It's a matter of principle. NYC (or any municipality) shouldn't be bending over for massive multinationals. It's a form of corruption, one that's depressingly widespread, and it's a race to the bottom that, from a 30,000 foot view, accomplishes nothing but screwing over the taxpayers and smaller competitors lacking the leverage for these antics, and benefiting the corporations that are already enormous and powerful.

I can’t believe you have to explain to people why corporatism is a bad thing. It underlies the largest problems in this country, and we should actively be protesting it.

It’s not corruption to reduce the required nonconsensual payment in your jurisdiction to attract new business.

The alternative, as is being demonstrated, is that you simply don’t get that business, and you lose out. x% of $0 is $0.

>to attract new business

No. Not "new business". "A" new business. It's a sweetheart deal for one company in particular subsidized by the taxpayers. They're not reducing their citywide tax rate to attract Amazon, they're just giving a handout directly to Amazon.

What you're describing is nothing close to the reality. It's the prisoner's dilemma. Cities that participate in this scheme take turns screwing each other over in an attempt to get a minor benefit themselves, but compared to the scenario where nobody played the game to begin with, they all lose.

This is not a zero sum game.

You're right - the Prisoner's Dilemma is a negative-sum game.

do you have a link to that data?

Here you go[0]. Some highlights:

1. $2.988 billion in state/city subsidies (so ~$48,000 per job)

2. The state estimated that Amazon will generate $27.5 billion in state and city revenue over 25 years, a 9:1 ratio of revenue to subsidies.

Using the numbers above, we can calculate that the state would break even in roughly 3 years if they're correct.

[0]https://ny.curbed.com/2018/11/16/18098589/amazon-hq2-nyc-que...

The subsidies themselves would have been given to Amazon over the course of several years. NY would be in the black after no more than a year.