> Wouldn't you call two new offices that are smaller than the headquarters "satellite offices"?
Not quite.
Amazon has satellite offices, that employ an order of magnitude fewer employees.
At 25k/branch, the term "regional headquarters" can be considered justified.
They did game the system though. Feels like they negotiated tax benefits with 50k employees in mind, and kept the same benefits while only giving locations 25k each.
This is good for tech in the east coast. Fin-tech firms WILL HAVE TO compete against Amazon for (supposed) west coast wages, and could help build a much stronger tech industry than NYC has atm.
Cornell tech much be so happy with their choice to open office on Roosevelt island.
I can see them being the biggest winners out of this whole set of events. NYU is probably also happy, having acquired NYU poly a few years ago.
> Fin-tech firms WILL HAVE TO compete against Amazon for (supposed) west coast wages, and could help build a much stronger tech industry than NYC has atm.
Those fin-tech companies almost certainly pay more than Amazon already. IIRC amazon has a cap of 275k for base pay, which means even if you're James Gosling that's the most you're getting, the rest has to come from RSUs which amazon also has a terrible vesting structure for. Amazon is regarded as a top-tier tech company, but their pay is not on par with any of the other companies (Google, FB, Uber, etc).
More tech presence is good, but I don't think big name companies are going to be too worried about their employees leaving to get paid less and have fewer benefits.
Very true. It's amusing to see people talk about "west coast wages" comparing favorably to wages in NYC.
The reason top tech generally kept out of NYC until recently is that they had trouble competing against investment bank salaries.
This only changed as top tech (especially FAANG) comp increased to catch up.
The less charitable interpretation is that top tech found itself compelled to pay more and more due to the talent crunch, until after all the increases it finally caught up with average NYC pay. Now, since it already pays at NYC-competitive levels, it might as well open offices in NYC and enjoy the talent pool there.
I am not sure if I agree with you on wage distributions.
Sure, Google and FB pay more and so do top investment banks / hedge funds in math/stat/algo positions . However, those simply are not the bulk of fintech employees.
The majority of fintech SDEs at GS,Morgan,etc. are working on software engineering and maintenance work. These roles pay closer to the $100k number than Amazon's quoted $150k. At least for new hires.
Pretty much this and fintech isn't this one thing that pays well but ranges from highly paid domain experts to generalists working on maintaining legacy systems. most generalists are not usually paid that well by SV big tech standards and the work environment is generally not as great. Amazon is more than competitive enough against the bulk of software engineering roles even at top investment banks and you will see lots of ex-top-IB engineers already working in their NYC office.
You don't understand Amazon's pay model completely. They have a backloaded vesting structure of RSUs, sure, but Amazon also provides a cash 'signing bonus' that vests monthly over years 1 and 2 in an amount that gives approximately the same total expected yearly comp for the first 4 years (same as calculated at time of grant; subject to change with stock movement).
My Amazon comp has been more than competitive with FB, Uber, Google.
That's very surprising that their base pay cap in Seattle is only $160k. I know several people, who aren't very senior, that are pretty close to that cap at Amazon.
If Amazon milked these cities to get the most value out of them, then they aren't going to dole out the red carpet with "west coast wages" for their new employees out of benevolence. I'm being cynical, but Amazon accumulated a wealth of data on cost of living, workforce statistics, and real estate to know how to play the HR game so what they pay their employees will always work out in Amazon's favor.
They did game the system though. Feels like they negotiated tax benefits with 50k employees in mind, and kept the same benefits while only giving locations 25k each.
If that's what happened, that's poor negotiation by the cities. If they made an offer based on employee counts, they could have required employee targets in return for the benefits being offered.
And if Amazon refuses to make firm employee count guarantees in return for the benefits being offered, then that's a pretty strong signal that you shouldn't rely on their promises.
The agreements do come with requirements around number of jobs created. Where Amazon played the system is in understanding how these deals get done.
If you have your politicians pitching the public on this huge 50k jobs deal, then they’re going to accept fewer jobs in the end rather than lose out altogether. Once a city commits itself to being in the Amazon race, losing is a huge political liability. Cities lose all leverage.
But paying a company $10,000 in benefits per employee for 1,000 jobs may not be as valuable to the community than paying $10,000 per employee for 20,000 jobs.
> Fin-tech firms WILL HAVE TO compete against Amazon for (supposed) west coast wages
I think you have that backwards. When I worked for Netflix I got an offer from a fin-tech firm that was double my already top of market Netflix salary. I chose to stay at Netflix because the fin-tech work sounded utterly soul crushing (and the work at Netflix was still great) and my wife didn't want to move to NYC. But had I taken it I would have made a lot more than any job here on the west coast.
> This is good for tech in the east coast. Fin-tech firms WILL HAVE TO compete against Amazon for (supposed) west coast wages, and could help build a much stronger tech industry than NYC has atm.
Amazon will represent a tiny portion of NYC's tech industry. Just a drop in the bucket. It won't move the dial much. Also fin-tech firms already compete with tech companies and they pay very well ( better than amazon ).
> Cornell tech much be so happy with their choice to open office on Roosevelt island. I can see them being the biggest winners out of this whole set of events. NYU is probably also happy, having acquired NYU poly a few years ago.
Neither cornell nor NYU needs amazon. It won't make a difference. The biggest winner will be amazon as they gain more political influence. That's what this move is about after all. Political influence in the two most important political centers of the US and the world.
Not quite.
Amazon has satellite offices, that employ an order of magnitude fewer employees.
At 25k/branch, the term "regional headquarters" can be considered justified.
They did game the system though. Feels like they negotiated tax benefits with 50k employees in mind, and kept the same benefits while only giving locations 25k each.
This is good for tech in the east coast. Fin-tech firms WILL HAVE TO compete against Amazon for (supposed) west coast wages, and could help build a much stronger tech industry than NYC has atm.
Cornell tech much be so happy with their choice to open office on Roosevelt island. I can see them being the biggest winners out of this whole set of events. NYU is probably also happy, having acquired NYU poly a few years ago.