TH3BUDDHA

Look at the Phoenix skyline

So do a lot of cities that are losing population.

I like the that Columbus grows slowly and steadily rather than becoming a boomtown. So many rises and falls around the country over the decades and Columbus was just sitting there quietly in the background always chugging along on its consistent upward trajectory.

We should just make Columbus not having an identity our identity. KEEP COLUMBUS IDENTITYLESS!

At least it's being built in phases over 10 years. In the article, the developer mentions this "allowing flexibility down the road." So, maybe the towers will come back depending on the office market in a few years.

If Harmony Tower happens, won't it be in there?

Personally, I have always thought that attendance lagged because we had a bad stadium in a weird part of town. When you drive by Crew Stadium on 71, it looks like a high school football stadium rather than a professional stadium. The only real appeal to the stadium was for people that were die hard fans. The stadium wasn't a particularly special experience on its own. I think that will change for the new stadium as casual fans will want to visit a cool stadium in the Arena District just for the experience even if they don't care about the team as much.

You're fighting a strawman here to try and counter my point that Ohio is getting a lot of investment. I never made any claims to any of the metrics you mentioned and that discussion on "benefiting citizens" is an entirely different one than the one we are having. That being said, if you look, Ohio has only just started to win the SiteSelection Governor's Cup. So, all of these metrics that you mentioned will lag behind several years of doing well with that as many of the projects aren't even complete yet. You won't just win that for one year and then instantly reverse decades of bad data. As we know, the census underestimated our population by 100k. Time will tell if that turns around even more. I'm personally expecting this decade to be very bright for Ohio based on projects coming online around the state. It's blatantly obvious there are many quality things happening around the state right now.

With all of the work on west campus, by the time this is built out, it might actually bisect campus pretty well.

As I said above, my main point is that, regardless of the reason for investment, Ohio is currently getting investment, and a decent amount of it. Ignoring the billboards in particular, I think the state and any organizations working towards getting that investment deserve a little credit even though people want to keep sh*tting on them for some reason. Something is working. That's my point.

Yes. If you look further up in this thread, you will see that Ohio is #1 in the country for corporate investment projects per capita and #2 behind only Texas in raw numbers of projects. This is according to SiteSelection and their criteria for a "project". If you look at the rest of the list near the top, it is filled with other states that are currently considered hot spots for population growth and business investment. I would also argue that the Forbes article that I posted is not really "anecdotal" as it is a national publication looking at things from a national standpoint over time.

Just for the record, I don't really care that much about the billboards in particular. It just happened to be the topic of discussion that led to this. I just think that JobsOhio, and Ohio in general, is getting a little more sh*t currently than they deserve. I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that the state is currently politically conservative and people automatically want to act like any conservative state is a desolate sh*thole that scares away businesses. We're getting a lot of good projects, and as a lifelong Ohioan, it makes me glad to see. I'll leave it as that as I know I can be argumentative and it rubs people the wrong way.

But, not every city, state, town is seeing the level of corporate investment that Ohio is. Maybe they should try billboards.

Well, I'm sure that you have done your due diligence and have done more market research than the marketing team putting millions into a national campaign. I'm sure all of these billions in corporate investment must be the result of Ohio's superior amenities rather than these kinds of efforts. I guess I'll take your word for it. So, I guess we're done here. Even though I know you've done your research, I think it's important to note that JobsOhio is not funded by tax dollars: https://www.jobsohio.com/about-jobsohio/about-us/understanding-jobsohios-funding/

Exactly! Seems like you'd want to advertise that you have an entire organization dedicated solely to making this process as smooth and painless as possible. You'd risk being passed up by some companies if you didn't.

See my most recent comments.

@DarkandStormyanother article from today: Biotech firm to build $365 million packaging plant in New Albany The company will hire technicians, engineers, managers and other positions to staff the plant. The facility is expected to have an annual payroll of around $41 million. The state tax credits are worth up to $15 million over the next 15 years, depending on how many jobs are created. The city of New Albany has granted other tax breaks, including a 100% property tax abatement for 15 years, for the project. Amgen Senior Vice President of Manufacturing Arleen Paulino said the company chose New Albany for its factory because of access to talented workers, "favorable operating costs," a centralized location for logistics and "the vibrant business climate." Full article: https://www.dispatch.com/story/business/2021/06/28/biotech-firm-amgen-employ-400-new-new-albany-factory/5364472001/

Yea, it would be a perfect way to add street activity during the match for people walking around the DORA.

This is an old article, but has some decent info: Businesses Move To The Midwest, First Stop: Columbus ... Low business costs incentivize companies to grow In comparison to traditional entrepreneurial hubs like New York City, Boston and Silicon Valley, the Columbus Region, and Ohio as a whole, offers comparatively low operating costs for businesses. Columbus’ attractive tax climate was ranked as one of the top three most business-friendly environments in the U.S. by KPMG and EY. Further, the cost of living in Central Ohio is 10 percent lower than the national average, making living and working in the Columbus Region more affordable for entrepreneurs and local employers alike. These factors, in combination with strong entrepreneurial resources, make the region and state an ideal spot to start businesses, and also scale them. Full article: https://www.forbes.com/sites/groupthink/2018/02/18/businesses-move-to-the-midwest-first-stop-columbus/?sh=2d4a2be53721 Here's another: Apple picks North Carolina over Ohio, but One Columbus still tending many fruits ... Ohio was in fact the first runner-up, according to an executive summary by the North Carolina Department of Commerce, which unlike JobsOhio is a government agency. Ohio offers "lucrative incentives," including grants, tax credits, jobs incentives, plus overall low business taxes, the document said. North Carolina countered with incentives paid out based on income tax withholding from new jobs that would total $846 million over 39 years, almost recouping the capital expense. "The company has stated that an award at this level is critical to North Carolina's consideration as the project location," it said. Full article: https://www.bizjournals.com/columbus/news/2021/04/28/one-columbus-many-deals-ahead-despite-apple-loss.html More: Columbus council approves tax incentive for tech-driven lender A San Francisco-area-based tech-driven lender has received the approval of the Columbus City Council for a job-incentive package tied to opening a local office that city officials say will create 100 full-time jobs in the Short North. Upstart Network plans to invest $1.4 million into its new office at 711 N. High St., while the estimated annual payroll will be $10.75 million. Upstart Network will receive a jobs-growth incentive that will yield cash payments to the company totaling between $335,938 and $403,125 over five years. The company will receive 25% of the city income taxes withheld on new employees, or 30% of the income taxes withheld on new employees who live in Columbus. Full article: https://www.dispatch.com/news/20190513/columbus-council-approves-tax-incentive-for-tech-driven-lender Upstart(mentioned above) has now outgrown its San Francisco office in Columbus: Upstart's Columbus 'HQ2' is now bigger than its Silicon Valley office The Columbus HQ2 of newly public Upstart Holdings Inc. is now larger than its Silicon Valley office, and it's still hiring. At some point in recent weeks, Columbus surpassed the San Mateo home – both are about 450 employees – and is growing faster on a path to 500 jobs, said Grant Schneider, data scientist who leads the second headquarters. The Columbus operation has about doubled in size since sending everyone home from the Short North office, he said. The company had projected Columbus would be larger – it's just happening faster. Full article: https://www.bizjournals.com/columbus/news/2021/05/28/upstart-columbus-office-passes-siliconn-valley.html Dog lovers’ spending ignites hiring at Bark & Co.‘s Columbus ‘pawffice’ It wasn’t even two years ago that the company opened its Columbus office, its first outside of its New York City headquarters, with the help of state tax incentives. Now it plans to take over another floor of the Carlile Building, and the company will soon have more employees here than it does in New York. Full article: https://www.dispatch.com/news/20170316/dog-lovers-spending-ignites-hiring-at-bark-amp-cos-columbus-pawffice

That's my point, though. I'm not saying these billboards are trying to make people move to Lima. They lure the companies to the state with low taxes and then the company goes near one of the 3 C's where the amenities are. These things aren't mutually exclusive.

Anecdotally, I think all of these points are being disproven by the activity in Columbus right now. I'm sure it's happening in other cities around Ohio right now, but I only see Columbus.

These are all fair points, and obviously it isn't easy to draw a direct correlation between businesses moving here and incentives offered. Anecdotally, the articles I've read on Columbus Business First usually are west coast tech companies moving offices here. I know a big part of the most recent Apple offices that went to North Carolina had to do with incentives offered and leaked meeting notes actually mentioned Columbus as the main competition. I would have to dig for these articles a bit, and I am at work currently. Sometimes, being ridiculous is the main point. People are talking about it and the goal of marketing is to get attention. If it wasn't for how stupid this ad is, that person would have never tweeted about it and it would have never been posted to this forum. How many other billboards/signs do New Yorkers walk by everyday without giving a second thought to? How many absolutely ridiculous ads do you see on TV where you ask yourself, "How could this possibly work as an advertisement?" You just need to stand out in some way and be in peoples' minds.

Every single relocation of an HQ or creation of a new HQ2 involves negotiations around tax breaks and other incentives. If a location doesn't have business friendly policies in place, they better be willing to provide incentives outside of those policies. You even mention this in your comment: You can't ignore this, though as it's quite likely those companies wouldn't have made the decision without those negotiations. I think we can take a look at migration data over the past decade to counter the "companies move for cultural amenities argument." Nobody can deny that companies have been moving from California to places like Texas for quite some time. Tech companies are moving in droves. California has arguably the best amenities and weather in the country. The only logical explanations for relocation is business environment and this is brought up time and time again. The vast majority of people move for jobs. Convince the companies to come and people will follow.

The tweet, and many forumers in this thread, miss the point entirely. The ad isn't about attracting New Yorkers to Ohio. It's about attracting New York businesses to Ohio. People follow jobs. It's the primary reason people move. And, companies are always interested in hearing how they can cut costs. This campaign also includes ads pointing out tax breaks and nearly every company that moves jobs to the Columbus area, and there are many doing so, mentions the business friendly environment of Ohio in their statement. Something is currently working, whether it be the work put in by JobsOhio(which is doing tons of successful work around the state besides this ad campaign) or something else. As I pointed out, we do not lack for corporate projects around the state right now.

But, we come in second place behind Texas for raw number of projects.