Amazon recently announced that it would be splitting up its new headquarters between the states of New York and Virginia, despite the fact that D.C. government officials lobbied the company with more than $1 billion in offered incentives to base the new investment in the nation’s capital.
The culmination of a political battle over access to public records has revealed that D.C. was willing to pony up more than $1 billion for the alluring new corporate headquarters, and even offered flash permits in an effort to secure the deal.
In what was almost certainly the largest sum ever offered to a private company in an effort to win local jobs, D.C.
was willing to provide the equivalent of some $1.053 billion through discounted property and taxes to Amazon. The lofty figure still fell short of the colossal sums offered to Amazon by other localities vying for the headline-grabbing investment, however.
Bids from many cities
The state of Maryland was prepared to offer nearly $9 billion to Amazon in an effort to secure the new headquarters, for instance. According to the Baltimore Sun, billions in infrastructure agreements still wasn’t enough to lure in Jeff Bezos’ mammoth internet empire, which is rapidly becoming one of the most well-recognized companies in the world.
The city’s broad incentive package to lure in Amazon workers included a tax credit for every new employee that Amazon would have hired.
Not all of the information behind the deal is yet publicly available, and now that Amazon has decided to opt elsewhere D.C.’s true lobbying efforts may never be fully understood.
Four locations shortlisted
The vast majority of those bidding for Amazon’s new headquarters did so discreetly and privately, as reporting from WAMU notes, in an effort to remain competitive.
The city’s effort to lure in Amazon was eventually branded SEO Washington, with more than four proposed locations having been offered to Amazon for its additional headquarters.
The tax incentives Amazon would have enjoyed in D.C. would have been spread out over the course of the next two decades, with the company potential reaping up to $1.053 billion through 2034.
Amazon’s ultimate decision to split its new headquarters between Virginia and New York was predominately driven by the desire to have access to a well-educated workforce and the geographic proximity to political power that those two cities enjoy, claims the editorial board of USA Today.
