Like giving more money already-highly-profitable companies?
> Taking all this into account, this seems like a super safe path to greater tax revenues, which will improve the city and state as a whole.
Well, like I said, I'll believe it when I see it. Your argument makes logical sense, it's just that your argument has been used to justify all kinds of spending in the past, and lo and behold, homelessness is increasing, schools are still underfunded, rents are more and more unaffordable, etc. If giving money to already-profitable companies works so well, then why are none of the problems I care about solved already, since we've been giving money to already-profitable companies for decades?
https://itep.org/amazon-in-its-prime-doubles-profits-pays-0-...
The net new revenue can be used by the city and state to pay for whatever services they deem fit (e.g. infrastructure, health, etc.).
> we've seen these kinds of wildly optimistic plans time and time again with companies promising tax revenues based on straightforward filing, and then using the wide variety of loopholes to (legally) avoid the projected taxes
The company is not promising tax revenues here. The city/state are. They are the ones who commissioned the economic analysis, and I am sure the findings informed their negotiations. The tax sources are not just Amazon either - it includes things like taxes from the additional jobs and businesses that will be created outside of Amazon.
> I don't really care to hear about ROIs.
The ROI is what matters, though. If you were a city that is looking to increase your budget to provide more services to your constituents, you might consider what sort of investment choices you could make to get there. The ROI here is well beyond any other conceivable option. It is so large that even if projections of a 9:1 ROI are way off, it would be a big win. To put it into context, the NY Film Tax Credit program had a 1.15:1 ROI but was still implemented. Also, most of the subsidy to Amazon is not an up-front lump sum. Rather, most of it takes the form of credits for prior actions.
Taking all this into account, this seems like a super safe path to greater tax revenues, which will improve the city and state as a whole.