Why New York and Virginia were right to gamble on Amazon

Even NYC could use 25,000 new jobs

The Statue of Liberty.
(Image credit: Illustrated | Friday909/iStock, Madiz/iStock, Screenshot/Amazon)

As Amazon boss and founder Jeff Bezos has put it, "In the end, we are our choices." And neither New York nor Virginia should already regret their gamble to pull out the financial stops to attract the retail and cloud computing giant's second and third headquarters. They should enjoy the win and celebrate the 25,000 jobs headed to each.

Of course, there is no guarantee the bet will pay off over the longer term. And the short-term impact surely means tighter housing and worse traffic. Citizens in both places should ask hard questions about whether officials overbid, especially given Amazon splitting HQ2. Still, the potential opportunity to firmly anchor and expand positions as technology and entrepreneurial hubs was probably too good to pass up.

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James Pethokoukis

James Pethokoukis is the DeWitt Wallace Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute where he runs the AEIdeas blog. He has also written for The New York Times, National Review, Commentary, The Weekly Standard, and other places.