Definitely true, but Amazon has bigger issues asides from beef with city council that forced HQ2 and expansion outside of Seattle.

I would say most of it was ability to continue to recruit tech talent, their reputation is essentially a "bottom of the barrel" tech company, a great place to join if you can't get into a better shop.

Amazon has completely saturated the Seattle market, due to the fact that everyone here has worked there once (and used them as a stepping stone to a better company) or would prefer not to touch them with a 10 ft pole, so they kind of had their hand forced and had to expand elsewhere.

>My comment was about the strategy behind the purchase of a building, not mass agglomeration,

One way Google attracts talent by building nice offices and providing perks that their competitors don't, such as an office with a fully operating kitchen providing free meals, daycare, meditation areas, arcades, etc. They're not going to invest this much into a rental, because that would move all the leverage to the landlord to jack up the rent come renewal.

Would you spend $50,000 renovating the backyard of a house you rent? probably not.

>though I do think your simplistic description does not align with the complex reality of what actually happened, and why, in tech hubs over the last decade.

It's easy to be critical, but you haven't offered any insight as to what actually happened.

If what I said wasn't true, why would Google buy a building in Seattle and not in Alabama? If there is a cluster of talent, it's easier for them to open a building there rather than expecting people to move to you. That is why Amazon is also expanding in Bellevue to poach Microsoft talent, because Microsoft employees refuse to drive over the bridge.

I think what top tech workers actually prefer is a culture where they can decide to come in when they please, rather than being mandated to come in 3 days a week.

I’ve worked in several big tech companies, not many people are leaving to go to a remote place because you’ll lose a ton of leverage and pay with COL adjustments.

It’s not that complicated… there is still a shortage of talented tech workers. Google isn’t looking for your typical college grad, they’re looking for the best of the best to work on very large scale and complex issues.

The engineers they need already work in big tech. The easiest way to steal them is to open an office right next to their current office, so they opened a location in Seattle since Amazon, Microsoft, Meta and others are there.

It’s similar to when Burger King wants to open a new location, they’ll just find the nearest McDonalds and put it across the street.