Dallas is one of the top contenders for Amazon’s HQ2

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According to a report from The Wall Street Journal, Dallas is one of the top contenders for Amazon’s HQ2. 

In September 2017 Amazon announced that it is looking for a second home for its headquarters. Since the announcement, cities all over the country are in a fierce bidding war for the new headquarters. Currently, Dallas is one of the top contenders for Amazon’s HQ2.

Upon the announcement, Amazon laid out the type of city they are looking for based on specific criteria. Amazon wants a place with at least a million people, a diverse population, good schools, and flexible lawmakers. In addition, Amazon wants room for up to 50,000 workers. Last month Amazon announced that it received 238 proposals from cities across the U.S. The Wall Street Journal used Amazon’s criteria and ranked each city based on the factors of the company’s request for proposals. The factors include: tech labor force, fiscal health, cost of living, college population, culture fit, and state tax rank.

Based on the checklist of factors, Dallas is one of the top contenders for Amazon’s HQ2. The other top contenders, according to the report, are Boston and D.C. One of the factors that helps Dallas’ ranking is state income tax since Texas does not have state income tax. The absence of state income tax is appealing to Amazon. Dallas also ranked high in tech labor force and the cost of living. Of the three top candidates, Dallas scored the lowest in culture fit and fiscal health. Conversely, Boston scored highest in culture fit and fiscal health. D.C. scored highest in college population.

Amazon has a long checklist for their new headquarters. It will be interesting to see if Dallas continues to be one of the top candidates for Amazon’s HQ2 as their search continues further. Amazon hopes the new HQ2 will be ready by 2019.

Dallas’ ranking from The WSJ. 

Karley Kampf
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