Amazon: Corny Capitalism on Parade

[Pilot1]

Amazon has a fiduciary duty to maximize shareholder wealth. If states and cities want to bid against each other for jobs, then Amazon has a legal obligation to extract the best deal possible.

Capitalism 101.

Hate game, not the player.

I think that is what most of us are saying. I have no problem with a company trying to get the best deal. I do question the huge cost versus a lot of often NEBULUS benefits, but it is up to that jurisdiction, and their political leadership to make that decision. Politicians like to make splashes, and this certainly accomplishes that. Whether or not it is a long term net economic positive is another story.

 

[BlackFlag]

Total hypocrisy. I have no problem with a private company working government to competitively get what they want. Who knows if the job creation, and economic benefits Amazon brings will outweigh the cost to the TAXPAYER. We are all subsidizing Amazon, but that's the way it works today. Look at sports stadiums. Same deal for the franchise.

When Trump did it, his supporters cheered.

Carrier Announces Deal with Donald Trump to Keep Jobs in Indiana

And then the jobs left anyways, while Amazon is creating new ones.

 

[Pilot1]

Jobs are always coming, and going. That is the nature of the economy. We tend to only focus on the ones going away. At least this is a job creation story, not a loss.

 

[Oddball]

Access to software talent.

Software people don’t want to live in Akron and Detroit.

But Amazon did what many large corporations do. Corporations play off jurisdictions against each other all the time. Amazon was just really high profile about it.

I'm sure the access to politicians had nothing at all to do with it, huh?

And I know this is how crony capitalism works...It's just odd that the usual suspects who complain about all the jabbering point issues in the OP suddenly fall silent, when it's the players on their team playing the game.

 

[Oddball]

Total hypocrisy. I have no problem with a private company working government to competitively get what they want. Who knows if the job creation, and economic benefits Amazon brings will outweigh the cost to the TAXPAYER. We are all subsidizing Amazon, but that's the way it works today. Look at sports stadiums. Same deal for the franchise.

When Trump did it, his supporters cheered.

Carrier Announces Deal with Donald Trump to Keep Jobs in Indiana

I didn't....Crony capitalism sucks.

 

[Oddball]

The only thing we can do if we are against these very profitable corps getting taxpayer subsidies is to make it known to our state, and local representatives we don't see the Cost/Benefit outcome as positive. Of course they can cook the books, and show us all kinds of Pro Formas with projections justifying this stuff, but I doubt it ever is even a wash. I may be wrong though.

The politicians see the cost/benefit outcome....It costs them ZERO (because they're buying corporate favor with YOUR money), and they get corporate kickbacks (er DONATIONS, yeah that's the ticket) in return.

 

[Oddball]

I don't get the Amazon love.

Oh geez, the guy that works with me has Alexa. Yeah..I can fuck Alexa all kinds of up. ;x

Alexa can't handle me, baby.

Bezos is a bazillionaire who supports democrats, just like Buffett, Gates, etcetera.......All you need to know.

 

[Pilot1]

The politicians see the cost/benefit outcome....It costs them ZERO (because they're buying corporate favor with YOUR money), and they get corporate kickbacks (er DONATIONS, yeah that's the ticket) in return.

So basically you're saying the politicians are telling us, "Have a little faith baby, have a little faith."

 

[Eric Arthur Blair]

I don't get the Amazon love.

Oh geez, the guy that works with me has Alexa. Yeah..I can fuck Alexa all kinds of up. ;x

Alexa can't handle me, baby.

Bezos is a bazillionaire who supports democrats, just like Buffett, Gates, etcetera.......All you need to know.

They didn't get to be so rich throwing their money away. They know who will play the crony capitalist game with them.

 

[RoshawnMarkwees]

The irony of this is that Amazon just helped the socialist wing of the Democratic Party. Already the newly elected socialist woman whose name I keep forgetting is raging on about what a joke this is, talking about why this money should be spent on subways and infrastructure for New Yorkers. As much as I despise socialism, on this issue she is right. Bezos is worth over $100B dollars personally, the corporation much more, and taxpayers have to pay him for jobs that primarily sell cheap, useless Chinese products?

Going against Amazon right now is politically popular.

Amazon has a fiduciary duty to maximize shareholder wealth. If states and cities want to bid against each other for jobs, then Amazon has a legal obligation to extract the best deal possible.

Capitalism 101.

Hate the game, not the player.

But the shareholders are subsidizing their own dividends.

 

[Oddball]

Jobs are always coming, and going. That is the nature of the economy. We tend to only focus on the ones going away. At least this is a job creation story, not a loss.

And how do you feel about taxpayers subsidizing those jobs to the tune of over 50K per job?