Amazon halted plans for two buildings in Seattle in response to a proposed tax that would cost the company about $22.5 million a year.
[ image description is a giant glass dome in front of a few tall buildings. ]
“It's the latest sign of a strained relationship between Seattle and Amazon, which employs around 45,000 people in the city. The company announced last year that it will open a second headquarters elsewhere, dubbed HQ2, that could eventually host 50,000 employees.
Amazon, the second most valuable company in the world, netted $3 billion last year. Seattle's proposed "head tax" would impose an approximately $500-per-employee fee on companies with annual revenue in the city of $20 million or more, costing Amazon about $22.5 million per year based on its 45,000 employees there.
That’s less than 1 percent of its annual profit. (Amazon is still threatening to leave nonetheless)
In 2021, the tax would change from a head tax to a 0.7 percent payroll tax, which the Seattle Timesestimates would cost Amazon $39 million a year, or slightly more than 1 percent of last year’s profit, assuming the company employs 50,000 people in Seattle by then.”
The new tax is supposed to fund housing for marginalized local citizens. The city's unsheltered population grew by 44 percent over the past two years to 5,500, according to a recent US Department of Housing and Urban Development report. That gives Seattle the third largest homeless population in the country.