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Comment by __float | Hacker News Reader

Has anyone seen specifics on how they'll be held accountable? They've made promises for x jobs with $y average salaries, but if they don't meet that, then what?

https://ny.curbed.com/2018/11/16/18098589/amazon-hq2-nyc-que... suggests that nearly $1.3 billion is not tied to any amount of job creation at all.

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The NYC REAP is per employee[0]. Zero employees, zero dollars. ICAP is property tax abatement and requires spending 30-40% of the assessed value of the property[1]. Long Island City might be cheap in terms of NYC real estate, but it’s not particularly cheap overall. I can’t imagine they won’t spend more than the ICAP portion.

[0]https://www1.nyc.gov/site/finance/benefits/business-reap.pag... [1]https://www1.nyc.gov/site/finance/benefits/benefits-industri...

That article is an example of people not understanding what this deal is. Amazon is not receiving $3B in public dollars, they are receiving $3B in tax breaks. They are shifting a small % of that via PILOT and some other funding Amazon has agreed to.

I don't understand how people think this is in any way a bad deal for NY.

Tax breaks have a value, some might even say a cost.

There is no agency, governmental or private, in existence that subsequently measures or keeps tracks of these "job creation" promises. And in the very unlikely event that their broken promises do come to light, it will be explained away in the usual manner as to deflect (e.g. circumstances change, etc.). Just remember one thing: At the end of the day Amazon is a private enterprise and it can and will do whatever they want and are accountable to no one.

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