<story><title>Google Plans Large New York City Expansion</title><url>https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-plans-large-new-york-city-expansion-1541636579</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>taurath</author><text>This coupled with the Amazon news is starting to get distressing. With the amount of companies that copycat them it’s like the rich are getting richer and the economic benefits are still going to be concentrated only in the most affluent cities. The rest of the country desperately needs real industry and good paying jobs - and will go to huge lengths to try to get them but it appears nobody can come up with a business plan. We’re truly heading for Elysium.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>TulliusCicero</author><text>&amp;gt; The rest of the country desperately needs real industry and good paying jobs - and will go to huge lengths to try to get them&lt;p&gt;No they don&amp;#x27;t. Tax breaks aren&amp;#x27;t enough. One of the big reasons a lot of people really like NYC is that it&amp;#x27;s one of the few cities in the US that actually feels like a city. NYC is urbanist in a way that relatively few American cities are (and most of the other cities in this category are also big economic winners, like SF and Boston).&lt;p&gt;How many of those more conservative&amp;#x2F;cheaper US cities actually take walking&amp;#x2F;biking&amp;#x2F;transit over driving as a serious issue? Virtually none of them that I&amp;#x27;ve seen, they put in token efforts at best; an unprotected bike lane here, a &amp;quot;technically counts as transit&amp;quot; bus stop there, but very little that really moves the needle or challenges the status quo.&lt;p&gt;Name one of these cities, and I&amp;#x27;ll show you how they&amp;#x27;re failing miserably on at least this front just by a quick look at Google Maps.</text></comment>
<story><title>Google Plans Large New York City Expansion</title><url>https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-plans-large-new-york-city-expansion-1541636579</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>taurath</author><text>This coupled with the Amazon news is starting to get distressing. With the amount of companies that copycat them it’s like the rich are getting richer and the economic benefits are still going to be concentrated only in the most affluent cities. The rest of the country desperately needs real industry and good paying jobs - and will go to huge lengths to try to get them but it appears nobody can come up with a business plan. We’re truly heading for Elysium.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>umeshunni</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s a classic chicken and egg problem.&lt;p&gt;Companies don&amp;#x27;t want to establish new offices in cities where they cannot attract new talent or there isn&amp;#x27;t a large existing base of talent. This limits large new offices to large metro areas (5M+ people)&lt;p&gt;People don&amp;#x27;t want to relocate to cities where there aren&amp;#x27;t multiple job possibilities - you lose your job&amp;#x2F;hate it and don&amp;#x27;t want to have to relocate to find a new job or you want to move but your spouse can&amp;#x27;t find a job there because their industry isn&amp;#x27;t well represented there.&lt;p&gt;This leads to a reinforcement cycle where new jobs are created in a city, people flock there, found the next generation of companies, new jobs, more people fleeing less attractive cities and so on...&lt;p&gt;Things that can happen that could break this cycle include - new industries emerging (like tech in the 90s), poor governance, infrastructure in an area forcing companies to find alternatives (like bay area right now), new skills coming into demand and companies establishing offices to take advantage of that (e.g. Pittsburg emerging as an AI hub, Seattle for &amp;#x27;cloud&amp;#x27; skills etc)</text></comment>