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Comment by sumeno | Hacker News Reader

What happens if you want to switch jobs? Tying basic necessities like housing to your employer is a disaster that traps people in jobs. It's part of the reason healthcare in the US is so screwed up.

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Then you can find another accommodation. What's the big deal? Many times people try to find a place closer to their new work. There are many factors that contributed to the healthcare problem, generalizing one factor and using that here does not make sense.

The housing could be normal rentals not conditional on keeping the job. I would guess that most Amazon facilities are located in urban areas. It would not be isolated mining town like in 1900s

If it's normal rentals, then there's no incentive for companies to build said housing in the first place -- unless they want to separately diversify into real estate.

The incentive is to get workers at all.

Sure, as long as they can externalize this cost, they won't do this, but in the Bay Area Google determined it costs them less to to fight for housing projects and fund those, than pay the enormous overhead for getting their employees living there.

Is this what you are referring to? If so, it sounds like it's not for the workers, it's a social good project, much like what Amazon is doing by housing the homeless. I don't think it will even put any pressure on the market whatsoever.

https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/03/04/google-backs-three-ba...

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