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For Once, Amazon Loses a Popularity Contest

Personally, I was against the deal, but I had mixed feelings, even afterward. For some portions of our economy Amazon coming might have been good news, e.g., real estate, technology, and support industries. For others, and for infrastructure services in NYC, my sense was that it would have been a strain and a drain, taxing our resources and us subsidizing it with tax breaks, leading to higher costs for local inhabitants. My later thoughts had to do with evening out our economy, so heavily reliant on finance.

For myself, I've worked in technology for 30 years, mostly in finance but lately medical. I live in Manhattan, in one of the more densely tech-inhabited areas, and Amazon would have likely been good for me personally, although that is debatable. A large number of tech job, and with Amazon's higher pay, might have both made tech jobs more competitive while also making it more lucrative. Even then, Amazon has reached out to me several times about working for them, but then again, I am always getting emails and call about roles, many of it the equivalent of spam.

In the end, on one hand, I'm glad Amazon was rebuffed because of its potential harm to NYC, but then again, I likely would have liked to see the gleaming towers and growth that it would have brought. Regardless, NYC will still grow, will still be highly unequal, and technology will still take over more jobs, but maybe not so quickly as if Amazon been able to stay.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/14/business/amazon-new-york-city.html?comments#permid=30635150

@citizennotconsumer - I think you underestimate how much this hurts Amazon. Publicly, Amazon can decry the local politics to the media, but internally, they will have to blame themselves for the ignorance and bad decision-making that went ahead with the plan. A high-level decision should have been smarter, should have taken into account the potential pushback, should have done better PR. It is a failure of decision-making at a high-level within Amazon...

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/14/business/amazon-new-york-city.html?comments#permid=30634885:30635376




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