AOC gets what she wants: [NYT] Amazon Pulls Out of Planned New York City Headquarters

yeah . . . maybe not:

Amazon’s announcement that it will cancel its plans to build a major office complex in Long Island City is a huge defeat for Governor Cuomo and Mayor de Blasio, who staked their political capital on the high-profile deal. The collapse of the deal is a victory, though, for the anti-gentrification, anti-development Left, which assailed the plan as a giveaway to a trillion-dollar company and its billionaire owner. They claimed that Amazon would drive up rents, destroy the local community, create noise pollution, and increase wealth inequality in New York. A typical response came from law professor and three-time loser political candidate Zephyr Teachout, who exulted on Twitter, “!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! POWER OF THE PEOPLE. Speechless. Truth to power wins!”

What has “truth to power” won? It’s not as though Amazon was preventing the rise of sustainable, green, unionized, and well-paying manufacturing jobs in Long Island City, or stopping the construction of affordable low-income housing, along with schools and parkland. The area where the company planned to build its secondary headquarters has been the focus of economic development plans for decades. It is presently the site of parking lots, storage units, and empty, city-owned land. Now it will stay that way. Amazon was planning to rent 1 million square feet in the Citigroup Tower in Long Island City, which is largely vacant of tenants, and will now remain so.​

https://www.city-journal.org/amazon-cancels-queens-hq

 

Left-leaning New York Daily News Editorial Board proclaims today's announcement a "cataclysmic failure" for NY progressives:

https://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/ny-oped-the-job-killers-won-20190214-story.html

The job-killers won: Amazon's decision to pull out of its headquarters deal is a cataclysmic failure of New York's progressives

By DAILY NEWS EDITORIAL BOARD
FEB 14, 2019 | 12:55 PM

So-called progressives just killed 25,000 to 40,000 high-quality jobs coming to New York City.

So-called progressives just shredded plans that would have delivered up to $27.5 billion in New York tax revenue over 25 years — real money that could have gone for schools and subways and public housing and health-care for the needy.

So-called progressives just looked at caterers, construction workers, electricians, cleaners and countless other professionals in Long Island City and throughout the five boroughs desperate to benefit from the economic activity that new employees would bring, and said: Suck it up. Amazon failed our ever-changing litmus tests, so we don’t want them here.

Amazon cancels plans to open headquarters in New York, citing opposition from local politicians »

Now one of the world’s biggest and most innovative companies, perfectly poised to play a central role shaping the global economy for a generation, will take its employment opportunities elsewhere.

We never said this was a perfect deal. A $505 million cash grant promised to assist Amazon in building its campus — designed, cough cough, so they’d use union labor — was questionable. But Amazon ran a national competition and asked cities to bid. Gov. Cuomo and Mayor de Blasio made an offer that won.

Politicians love to blather on about not letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. This deal, on balance, was all kinds of good.

The subsidies were far less generous than those dangled by other cities. The city’s benefits were all as-of-right, available to any comer. The biggest chunk of state subsidies, through the Excelsior Jobs Program, have been awarded with nary a peep to 800 companies — including, four times, to Amazon itself.

And not a penny in public money was up front. It was all to return to the company as a small share of the tax revenues it paid, as it paid them.

Nevermind all that. Nevermind overwhelming public support that held solid even after smear campaigns. So-called progressives — after begging Amazon to choose New York! — decided this time, with the most jobs on the line, was the moment to go to the barricades, to say hell no, they won’t come.

Why? Because Amazon is a huge corporation. Because it wouldn’t pledge to stay silent during a Staten Island fulfillment center organizing drive. Because it might have a contract with ICE.

Congratulations, Sen. Mike Gianaris, who was salivating at the prospect of killing the deal by abusing his authority on the Public Authorities Control Board, which is not supposed to vote on the merits of a project. Congratulations, Sen. Andrea Stewart-Cousins, who nominated Gianaris to that board. Congratulations, Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer, who threw every imaginable objection against the wall hoping something would stick.

Congratulations, Council Speaker Corey Johnson, for going along with the death-by-a-thousand-cuts brigades. Congratulations, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who sees climate change as an existential threat, but just helped scare one of the country’s biggest job-creators away from an urban site next to public transportation.

All of you built this disaster.


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NY Times:

"There were all sorts of problems with the deal New York cut to bring Amazon to the city, and Amazon is no paragon, but its abrupt withdrawal was a blow to New York, which stood to gain 25,000 jobs and an estimated $27 billion in tax revenue over the next two decades. This embarrassment to the city presents a painful lesson in how bumper-sticker slogans and the hubris of elected — and corporate — officials can create losers on all sides. . . .

"Things quickly got out of hand, though, and reasonable criticism of the deal was overwhelmed by opposition to the company itself, even as polls showed wide support for Amazon’s move to Queens. Elected officials who identify as progressive painted Amazon as a rapacious engine of inequality. It seemed that few were interested in having a constructive conversation about how to improve the deal and make it work for the tech giant and the city."​

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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/14/...l?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

 

The Wall Street Journal Editorial Board tonight:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/amazon-escapes-from-new-york-11550189053?mod=hp_opin_pos3

Amazon Escapes From New York
$3 billion in subsidies couldn’t overcome the hostility to business.
187 Comments
By The Editorial Board
Feb. 14, 2019 7:04 p.m. ET

After getting mauled by a mob of unions and politicians, Amazon on Thursday cancelled plans to build a second headquarters in New York City. It’s a testament to New York’s toxic business environment that even $3 billion in subsidies wasn’t enough to keep the company in town.

“A number of state and local politicians have made it clear that they oppose our presence and will not work with us to build the type of relationships that are required to go forward with the project we and many others envisioned in Long Island City,” Amazon said in calling off the three-month engagement.

The Seattle-based retailer had only kind words for Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio, who wooed it like contestants on “The Bachelor.” In return for the promise of 25,000 jobs, the state and city in November offered up to $3 billion in subsidies as well as a helipad for CEO Jeff Bezos and other executives to fly over congested city streets.

But the ensuing gang-beating offered a portent of what Amazon was walking into. An Amazon executive was asked at a City Council meeting last month whether the company would agree to unionization. “We have great-paying jobs and we respect an employee’s right to choose or not to join a union,” the executive explained. “The goal that you are trying to achieve is good jobs, not low-paying jobs.”

Mr. de Blasio’s response? “We’re a union town.” He added: “There is going to be tremendous pressure on Amazon to allow unionization and I will be one of the people bringing that pressure. I believe that ultimately that pressure will win the day.” This followed Mr. de Blasio’s recent declaration that there’s too much money in the city in the “wrong hands.”

Mr. Cuomo blamed hostile state Senate Democrats for driving off Amazon and insisted the state’s “fundamentals” will “continue to attract world class business.” If that’s so, why did New York politicians spend $10 billion last year—more than any other state—on business incentives? Republican states also compete with subsidies, but progressives have to offer more to compensate for their oppressive business climates.

The city has the country’s second-highest income tax, and Mr. de Blasio last month proposed that all private employers be required to provide workers two weeks of paid vacation each year. That’s on top of paid family leave. Animus toward business represses the organic investment and job growth that make a dynamic economy.

Reacting like a spurned suitor, Mr. de Blasio trashed Amazon. “You have to be tough to make it in New York City,” he said. “We gave Amazon the opportunity to be a good neighbor and do business in the greatest city in the world. Instead of working with the community, Amazon threw away that opportunity.”

The mayor is reflecting the view on the left that businesses are wards of the government and owe their success—and profits—to the state. But businesses should take note that they encourage this co-dependency by seeking government handouts.

Consider Taiwanese manufacturer Foxconn, which was given $4 billion by Wisconsin to build a factory to manufacture LCD TV screens in Racine. Last month Foxconn acknowledged it made little economic sense to make the screens in Wisconsin and floated building a research hub instead, prompting President Trump to intervene personally with Foxconn chairman Terry Gou.

Liberals love to conflate corporate welfare with capitalism, and these kinds of deals help promote their narrative that the American economic and political systems are rigged. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted that “everyday New Yorkers & their neighbors defeated Amazon’s corporate greed, its worker exploitation, and the power of the richest man in the world.” Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren declared, “How long will we allow giant corporations to hold our democracy hostage?”

Amazon was right to pull out of New York City, but it would have avoided a lot of grief if it had made its original headquarters decision on the business “fundamentals.”

Appeared in the February 15, 2019, print edition.
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