Political and business leaders often say that conflict creates opportunities.
A few weeks ago, Andrew Cuomo and Bill de Blasio announced plans to give Amazon – one of the three most valuable companies in the world – over $2bn in taxpayer subsidies to locate a major operation in Queens.
The response to the deal, and resulting conflict, was fast and ferocious.
State senator Michael Gianaris, who represents the affected district, said: “Ideally [the deal] should be torn up and thrown in the garbage.”
Local residents, community groups and activists staged multiple rallies around the city, including near the proposed site, protesting against the decision.
Unions expressed deep concerns about offering massive tax subsidies to help a company accused of aggressive anti-union tactics set up shop in New York.
The newly elected member of Congress Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said her Queens constituents responded with outrage to the deal, and she expressed skepticism over the lack of progress offered on good healthcare, living wages and affordable rent.
You might forgive the mayor and the governor for being surprised at the ferocity of the backlash. Just a month earlier, a national survey showed that Amazon was the most trusted institution by Democrats. But perhaps by “trust” they meant “trust that the packages will arrive”, not “trust with the future of our lives”.
As it stands, the New York state legislature (of which one of us is a member) has the power to stop the proposed transaction, by vetoing a state grant of hundreds of millions of dollars, and momentum against the proposal is building. Amazon’s likely response is to try to sweeten the deal – a few million here and there, promising to build a park or a hospital – and the governor will probably do all he can to provide cover.
Some of the anger comes from the fact that it seems that Amazon would come to New York regardless of incentives, for the quality of the workforce, and to be near Wall Street and the media capital of the world.
But the electric response to the proposal also shows the depth of the growing resistance in our country to the madness of corporate welfare. Scamazon, as it is becoming known, has become a flash-point for people fed up with corruption – legal and illegal – and the abuses of corporate monopolies.
In New York, it didn’t help that the last four years have led to corruption convictions for the state’s so-called economic development maestros. Alain Kaloyeros, the architect of large deals such as the Buffalo Billion initiative, was recently convicted of bid-rigging. Joe Percoco, Governor Cuomo’s former closest aide, was found guilty of corruption charges – including bribery – involving two companies doing business with the state, and sentenced to six years in prison.
These incidents understandably cast a shadow on the large economic incentives and giveaways our state continues to offer large corporate entities. And Amazon has made no bones about its willingness to use power in every way it can to build more power –and pay fewer taxes. As the famed poet, writer and civil rights activist Maya Angelou once said, “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.”
It seems that Amazon didn’t just study Walmart – a company widely criticized for its mistreatment of workers – as it built its business model. It studied Tammany Hall; once it gets a foothold in a city’s politics, it does not like to let go. Take Seattle, its first home. After the city passed a corporate tax to address a growing homelessness crisis, Amazon engaged in old-fashioned brute politics, threatening to leave the town if it wasn’t repealed.
The opportunity is here to change the way we treat monopfolistic entities like Amazon, to stop rolling out the red carpet, and start taking tough but fair stances that prioritize everyday Americans. Do we have to political guts to do it?