Hacker News Reader

Comment by peteretep | Hacker News Reader

Let's say I'm the mayor of Detroit, and I want this. What incentives are in my power to offer, if I team up with the Guv'nor? Can I just gift them the land?

View on HN

Click through into the RFP and there's a section touching on this:

  Incentives 
  –
  Identify incentive programs available for the Project at the state/province and local 
  levels. Ou tline the type of incentive (i.e. land, site preparation, tax credits/exemptions, relocation 
  grants, workforce grants, utility incentives/grants, permitting, and fee reductions) and the amount. 
  The initial cost and ongoing cost of doing business are critic
  al decision drivers.

You wouldn't be able to gift them the land, but you would probably be able to waive property tax on said land. I know Detroit has a city income tax, so the mayor may be able to waive that for all Amazon employees if they committed to moving their headquarters within city limits.

St. Louis recently offered up this footprint to the NGA to keep them in the city:

https://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/stltoday.com/co...

That area has lost so many buildings over the last 30 years that it's practically an urban prairie, but they did use eminent domain to get the few remaining residents out.

In short, yes, land is on the table.

cost of land is probably the least of amazon's considerations in building a second HQ

edit: to elaborate, what they care much more about, i'm sure, is ability to attract and retain talent in the area. which I'm not sure detroit could do much about. even if you could make it more desirable to live there there's so little talent in the area you'd have to spend a crazy amount of time and money relocating people

I think you are under-estimating the amount of tech talent that supports the automotive and satellite industries in the Midwest.

> there's so little talent

Citation needed. For example, the University of Michigan's engineering school is well ranked in many areas, grants 3,000 degrees a year, and is an hour away:

https://www.engin.umich.edu/about/facts/

I'd be quite surprised if Amazon hires less than 3,000 software engineers a quarter. U Michigan may be a good or great engineering school but if it's an hour away it rounds to part of the national market.

I went there, along with several of my friends. Most of them now work for Amazon, several in the extant Detroit office and commute there from just outside Ann Arbor. You'd be surprised at how easy an hour commute is in South-east Michigan, esp. compared to Cali or Jersey traffic.

Stanford and SF are a similar distance, and I don't think anybody would say that Stanford "rounds to the national market" for SF companies. I certainly know plenty of U of M grads who have ended up in Detroit, so I suspect your theory needs some work.

Relocation is a relative drop in the hat if you can otherwise attract talent--potentially at a lower salary than the West Coast.

Jobs in remote locations make it hard to attract people who know what a BATNA is.

I mean, how am I supposed to negotiate with my boss for a $5,000 raise if he knows changing jobs will cost me $20,000 in relocation costs?

There's a fair amount of engineering talent out here. However, it's mainly focused in the auto industry which has never been seen as a sexy industry until the recent push into self driving cars.

Fair amount is an understatement when talking about the whole field of engineering. IIRC Metro Detroit has the largest population of engineers in the US. Granted a big portion of those jobs are in Auburn Hills, Dearborn and Warren rather than Detroit proper.

Edit: just checked the BLS numbers and apparently it's #4, beaten by Houston and edged out by NYC and LA.

Amazon already has a (albeit relatively small) office in Detroit, so they must not be so skeptical of the talent pool.

tax incentives are most common. (i worked in the business development office of a state government for a very short duration)

I'd imagine it would be along the same lines of what movies / studios get to shoot in certain cities -- relief from various tax types, priority in various permits, etc

Reply on news.ycombinator.com