The 1 Hot Take You Should Read About Amazon HQ2

Barry Ritholtz is one of my favorite practitioners and thought leaders on the subject of wealth management. This week he wrote a Twitter thread which provides the most cogent, funny and concise commentary on what really happened with AMZN’s plans to build in LIC.

Some key takeaways from Barry's post:

1. AMZN is a great company that delivers value for consumers across many services & Jeff Bezos has achieved amazing things in his 20+ years as an entrepreneur.

2. But…People are rankled when a city and state government with limited resources (see my Tweets on the MTA) gives the 2nd most valuable company on Earth a $3B subsidy.

3. Because…AMZN already doesn’t pay Federal taxes.

4. And…others in AMZN’s cohort (APPL, GOOGL) expanded to NY without demanding incentives.

5. Finally…asking the government to subsidize your business is (arguably) Socialism.

Whether or not you agree with Barry, what is clear is that we are just at the start of a very complex discussion over how public money is used to support the private sector.