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Comment by dpflan | Hacker News Reader

I suspect you are correct; this is a way to make the two cities compete to please / to accommodate / to benefit Amazon and get the headlines that they are Amazon's choice for X, Y, Z reason. Amazon's gravity is quite strong, and its tactics very honed.

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I wish all cities competed for residents in this way.

I think it would drastically improve our government if there was an actually significant risk of people leaving when the government messed up.

It has happened. Remember White Flight?

Yes that a pretty good example, even if it hasn't held up well with modern day morality.

Are you referring to the GI Bills that allowed flight to new suburban developments or something else?

White flight refers to white residents (and usually with it, investment) leaving racially-mixed American cities for the racially homogeneous suburbs en-masse during the civil rights movement and the race-riots that occurred in major cities toward the end of that era.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_flight

Wow, you and I couldn't see things more differently. Sports teams are doing this to cities constantly. Build us a new sports stadium at your expense that will be used 8-10 times a year. We'll take the concession revenue, the parking revenue, etc. Maybe we'll let you have a tax on food.

Maybe we'll move away before the city is done paying for the stadium. See St. Louis and the Rams. It's rare that a city like San Diego refuses to buckle under.

In Portland, the City of Portland makes up the difference between the minimum wage and $15/hour for the employees who work the MLS Timbers games.

Nearby in Beaverton, Nike's property was guaranteed by the state not to be annexed by the city so they wouldn't be required to pay property taxes. There was muttering that maybe Nike would pack up and move if this didn't happen.

What I would love to see is that cities and states are not allowed to offer subsidies to companies. If you want to move here, great. How many stupid things like what Scott Walker is doing with Foxconn have to happen before something like that is prohibited?

In a show-down between corporate pros and local politicians, I know who's going to come out ahead.

These items go to a vote. I, like the commenter you're responding to, appreciate this mobility and community choice. That a smaller set of citizens can choose abatements at their own expense is much better than it being done in a capital far away. Many times it's great that self-determinism, be it propositions, bonds, sports teams, taxes, etc, is welcomed at the community level and is always scary when curbed by larger entities. There are levels and limitations of course, but to say the community's financial choices here should be outlawed is unfair.

> These items go to a vote.

And they get voted down. And the moneyed interests jam them through anyway.

I was stunned when the Chargers finally got told to get lost out of San Diego and it stuck.

> It's rare that a city like San Diego refuses to buckle under.

While we're listing these cities, we should add Oakland to the list.

If I'm in government and I mess up then I would love if the people who are angry just packed up and left.

I'd be more upset if they stayed angry and showed up on election day.

Luckily you can carve up the angry peoples’ electoral districts every 10 years assuming you are in power at the right time.

Isn’t that what this is, in the end? The supposed reason for courting these deals is always the jobs it brings, and the reason for jobs is to attract new residents, or retain existing ones.

Amazon isn't a resident.

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