry is pretty immune to online retailers. If you start deriving all of your dollars from the service industry it won't matter if your retail portion is getting under attack. In fact it means you don't need a storefront anymore and don't need retail employees to be able to derive the same income. So less risk for you.

When I hire an electrician - he doesn't care if I supply my own cable. When I hire a carpenter - he doesn't care if I supply my own lumber. When I hire a roofer - he doesn't care if I supply my own shingles.

As long as you don't tie the viability of your business to the local retail sector, you'll be fine. As for your old retail employees - the kid in the garage is going to need help building stuff, and AMZL (Amazon Livery) is going to need help delivering stuff. I would estimate 70% of all my Amazon deliveries these days isn't FedEx/UPS anymore - it's private people with their own cars driving around and delivering stuff.


weilke said:
Wow, SALES of 100k a year. How many of those resellers make a full-time living out of their web store ? Sure, there is a good margin on reselling dayglo dogleashes from China, but 100k in sales isn't the mark of a successful business.
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You can make a minimum-wage style living on $100k revenue a year if you don't have to pay for expenses like a physical store presence or employees. But below that I agree it's definitely only a hobby, which is why I excluded it. '

Total Amazon 3rd party sales in 2015 was $131b. They don't break it down more than that (except the 70'000 / $100k thing) so hard to say where the top of the bell-curve lies. Let's say the top 10'000 got half of that, so then the top 10'000 have sales above $6.5m. Or maybe the top 1000 have sales of $65m each.

So hard to say on an individual bases - I was really just trying to exclude the 1.93m retailers that make below $100k since those are solidly hobbyists.

Either way, 3rd party sellers as a whole have about 3 times as much sale revenue on Amazon compared to Amazon itself.
 
Rushie said:
That makes a lot of sense. More than anything else the tech industry is where the private market is bringing incredible progress to mankind and the internet is the last free and mostly unregulated territory. It has resulted in the greatest advance in social development since the invention of writing, and the most accessibility between individuals that has ever existed. It has eliminated information barriers between potentially all 7 billion of us. From any politician's standpoint, that can't be good.

What is a politician more than anything else? It is someone who wants to control. An unfettered private industry bringing directly to all people the tools to bypass borders, rules, controls and restrictions is going to be hated by anyone seeking to stay in power because that is what political structure and government is: having the power to control others.

I'm not saying that's bad or good; it's both. Some government is necessary. But I think technology is advancing so fast, government feels they aren't in the driver's seat, and they're right, they're not, and they hate that.
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I would argue that the Internet is anything but "free and mostly unregulated", and it's getting worse every day. YMMV.
neilw2 said:
Will be interesting to see what the eventual "winning" city will give Amazon as far as concessions? Tax reductions? Infrastructure upgrades for them?

I'm all for getting people employed and this would bring many, many jobs into the area, but as a independent retailer myself the thought of a ever expanding Amazon keeps me up at night. Imagine how much small business would succeed if cities and towns gave the same concessions that they do to the big boys.

I'm a free market capitalist by my very nature so I believe the consumer will decide who offers more value in the long run, and I'm confident that my business offers more value than the faceless Amazon- but I just cant hide my contempt.

Not a day goes by where I don't have a customer pulling out their phone and checking Amazon's pricing on the same item I have. Invariably after they get all our advice and expertise and get to try and feel the product the customer will say they can get it cheaper on Amazon. I try to explain to them that it does cost money to keep the lights on and the employees paid and I'll be here if you have any problems with your item and stand by my products. I explain I can't do all that and operate on the 1% margins that Amazon works off of. Many people will understand but many people don't. There honestly hasn't been this much of a threat to small business retailing since Wal-Mart.

Be good to your local business and shop local!

Ok, I'll get off my soap box now.
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Oh there is no question it will be about tax breaks, grants, and incentives - and you & I both know who pays. Not much different from the sports team that wants a new stadium partially or fully funded by the state and local government. And with the current Federal tax code, those states and localities that tax their citizens out the wazoo to provide such incentives are then subsidized by the Federal tax code that gives a full deduction for state and local taxes that are paid. So a state like Texas that has no state income tax is at a disadvantage compared to New York, California, or Mass. where the state/local tax is deductible from the Federal tax. (Apparently the some republicans are trying to change that in the Federal code, while republicans from 'blue states' are opposed because will raise the overall tax paid by citizens of their states).

I really wish that local incentives were not on the table because it's the local citizens that pay more and get hurt - often, as you note, to the detriment of local business.
 
This should improve the traffic situation in DFW....
 
wsuffa said:
So a state like Texas that has no state income tax is at a disadvantage compared to New York, California, or Mass. where the state/local tax is deductible from the Federal tax.
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The sales tax and (crazy high) property taxes that people pay in Texas are also deductable from Federal tax.

(WA tax works the same as TX, and I claim the sales and property tax deductions every year.)

So not sure what puts people in TX at a "disadvantage" exactly.
 
Yeah, the DFW area is a bit light on the pop density, traffic load and infrastructure as it is. I say jam them in! Good luck N Texans! :D
 
deonb said:
More like - We don't want to have them.

Trump dislikes Amazon in particular, but even if it wasn't for that - congress and tech companies are always at odds - no matter which side is in power. Republicans don't support tech worker visas. Democrats don't support capital repatriation.

Opening a dev center in Canada is a great way for Amazon to get around both of those. As a shareholder I'd want them to do that.
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Well as a "shareholder" I doubt you care much about "We".

"We" want the jobs, the money, and the experience.
 
deonb said:
The sales tax and (crazy high) property taxes that people pay in Texas are also deductable from Federal tax.

(WA tax works the same as TX, and I claim the sales and property tax deductions every year.)

So not sure what puts people in TX at a "disadvantage" exactly.
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No disadvantage but you'd have to compare to all 49 other states. We moved from NC which has an income tax. Our total tax burden is slightly lower in Texas. We're not complaining.
 
weilke said:
EVERYONE is bidding for the Amazon HQ. Amazon is just looking at the different subsidy offers before they decide.
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Exactly. Everyone is bidding for this.

They need infrastructure, access to air travel (that means a nearby hub, and a big GA airport for the execs), " Quality of Life" (Whatever that really means), and most of all HUGE taxpayer subsidies.

In my mind, that means Atlanta or Colorado.
 
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