In addition to it's two new headquarter locations in New York and Virginia, Amazon is also opening a Center of Excellence for its Operations business in Nashville, which will add 5,000 new jobs to the city.
Cari Wade Gervin comments on how Amazon's entry may impact the city in this article for Curbed:
“What many people don’t yet realize is that many—or maybe most—of these jobs won’t be filled by Nashville residents,” says Paulette Coleman, an activist with Nashville Organized for Action and Hope (NOAH). “And the very educated, higher-income residents of Nashville are not the ones who need jobs.” Coleman says she’s worried that the influx of high-salaried positions will further exacerbate the city’s shortage of affordable housing and points to the spiking rates of homelessness in tech hubs like San Francisco and Seattle.
“We need to look more holistically at the consequences,” Coleman says. James Fraser, a professor at the University of Minnesota who studies housing issues and lives part-time in Nashville, says the city already has a deficit of 35,000 units of low- to moderate-income housing. According to Zumper, Nashville is the 23rd most expensive rental market in the country, with an average rent of $1,330 for a one-bedroom apartment in October, a 12.7 percent increase from 2017.
“This cycle of gentrification continues to grow, and the city’s response does not match the scale of the problem,” Fraser says, predicting Amazon relocations will only make things worse. “In Nashville, 25 percent of renters pay half their income in rent, and 25 percent pay over 30 percent of their income. It’s going to hit a breaking point where the city becomes less competitive, because we’re talking about firefighters, teachers, police officers who can’t afford to live here.”
Continue reading at Curbed.
Read More
