
Amazon’s pricing tactic is a trap for buyers and sellers alike - DanBC
https://www.ft.com/content/86426be2-ad1f-11e8-94bd-cba20d67390c
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neonate
[http://archive.is/PYB4g](http://archive.is/PYB4g)

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Fred27
Thanks.

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winningcontinue
most shocking part is the NDAs with cities for the HQ2 bids require local
governments adherence to dynamic pricing contracts. For one CA school
district, that system would make them pay 12% more. So on top of the big and
extended tax breaks cities have to give to win over Amazon, along with the
exceptions to zoning restrictions that most builders have to adhere to, that's
not enough. They also have to buy from amazon at inflated prices. Not a bad
deal, if you're Amazon.

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dvfjsdhgfv
My general thought on this: why allow tax reductions for giants like Amazon at
all?

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whb07
Because how else can a city compete? Look at the number of Caribbean islands
which are known to be “tax havens”. Besides offering virgin beaches and piña
coladas (which other places can also offer), they can also advertise favorable
taxes and rule of law to lure foreign capital in.

tldr: “better to have a smaller % of something than 100% of nothing”.

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dvfjsdhgfv
Would Amazon really risk offshoring HQ2 to the Caribbean? I doubt it. And if
tax reductions are disallowed, the cities have to "compete" on other metrics.
Otherwise we'll soon hear that cities pay Amazon to pick them up.

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whb07
I never said Amazon would be considering a Caribbean island as a potential
candidate. I think you missed my general point.

What does a company do when trying to gain your business? They can compete on
price or quality/service. In this case the local city governments are
competing in price, especially those that cannot offer the education like that
of Boston for example.

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ikeboy
This article is dumb.

1\. mentions it being a trap for sellers - doesn't even mention sellers at all
throughout the article or ever elaborate

2\. never even says what the "pricing tactic" is

3\. somehow shoehorns Sanders complaining about worker wages into it

There's no coherent narrative, analogies that aren't compelling or fleshed
out.

Should have been a tweet, not an article.

