I don't think driving business away from the parish is ever a good idea. But let's face it, the location of major business developments in the US has been as much a means of squeezing tax breaks out of local authorities for companies that didn't need help, so they would set up in places where they would have gone anyway. Does New York really need more jobs? More than Louisiana?
I don't doubt it. But if you're going to issue a tax break to a multi-national (paid for by the community), why not issue it where it will do some good for the community?
NYC hardly needs more job slots or more people. There are so many other places in this country which could be transformed by a major corporate investment. The article mentioned something about Nashville in addition to DC? Good for them.
Is Amazon a huge soul crushing conglomerate that's taking over the world? Yeah. Are they going away? No. Only getting bigger. Walmart did it to local brick and mortar forever - and now Amazon's doing it to Walmart forever. What's unique about this is that you really can blame it on the politicians and a particular political party. In fact, Amazon specifically stated political opposition as the reason for scrapping their New York plans. Kudos to them for being specific. And now Queens doesn't have to worry about gentrification any more. Because it's all about identity. I count at least $2.84B in public money spent on sports stadiums in the State on New York in the past decade (New York Times). And those stadiums are exempted from annual property taxes and they sure as hell don't support 20,000 good paying full time employment middle class jobs. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/11/nyregion/stadiums-arenas-funding-nyc.html The States of Virginia and Tennessee were certainly willing to offer competitive tax packages. Look, tax incentives are a necessary price of admission for any big company expanding and building. Every State is going to aggressively pursue companies and offer incentives. The idea is that the income the state gives up in property taxes and incentives they recover in employee income taxes and associated construction and various services and maintenance revenues to local businesses that are necessary to support a huge facility with 20K workers. Louisiana versus New York worker quality is really beside the point. This is mostly about shipping and handling packages. The minor part about marketing and software development and business expansion and website platforms takes place on a smaller scale and on a campus setting - Amazon already announced those tech campus expansions in Nashville and Northern Virginia last fall. FedEx has their major handling hub out of Memphis, Tennessee. UPS has their major handling hub out of Atlanta, Georgia. DHL has their major handling hub out of Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky. That's logistics, IT, flights, airplane maintenance, and of course package handling/routing.
Nashville has been killing it. Goldman Sachs is building there and UBS is expanding there. Middle Tennessee has a thriving automotive sector. Great roads, no State budget or pension financial crisis, and no State income tax.
NYC has a huge talent pool because talented people flock there for opportunity. Create opportunity elsewhere and they will come.
New York ranks #1 in exodus to other states. https://www.bizjournals.com/newyork...-ranks-no-1-in-losing-residents-to-other.html