It has had towns and cities across the country dancing to its tune.
So I saw the Amazon list. And what’s really interesting is that without my saying more, you know exactly what list I mean: The list of cities that are finalists for HQ2, the second Amazon.com Inc. headquarters that carries among its rewards 50,000 high-paying jobs and $5 billion in investment.
Amazon released the list last week. And, like lots of people who’ve taken a look, I was left underwhelmed. Because what immediately struck me is how conventional it is. Amazon has pretty much picked the same finalists that any company with an eye toward building a new headquarters would pick.
I mean, seriously. New York. Duh. Boston. General Electric (or what’s left of it) is already heading there. Washington, D.C., and its environs. Like they need more jobs and pricey real estate. Atlanta, Dallas and Raleigh. Where everybody else is moving.
Utterly conventional. Yet we’re all talking about it. And writing about it. And arguing about it. Amazon has accomplished an enormous act of public relations. Only Amazon could have turned the process into an extravaganza, full of millions of dollars’ worth of free publicity, as the news media cover the story with breathless anticipation.
Amazon, by publicly releasing its criteria, likely encouraged a significant investment from cities that might otherwise not have bothered. Beyond that, Amazon is Amazon. What local officials could resist the chance to lure one of the Big Four?
The publicity that will attach to landing HQ2 will be several orders of magnitude larger than landing a warehouse or fulfillment center. Just imagine being the mayor or governor who can go on television and say, over and over, “I brought Amazon here.” The prestige could make a political career.
But the process is humiliating. Victor Luckerson of The Ringer has mocked the quest for HQ2 as “Amazon’s megalomaniacal game show.” Maybe that’s a smidgen over the top. Still, one sees his point.
Amazon has towns and cities across the country dancing to its tune. The real game is musical chairs. And, as you may remember, each time the music stops there are fewer chairs left.
In grade school, the game’s fun. What I remember, though, is that there were some kids who always lost. Always. They were too slow, or too clumsy, or too easily distracted. The same kids, every time, were failing to find a seat in time.
In Amazon’s game, after all of that dancing and running around, the result is an entirely conventional list of cities. What’s wrong with that? Arguably nothing. In principle, Amazon should do what’s best for Amazon.
If HQ2 winds up in Boston, Dallas or Northern Virginia, well, that’s where companies are going these days. Decisions about headquarters investment tend to be guided by the decisions of peer companies, even when the peer companies are in different industries. When we cut past the hoopla, there’s no reason for Amazon to be different.
On the other hand, I find it a little surprising that there’s been no great outcry from the left about Amazon’s corporate responsibility in siting its second headquarters. Consider what the company could have done for income inequality by selecting Detroit or Hartford, Conn. An unfashionable city that rarely sees positive headlines would suddenly have become the hot new place for hip young professionals and the shopping, restaurants and housing that follow in their wake.
But no. The only even mildly unusual choice on the final list is Newark, N.J. Except that Newark isn’t unusual at all. The city’s gentrification is well underway, and (given the explosive growth of the New York metropolitan area) will likely rush onward, with or without Amazon.
By one estimate last week, the favorites to land HQ2 are now Atlanta, Boston and Washington. The rich, it seems, are likely to get richer.
Maybe it’s not Amazon’s job to help out the cities that are struggling. It’s sad, though, that a contemporary left that other times obsesses over inequality is content to let the same swift kids keep hogging the chairs.
Stephen L. Carter is a Bloomberg View columnist and a professor of law at Yale.