Thursday, October 19, 2017

AMAZON HQ2

Amazon has it backwards. 

The people Amazon needs want to live in Santa Cruz, Santa Barbra, San Diego.  The people HQ2 is going to attract will be those willing to settle for Austin, Atlanta, Charlotte.  There is not a thing wrong with Austin. Atlanta, Charlotte.  Thing is Google is willing to gamble that settling for second tier candidates will be offset by the for now lower costs versus QoL equation.  My guess is that the challenges to Amazon will emerge from Santa Cruz, Santa Barbra, San Diego.

Nota bene.  California still innovates but you can expect the innovators to leave ever sooner.  Incubators not revenue sources. 

32 comments:

EngineerJim said...

Note that there are no California cities in the top 10 places to do business. So I guess CA wasn't even in the running for Amazon HQ2.

Unknown said...

amazon has a huge hub 30 min south of austin. there are tons of radio ads for Amazon careers.

Encinitas Undercover said...

Disagree. Calif anti-business policies outweigh the beaches drawing top talent.

Even home-grown companies like Schwab are moving their headcount out of state and keeping only wealthy upper management here.

LBD said...

Every business has to consider cost of living and Kali has to have priced themselves out. With communications now day you can work almost anywhere.

Rob Dawg said...

Herewith. Wow, I got to use the word herewith.

Herewith is a recent slightly redacted text I sent to a local political leader.

Looks like Austin TX. No matter what the rationales are claimed it comes down to no income tax and cheap houses and a big airport.

$350k nice houses and no income tax is a tough barrier to justifying [SoCal] City.

sm_landlord said...

I heard that Oxnard was going to put in a bid.

I had to laugh - the two local airports have so many flight restrictions that you can't easily get in and out by air - that is, unless you're The Cowboys and are allowed to use the airfield at the Naval Air Station.

Then of course there's the high taxes, high housing prices, and on and on.

Lawyerliz said...

What is Cali spending it All on

Lawyerliz said...

Well Kelly thinKS women should be respected, an the aren't now, see news. 40 years ago they weren't. hahaha. I lived ths previous 30 years and I can tell you it was worse, just not reported on, except rape. Now the glass ceiling is higher etc ect. Kelly Isn't a bad guy, just clueless.

Lawyerliz said...

I've been told Austin is very nice too.

Lawyerliz said...

Are the fires still burning?

LBD said...

Good Morning!

I see weekly hours worked haven't improved while I was on Vacation. No wage pressure.

Lawyerliz said...

K
I read one of the Feds was reporting everything was just peachy keen, everything improving.

Rob Dawg said...

California wastes money in unbelievable ways. Billions on road projects that should be tens of millions. The insane high speed rail project. Generous benefits. And corruption.

Lawyerliz said...

The spillway has gone way up, I read.

Rob Dawg said...

Kiewit, the Nebraska-based construction firm that has the main contract to rebuild the main spillway and emergency spillway at Oroville, the nation’s tallest dam, estimated in its winning bid in April that the work would cost at least $275 million. But the price tag has now grown to at least $500 million, said Erin Mellon, a spokeswoman for the Department of Water Resources.

Rob Dawg said...

The dam is part of the California State Water Project the entire thing was budgeted $1.75 billion in 1960 dollars. Roughly $15b today. I'd estimate the Oroville project was about $1.2b in today dollars. Makes the $400m and growing repair price suspicious.

Lawyerliz said...

Don't understand your numbers.

Lawyerliz said...

What do you think of Trump's tax proposals?

Encinitas Undercover said...

Lawyerliz 5:19,

Welfare and government pensions.

Lawyerliz said...

A mere billion dollars of insured losses for fires?

Lawyerliz said...

20 to 40 billion seems too high for Florida. Which is an estimate.

Lawyerliz said...

Harvy caused 19b $, oincluding flood insurance. Of course a lot of people did not have flood insurance.

Rob Dawg said...

The entire CSWP was budgeted $1,75b in 1960. Roughly $15b in 2016 dollars. The Oroville dam was a small portion of the huge statewide long list of civil engineering projects. My guess would be a bit less than 10% or $1.2b in current dollars. If the entire thing including building a railway, drilling monster tunnels and the largest ever underground power station were that much the original spillway was probably a rounding error. That makes me suspicious that $400m and growing repair price is substantially padded.

Lawyerliz said...

So you are looking at 40 to 60 billion dollars, not including infrastructure losses. Since this stuff operates on the margin, I expect the rebuilding to occur over the next
2 years or so, and economy to prosper as a result.

Lawyerliz said...

Ahhhh.

Lawyerliz said...

And another 40 b or so for P R

Cinco-X said...

A million here, a million there, and pretty soon it adds up to REAL money...

Lawyerliz said...

This means nothing important can be built.

LBD said...

Place your bid and collect for the bribes. Part of the current construction is temporary for the next run off, then tear it up and finish it. Sadly a lot of waste but it needs to be done or risk destroying the progress already made.

LBD said...

Opps. Kiewit is a Nebraska co. and talking about the Oroville dam.

Rob Dawg said...

Kiewit is well known in CA for having an inside track on juicy projects.

New post. Tell your friends. This sweet deal won't last.

Lawyerliz said...

Whatt?