- Amazon is pausing a major expansion to its operations in Seattle after the city proposed taxing large employers $500 per employee.
- Amazon's hardball stance points to the danger of a city being too dependent on a single company, an issue Seattle and whatever city wins HQ2 will face in the coming decades.
- During a recent visit to Seattle's 'Amazonia' neighborhood, it became apparent just how radically the company has changed the city, for both better and worse.
Amazon is pausing a major expansion to its operations in Seattle due to a tax proposed by the city council that would charge large employers $500 per employee.
About 75% of the estimated $75 million in tax revenue would fund the construction of 1,800 affordable housing units with the rest going towards homeless services.
Seattle's median rent has jumped by three times as much as the national figure over the last decade, while the city has the third largest homeless population in the country, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Many have blamed soaring housing prices and the homeless issue on Amazon, which accounts for more than 45,000 jobs in the city and around 20% of Seattle's prime office real estate.
Drew Herdener, an Amazon spokesman, said on Wednesday that the tech giant will stop construction on a building downtown as well as reconsider occupying another building that is already under construction until the head tax issue is decided. A vote is expected on May 14.
Halting the expansion could put 7,000 jobs in jeopardy, according to The New York Times.
Amazon's hardball stance points to the precarious position that Seattle — and whatever city wins the competition for the company's new $5 billion headquarters dubbed HQ2— faces in the coming decades.
Amazon dominates Seattle, sprawling across downtown and upsetting locals with snarled traffic, soaring housing prices, never-ending construction, and accelerated gentrification. The city has seen an unprecedented economic surge, adding 220,000 jobs over the past decade.
But the surge has come at a cost. Amazon has the economic leverage to essentially dictate terms, a dynamic readily apparent in the company's search for a second headquarters.
I recently spent a day in the Seattle neighborhood locals call Amazonia to see how Amazon has affected the city.
In the '90s, Seattle's South Lake Union neighborhood was a mess of parking lots, warehouses, and industrial buildings. Amazon has transformed the neighborhood and its surrounding areas, Belltown and Denny Triangle. Each of those pins on the map is an Amazon office.
Amazon's offices are spread across more than 33 buildings throughout the area, though some say the number is closer to 40. The company leases 100,000 square feet of office space in this building, nicknamed Otter.
Source: SF Gate
It's hard to overstate how thoroughly Amazon dominates downtown. The company is up to occupying 8.1 million square feet of office space in Seattle, reports say. Day 1 Tower, opened in 2016, is one of two towers that form the heart of Amazon's campus.
Source: Geekwire, SF Gate, CNBC
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