[bhupy]

> Having money to hire lobbyists lets people influence legislation to their benefit.

Sure, but ultimately the legislators are accountable to the voters, not the lobbyists. Most voters elect the candidate they think is most likely to represent their interests. Sometimes lobbyists influence legislators in ways that align with the interests of the legislator’s constituents, which is a feature and not a bug. When lobbyists influence legislators in ways that contradict with the interests of the legislator’s constituents, the incumbent is unseated — this isn’t uncommon.

> Big businesses can demand larger tax breaks by playing cities off each other

1. Competition among cities is what allows us to get the lowest possible tax for the highest amount of benefit. This doesn’t just happen with businesses, this also happens with individual taxpayers. This is why cities and states hesitate to raise taxes lest their citizens flee to lower tax states. Switzerland operates in the same way, where Cantons compete with one another. The net result is that the Swiss enjoy some of the lowest tax rates in the developed world, while maintaining one of the highest standards of living. This downward pressure on tax increases is a feature, not a bug.

2. Your own example is a bit of a contradiction, because Amazon ultimately failed to receive the tax break it wanted, since Queens/NYC “prevailed”

[triceratops]

Yeah...no. Most voters are not paying to the nitty-gritty of legislation that their representative votes on. Representatives rarely ever read the full text of the bills they vote on. It's a stretch to say voters do so, let alone use that info to inform their votes. As you said, these are partisan times and voters mostly just vote for "their guy" (or gal).

In the case of Amazon, they failed to receive the tax break they wanted from one locality, after protests. They still got it from the Virginia location and they found out what other cities were willing to offer them. More importantly, because of their size they were able to make demands that smaller businesses could not - so it's not like all businesses benefit from these lower taxes. And dozens of stories like this play out nationwide every year, without much coverage. This is standard operating procedure when Walmart opens a new location.

[bhupy]

> Most voters are not paying to the nitty-gritty of legislation that their representative votes on.

Sure, nobody suggested that they were. Voters pay attention to the high-level policy platforms of their representatives.

> As you said, these are partisan times and voters mostly just vote for "their guy" (or gal).

Yes, and "their guy (or gal)" are not arbitrarily chosen. The average voter chooses their representatives based on whether they think the representative is advancing the causes they care most about, or fighting against the causes they most disagree with.

> They still got it from the Virginia location and they found out what other cities were willing to offer them.

Sure, and that's what the residents/voters of Virginia sought out — local economic surplus.

> More importantly, because of their size they were able to make demands that smaller businesses could not - so it's not like all businesses benefit from these lower taxes.

This isn't necessarily true. Amazon, utilizes its economies of scale just like any other comparable institution. Unions can make demands that individual employees cannot, large nations can make demands that smaller nations cannot, Medicare might be able to make demands that smaller insurers cannot, etc etc. Most relevantly, small businesses themselves form industry associations that exert political force. And unlike power consolidation in labor unions or state actors, corporate consolidation is typically earned — people voluntarily engage with Amazon because it provides goods & services cheaply and reliably.

> And dozens of stories like this play out nationwide every year, without much coverage. This is standard operating procedure when Walmart opens a new location.

No they don't, this isn't even a falsifiable argument.

[triceratops]

> No they don't, this isn't even a falsifiable argument.

I mean this is pretty common knowledge re: Walmart, I'm amazed you're even arguing about. But here you go:

"While it was not feasible to contact local officials in all 3,000-plus communities in which Wal-Mart’s U.S. stores are located to find other subsidy deals, we did take this approach for all of the company’s distribution centers that are in operation or are being developed. We found that 84 of the 91 centers have received subsidies totaling at least $624 million. The deals, most of which involved a variety of subsidies, ranged as high as $48 million, with an average of about $7.4 million. As with the stores, a considerable amount of information on the size of the subsidies is not available, so the real total is certainly much higher."[1]

https://www.goodjobsfirst.org/sites/default/files/docs/pdf/w...

[bhupy]

That’s not the unfalsifiable argument. We’d already addressed Amazon and Wal-Mart. 2 of the 500+ billion dollar corporations that contribute to “inequality” as a nebulous problem.

Outside of that, you said:

> And dozens of stories like this play out nationwide every year, without much coverage

You’re arguing that there are “dozens of other stories like this” but that it’s apparently so commonplace, there’s no reporting on it. This is literally unfalsifiable, and more or less hogwash.

[triceratops]

Walmart alone opens dozens of new stores every year. Each one is a local story that doesn't get much coverage outside that locality. There are multiple chain stores just in the US. Boom, I just proved the "dozens of stories" part of my claim. :-P

Chain stores aren't the only kinds of businesses that lobby for tax breaks and subsidies. Sports teams are another example. And these are just the industries that get coverage.