E-commerce giant Amazon recently announced that Newark is on its list of 20 cities where the company wants to build its second headquarters.
In October, then-New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie offered Amazon $7 billion in potential tax incentives if the company came to the Garden State. Industry reports indicate Amazon will spend $5 million and employ 50,000 people where it decides to build.
The company received proposals from more than 240 cities and narrowed it down to 20 cities, including New York, Dallas, Atlanta and Austin, Texas.
So just how much of an impact would Amazon have if it came to Newark? For starters it would join 21 Fortune 500 companies that call the Brick City home, including IDT Corporation, Audible.com and Panasonic.
Mayor Ras Baraka said that Newark has business assets and resources and that Amazon would make a positive social and economic impact.
“With more than 60,000 college students in the city, the most untapped bandwidth of dark fiber in the world and access to Newark Liberty International Airport, the docks, railways and roadways of the eastern corridor, Newark has unparalleled logistical advantages for a company like Amazon,” he said. Baraka added that by coming to Newark, Amazon can show that it can “do good in the world and also do well as a company.” According to a 2015 report, Newark has an unemployment rate of 8.8 percent and a poverty rate twice the national average at 30 percent. Nearly 75 percent of Newark residents are Black and Latino.