So what did we expect? "Nice guys finish last", Stan Silver told me
when the company broke our efforts to organize a local union.
Another old adage, "The biggest gets the mostest".
For all of my years growing up in Seattle, from 1937 to 1965, when I
became totally blind, this sprawling metropolis was a company town. A
one company town. Boeing. And whatever Boeing wanted, Boeing got.
Then Seattle began to attract new sorts of business, Strong Coffee,
Software and Books with on-line orders that began including
everything. Boeing took their marbles and their corporate offices and
moved to Chicago.
Back in those early days during and following WW II, Seattle was a
strong union town. Boeing may not have liked it, but they paid their
shop labor a good living wage. Middle Class neighborhoods scattered
all around the downtown business district. But Amazon, Starbucks and
Microsoft...and even Costco were more in the Class of Walmart, in so
far as wages and benefits went. And as wages flattened out, property
flew through the ceiling. Those close in, solid old middle class
neighborhoods became far too costly for middle class workers.
Seattle, and similar large cities are in crisis. Most cities are run
by and for the town businesses. These leaders, known as the City
Fathers and the Pillars of the Community, would turn the town into a
Third World economy, except for the labor unions. The Fathers work
tirelessly to cripple the labor unions, while the unions work just as
hard at sharing a larger percentage of the profits. If either side
crushed the other, the city would go under, like Detroit. Under our
form of capitalism, a balance must be maintained if the city and its
inhabitants are going to live at anything above a bare existence. But
of course, neither side seems to understand this. So both go at one
another with a "winner take all" mentality. Amazon is looking like
the company town on steroids. Unchecked, Amazon and similar companies
will reduce our working class to the level of Serfs.
But I could be wrong. We could be reduced to Slavery.
Carl Jarvis
On 2/13/19, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Amazon Threatens to Cancel New York City Headquarters if It Doesn't Receive
$3 Billion in Subsidies
By David Dayen, In These Times
12 February 19
Fearful of losing nearly $3 billion in subsidies for its expansion in New
York City, Amazon has moved to a new strategy, one involving threats. The
Washington Post (owned by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos) reported on Friday that
the
company is "reconsidering" its plan to place an office facility for up to
25,000 employees in Long Island City, Queens. In doing so, Amazon is
signaling that it will squeeze opponents of the deal politically unless
they
support the massive subsidy package.
New York City lawmakers who weren't intimately involved with the "HQ2" bid
to bring in Amazon have been sharply critical of giving billions in
taxpayer
dollars to the world's most valuable corporation, so it can add to an
already existing presence in the region. The deal bypassed city council
approval, adding to the consternation.
Any major multinational would have multiple reasons to expand in New York
City, given its highly skilled workforce and status as a hub for the
technology, entertainment and advertising industries-all areas where Amazon
is expanding. That makes the billions in subsidies seem gratuitous.
"Amazon has been growing into the largest company we'll ever see," says
Jonathan Westin of New York Communities for Change, one of the groups
leading the charge against the Amazon deal. "The idea that we need to
subsidize them in any way blows our mind." Westin has helped rally
opposition to the deal from labor unions, community groups and prominent
politicians like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, whose district is adjacent
to the proposed site.
Several other issues have inspired outrage over what critics call the
#HQ2scam. Even before these subsidies, New York City has been struggling to
fund acceptable public transportation and affordable housing. Plus, adding
25,000 high-paying jobs to this corner of Queens will only make
gentrification worse, activists warn. "I think anyone who's middle class is
not going to be able to live in Long Island City much longer," Westin says.
Finally, at a City Council meeting last week, the company refused to agree
to remain neutral if Amazon workers attempted unionization in New York
City,
a red flag for a labor-friendly city. The HQ2 project has actually split
the
city's labor movement. The Retail, Wholesale, and Department Store Union
and
the Teamsters are against the project, while the Building and Construction
Trades Council that would build the HQ2 facility, and the SEIU local 32BJ
that would staff the building for security and custodial work, have come
out
in favor. Council Speaker Corey Johnson criticized Amazon last week for
pitting workers against one another.
Amazon can see its grasp on $2.808 billion in subsidies slipping away. This
week, the State Senate recommended the appointment of Sen. Michael
Gianaris,
a bitter critic of the deal, to the Public Authorities Control Board, which
reviews and approves state-based economic development subsidies. About $1.5
billion of the grants for HQ2 come from the state and could go before this
board, and the way the board is structured, Gianaris would have an
effective
veto over those funds.
Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo, a supporter of the deal who offered to
change his name to Amazon Cuomo if the company agreed to choose New York
City, would have to approve Gianaris, but that would create a standoff
between the governor and the legislature, reflecting the tensions that have
accompanied the Amazon deal.
While all of that is happening, Amazon floated this pullback from New York,
citing how "welcoming" politicians in Virginia and Nashville, Tennessee
have
been in handing over public money for its site locations. Embattled
Virginia
governor Ralph Northam, weathering a scandal over blackface pictures in his
medical school yearbook, found time to quietly sign off on $750 million in
subsidies for a 25,000-employee facility near Arlington, which the
legislature advanced with little opposition. Nashville is getting a
5,000-person operations center, and though the city budget is so strapped
public workers were denied a promised raise, this week officials passed a
$15 million infrastructure grant for the area Amazon will occupy, the first
of $117 million in subsidies for the project.
Amazon is likely threatening this pullout to concentrate minds among New
York politicians, in an effort to pin blame on them for "losing" Amazon.
The
company is hiring lobbyists and a "community affairs manager" in New York,
so it's clearly still committed to the deal at some level.
Amazon may also have a Plan B. One of the twenty finalists for HQ2 was
Newark, New Jersey, just across the border from New York City. It was one
of
the richest subsidy offers of the entire process - up to $7 billion from
the
city and state to lure Amazon. The company could certainly skip over to
Newark and re-open talks to place its offices there, if only to loosen
resistance in New York City.
Whatever the outcome, Amazon's gambit shows how much the HQ2 sweepstakes
has
backfired. What started as a virtual celebration of Amazon's prominence has
transformed into condemnation over a big company using its clout to extract
taxpayer dollars and disrupt communities. Even Michael Bloomberg is
denouncing tax gifts to Amazon.
More broadly, the Amazon farce has shone a spotlight on the sordid process
of economic development deals, which cost cities and states up to $90
billion annually while local services suffer from a lack of funds. Deals
that would receive almost no scrutiny, like U.S. Steel winning $47 million
in tax breaks from impoverished Gary, Indiana, now make headlines. By
making
the spectacle so public, Amazon may have ruined this gravy train for the
rest of corporate America.
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