PHILADELPHIA | Highrise Development Thread IX

[br323206]

Originally Posted by jsbrook

Employers don't like not having benchmarks on what a candidate is worth. I don't blame them. Yes, you can say it's not so relevant and there should be a negotiation and vetting process and that's the way a salary agreement for a new position should be reached. But it's still a data point. It's represents the value that SOME passed employer attached to the applicant. And that's generally going to be someone with a lot more interaction and knowledge of capabilities - through real world performance - than is usually possible to glean through the hiring process.

This is anecdotal but in a conversation with my own boss he talked about how he doesn't ask for salary history in hiring at all. He knows what the job is worth. It doesn't matter if you made $x+$50,000 or $x-$50,000 in your last position, if the job is worth $x that's what he offers. If you have an issue with the salary he's willing to have a discussion, but your past salary is not a variable he is willing to consider as a part of that discussion. I think that's a good policy.

[br323206]

Originally Posted by Redddog

Hey, Br323206.

Could you expand on the "expressed interest in lowering the wage tax" comment.

Would it be significant? Is there a reasonable expectation that if Harrisburg were to clear the way, this would have enough support? Any feel for the likelihood that Harrisburg would ever do something so "pro-Philadelphia?"

I'm specifically talking about the proposal to raise the commercial property tax so the wage tax can be lowered proportionally. Harrisburg has passed the legislation required once, but it needs to be passed twice (to amend the state constitution). They intend to pass it again this session as far as I know. Council also supports this tax swap, but has issues with the state legislation because it limits how the city can spend its own money (because of course they won't do something "pro-Philly" without throwing in at least a small screw you). I hope that the city and state can work through those issues and we can get this moving. If so, the goal is to get the wage tax below 3%.

[1487]

Originally Posted by jsbrook

Employers don't like not having benchmarks on what a candidate is worth. I don't blame them. Yes, you can say it's not so relevant and there should be a negotiation and vetting process and that's the way a salary agreement for a new position should be reached. But it's still a data point. It's represents the value that SOME passed employer attached to the applicant. And that's generally going to be someone with a lot more interaction and knowledge of capabilities - through real world performance - than is usually possible to glean through the hiring process.

this entire thing is being blown out of proportion. The rule simply says you can't ask for existing salary during the application process. Nothing says that once you offer the position you can't have preferred candidate verify current salary during negotiations or whatever. This merely means you can't use initial salary to "adjust" the offer down for people of certain classes. No one has explained how this hurts corporate profitability.

[1487]

Originally Posted by br323206

I'm specifically talking about the proposal to raise the commercial property tax so the wage tax can be lowered proportionally. Harrisburg has passed the legislation required once, but it needs to be passed twice (to amend the state constitution). They intend to pass it again this session as far as I know. Council also supports this tax swap, but has issues with the state legislation because it limits how the city can spend its own money (because of course they won't do something "pro-Philly" without throwing in at least a small screw you). I hope that the city and state can work through those issues and we can get this moving. If so, the goal is to get the wage tax below 3%.

i believe if it passes legislature again it becomes a ballot initiative. Hopefully it would pass. I don't think Council can do anything to change the way the law is structured if it passes. I know Clarke raised concerns about the fact that the additional revenue could only be applied to lowering other taxes.

[1487]

Originally Posted by jjv007

Come on dude, do you every think anything even marginally negative about how the city is operated? Sometimes you act as if they're damn near perfect.

dude, all i want someone to do is explain how this hurts profits. That's all I said. The article clearly says the company had a host of reasons for wanting out and people here are saying the salary history rule is definitively chasing businesses out of the city for some reason people can't really quantify. All I said was they were going regardless- you don't have to like it or accept it.

[1487]

Originally Posted by summersm343

Agreed. This is the problem. People are continuing to brush off these companies leaving as "they were probably leaving anyways." He legitimately said he is leaving because of the unfriendly business climate in the city. Until the population accepts this and pushes City Council to make the city more friendly to businesses, the same bullshit is going to continue to happen.

Not sure what reality people here inhabit but if the company has been here for 43 years taxes are LOWER now than they have been in the past. Wage tax reductions didn't even start until Rendell was in office. Some of the gambling money also goes towards accelerating wage tax reduction. They are also slowly reducing the BIRT. With the pending state constitution changes the wage tax will go even lower. It's already significantly lower than it was at it's peak. We also have 10 year tax abatement and KOZ areas that benefit companies who locate in those affected areas. How can anyone possibly be arguing that things are getting LESS competitive than they were in the past? When was the peak era for competitiveness on taxes? 10 years ago? 25? When you look at the overall trend line for taxes businesses care about (i.e. not the sugar tax or the recent hikes in property tax) they are not going up and no one is proposing to do so. This is why one has to assume (especially when you consider the state changes that are coming) this company has larger issues with it's urban location- i.e. homeless people, traffic, rents, parking, etc. Only a few weeks ago a company from Radnor announced they were moving HQ to FMC. Are those execs stupid? Are they not well versed in city tax burden? Picking on exodus as "proof" that the sky is falling is as stupid as finding one new city tenant and then saying that is "proof" that no additional steps need to be taken.

[iheartphilly]

Originally Posted by 1487

Not sure what reality people here inhabit but if the company has been here for 43 years taxes are LOWER now than they have been in the past. Wage tax reductions didn't even start until Rendell was in office. Some of the gambling money also goes towards accelerating wage tax reduction. They are also slowly reducing the BIRT. With the pending state constitution changes the wage tax will go even lower. It's already significantly lower than it was at it's peak. We also have 10 year tax abatement and KOZ areas that benefit companies who locate in those affected areas. How can anyone possibly be arguing that things are getting LESS competitive than they were in the past? When was the peak era for competitiveness on taxes? 10 years ago? 25? When you look at the overall trend line for taxes businesses care about (i.e. not the sugar tax or the recent hikes in property tax) they are not going up and no one is proposing to do so. This is why one has to assume (especially when you consider the state changes that are coming) this company has larger issues with it's urban location- i.e. homeless people, traffic, rents, parking, etc. Only a few weeks ago a company from Radnor announced they were moving HQ to FMC. Are those execs stupid? Are they not well versed in city tax burden? Picking on exodus as "proof" that the sky is falling is as stupid as finding one new city tenant and then saying that is "proof" that no additional steps need to be taken.

1487-did you missed this one...LOL.

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I love how a guy who has been running a business in the city for 30 years decides to pack up shop and move to the burbs, take over a hundred tax payers with him, cites his exact reasons for leaving, and people respond by saying the equivalent of 'that guy is full of shit, he was probably leaving anyways'.

[summersm343]

Originally Posted by 1487

Not sure what reality people here inhabit but if the company has been here for 43 years taxes are LOWER now than they have been in the past. Wage tax reductions didn't even start until Rendell was in office. Some of the gambling money also goes towards accelerating wage tax reduction. They are also slowly reducing the BIRT. With the pending state constitution changes the wage tax will go even lower. It's already significantly lower than it was at it's peak. We also have 10 year tax abatement and KOZ areas that benefit companies who locate in those affected areas. How can anyone possibly be arguing that things are getting LESS competitive than they were in the past? When was the peak era for competitiveness on taxes? 10 years ago? 25? When you look at the overall trend line for taxes businesses care about (i.e. not the sugar tax or the recent hikes in property tax) they are not going up and no one is proposing to do so. This is why one has to assume (especially when you consider the state changes that are coming) this company has larger issues with it's urban location- i.e. homeless people, traffic, rents, parking, etc. Only a few weeks ago a company from Radnor announced they were moving HQ to FMC. Are those execs stupid? Are they not well versed in city tax burden? Picking on exodus as "proof" that the sky is falling is as stupid as finding one new city tenant and then saying that is "proof" that no additional steps need to be taken.

Taxes are lower now than they were, but it's not good enough. Period. We're not competitive. We're losing out to other places like Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, Seattle, San Francisco, Boston, NYC, etc.

We'll never be able to compete with NYC, but we sure as hell should be competing with the others.

The fact that company after company continues to site the poor business environment in Philadelphia and the state of Pennsylvania due to taxes and silly laws for reasons why they are leaving, or reasons why Philadelphia is not attracting new companies and jobs at a faster clip is just more of a reason to believe it.

...and you continue to defend the city as if they're doing something right? They're just as bad as the idiots in the state legislature.

These other cities are doubling, if not tripling our job and population growth numbers.

[City Wide]

Originally Posted by summersm343

Agreed. This is the problem. People are continuing to brush off these companies leaving as "they were probably leaving anyways." He legitimately said he is leaving because of the unfriendly business climate in the city. Until the population accepts this and pushes City Council to make the city more friendly to businesses, the same bullshit is going to continue to happen.

I usually enjoy these discussions about the business climate in Philly and this round is no different. With the understanding that its impossible to lump all businesses into any one camp, I will say that many businesses want to take all the advantages that being in the City might offer, but few want to pay for them; no big surprise. Most business would claim that since they are the 'job creators' the City should bend over backwards to have the privilege of having the them within the City limits. Any law or regulation is too much. And if a business is short term and totally bottom line based, that makes complete sense.
Sure there are ways that gov't can be more business friendly (lower or get rid of any business tax) or the opposite, but having a business friendly climate is something that as long as there are any limiting laws and/or regulations there will be loud voices claiming that gov't is getting in their way. That's just the nature of the set up; gov't and business often have different goals and desires. And there's nothing wrong with that
For those who are bothered by Philly's so called anti-business climate I have to ask how businesses in NYC seem to not be troubled with the 'anti-business' environment there, which from what I hear is much more onerous then what we have in Philly.
I say all this as a long time small business owner who lives and works in Philly. My problem with the City is not the tax rate (but sure, lower would be nice!) but with the completely crazy set up of how taxes are paid and what they are paid on. For a large business with full time accountants etc. it might not be a big deal, but for small businesses the number of and level of taxes and forms to fill out and records to keep seem mind numbing.
And City council is a joke, buts that's true on many, many levels-------I will always push for a City that is trying to make the City a better place to live, and that covers many different areas. Unfortunately too many businesses and citizens seem to think that Gov't is there to give 'things' away, hand outs, be that tax breaks, city jobs, or long term housing.

[iheartphilly]

Quote:
Originally Posted by summersm343 View Post
Agreed. This is the problem. People are continuing to brush off these companies leaving as "they were probably leaving anyways." He legitimately said he is leaving because of the unfriendly business climate in the city. Until the population accepts this and pushes City Council to make the city more friendly to businesses, the same bullshit is going to continue to happen.

"People are continuing to brush off these companies leaving as "they were probably leaving anyways."

The context of this statement in my post #805 is that the quoted statement appears to be disingenuous and misguided at a minimum and is not meant to be apply to every company that leaves the City. If you run a big successful company in the city and you can continue to grow top line revenue and make a healthy profit, and you use other professional services like CPAs to do your books and filings, it sounds like BS to me that you pick up and leave the city citing reasons of pan handlers, homeless, etc. Sounds like a snowflake argument to me. Thank goodness Aramark and FMC don't think this way. As a matter of fact, they think the opposite and will continue to make money in light of the doom and gloom scenarios discussed here.

[summersm343]

Originally Posted by City Wide

For those who are bothered by Philly's so called anti-business climate I have to ask how businesses in NYC seem to not be troubled with the 'anti-business' environment there, which from what I hear is much more onerous then what we have in Philly.

I say all this as a long time small business owner who lives and works in Philly. My problem with the City is not the tax rate (but sure, lower would be nice!) but with the completely crazy set up of how taxes are paid and what they are paid on. For a large business with full time accountants etc. it might not be a big deal, but for small businesses the number of and level of taxes and forms to fill out and records to keep seem mind numbing.
And City council is a joke, buts that's true on many, many levels-------I will always push for a City that is trying to make the City a better place to live, and that covers many different areas. Unfortunately too many businesses and citizens seem to think that Gov't is there to give 'things' away, hand outs, be that tax breaks, city jobs, or long term housing.

1. Philadelphia cannot match NYC. I know we don't like to hear that, but it's the unfortunate truth. The quicker we stop trying to compare ourselves to NYC, and start comparing ourselves to Boston, San Francisco, Seattle, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, etc. - the better (By the way, every single one of those cities are doing better than Philadelphia in job growth, population growth, income/wage growth, crime reduction, poverty reduction, etc. etc.). People all over the world want to live in NYC, just like businesses around the world want to be headquartered or have a presence there. It's basically a status symbol. It's the same reason why people will spend 50% of their income on rent to live in NYC, but they wouldn't do that in Philadelphia. We shouldn't be comparing our tax structure to NYC, but to everywhere else.

2. Your point about too many different taxes and the difficulty in paying them is the point I'm trying to make. They need to lower some taxes like the Wage and BIRT taxes, but they need to merge other taxes into one instead of having so many different little taxes. Lowering some taxes, while merging other taxes and making things easier to pay would be a smart way to go. Anything to make running a business in the city is a smart idea that doesn't always involve lowering taxes. As you know in running a business, time = money. The more time it takes to do all of these little extra things that the city requires, makes the city looks less attractive than the suburbs or other cities when you have to do all of this plus pay higher taxes.

[summersm343]

Originally Posted by iheartphilly

The context of this statement in my post #805 is that the quoted statement appears to be disingenuous and misguided at a minimum and is not meant to be apply to every company that leaves the City. If you run a big successful company in the city and you can continue to grow top line revenue and make a healthy profit, and you use other professional services like CPAs to do your books and filings, it sounds like BS to me that you pick up and leave the city citing reasons of pan handlers, homeless, etc. Sounds like a snowflake argument to me. Thank goodness Aramark and FMC don't think this way. As a matter of fact, they think the opposite and will continue to make money in light of the doom and gloom scenarios discussed here.

It's not doom and gloom. The city will just continue to chug along at a slow pace in both population and job growth unless something is done to change this. We all like high rise and skyscraper construction, which is why we are here. If we want more built, we need a better business climate to attract companies and people to the city. If we want Schuylkill Yards built, 1301 Market, 2100 Market, etc. - we need a better business climate.

[jjv007]

Originally Posted by summersm343

1. Philadelphia cannot match NYC. I know we don't like to hear that, but it's the unfortunate truth. The quicker we stop trying to compare ourselves to NYC, and start comparing ourselves to Boston, San Francisco, Seattle, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, etc. - the better (By the way, every single one of those cities are doing better than Philadelphia in job growth, population growth, income/wage growth, crime reduction, poverty reduction, etc. etc.). People all over the world want to live in NYC, just like businesses around the world want to be headquartered or have a presence there. It's basically a status symbol. It's the same reason why people will spend 50% of their income on rent to live in NYC, but they wouldn't do that in Philadelphia. We shouldn't be comparing our tax structure to NYC, but to everywhere else.

2. Your point about too many different taxes and the difficulty in paying them is the point I'm trying to make. They need to lower some taxes like the Wage and BIRT taxes, but they need to merge other taxes into one instead of having so many different little taxes. Lowering some taxes, while merging other taxes and making things easier to pay would be a smart way to go. Anything to make running a business in the city is a smart idea that doesn't always involve lowering taxes. As you know in running a business, time = money. The more time it takes to do all of these little extra things that the city requires, makes the city looks less attractive than the suburbs or other cities when you have to do all of this plus pay higher taxes.

This x100 is what I've been trying to say for so long. Philly of now may be doing better than old Philly but old Philly was a struggling, declining industrial city. That's not a good standard to have when other cities are moving up the rear and passing you by. Philadelphia can be/stay a borderline top 5 US city as it's been for all its history if the city can get its act together but if it doesn't, it's well on its way to falling suddenly off the top 10 due to a cluster of rising cities. Then 50 years from now we can still be telling tourists how great the Liberty Bell and cheesesteaks are and talk about this pie-in-the-sky idea somebody once had for UCity.

[jjv007]

Originally Posted by summersm343

It's not doom and gloom. The city will just continue to chug along at a slow pace in both population and job growth unless something is done to change this. We all like high rise and skyscraper construction, which is why we are here. If we want more built, we need a better business climate to attract companies and people to the city. If we want Schuylkill Yards built, 1301 Market, 2100 Market, etc. - we need a better business climate.

Yes, yes, yes. Love this thread but sometimes too much false optimism and boosterism for the city. We can save that for City-Data. When a city has a thriving business climate, it doesn't have to worry about a failed proposal coz another will rise to take its place. Business builds cities. How much commercial office space is being constructed here compared to similar type cities? As much as CITC is great and all, that doesn't necessarily reflect the climate as a whole. What happens when that and FMC wrap up? We shouldn't be a city just hoping for good overall national trends to boost our progress. Any relatively major city can do that. We need to generate our own mini economy that can work somewhat independently of the larger market, which is oftentimes fickle.

[iheartphilly]

Originally Posted by jjv007

This x100 is what I've been trying to say for so long. Philly of now may be doing better than old Philly but old Philly was a struggling, declining industrial city. That's not a good standard to have when other cities are moving up the rear and passing you by. Philadelphia can be/stay a borderline top 5 US city as it's been for all its history if the city can get its act together but if it doesn't, it's well on its way to falling suddenly off the top 10 due to a cluster of rising cities. Then 50 years from now we can still be telling tourists how great the Liberty Bell and cheesesteaks are and talk about this pie-in-the-sky idea somebody once had for UCity.

True...true. Philly's industry can't compete with financial service industry in NYC. There are 330k jobs in NYC just in that industry alone. It will remain one of the major global financial centers in the world. But, I say we can continue to compete in healthcare, manufacturing, and educational services.

Also working against Philly, we have healthy suburbs like Montgomery, Bucks, and Chester Counties. These 3 counties have slightly over 1MM non-farm jobs and more jobs than Philly. So, we are competing with the surrounding counties, themselves, not just different cities.



Montgomery County-Bucks County-Chester County, Pa. Metropolitan Division


Total nonfarm

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1,031.4 1,070.5 1,052.7 1,046.6 15.2 1.5

Mining, logging, and construction

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52.6 52.9 53.8 53.9 1.3 2.5

Manufacturing

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91.0 92.9 93.0 92.2 1.2 1.3

Trade, transportation, and utilities

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203.4 208.4 207.8 205.3 1.9 0.9

Information

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21.0 21.3 21.2 21.2 0.2 1.0

Financial activities

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79.3 78.8 78.4 79.1 -0.2 -0.3

Professional and business services

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198.2 208.0 206.6 203.7 5.5 2.8

Education and health services

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174.7 180.5 177.7 177.8 3.1 1.8

Leisure and hospitality

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91.2 95.9 93.4 92.5 1.3 1.4

Other services

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47.0 47.4 46.6 46.2 -0.8 -1.7

Government

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73.0 84.4 74.2 74.7 1.7 2.3

[jsbrook]

Originally Posted by 1487

dude, all i want someone to do is explain how this hurts profits. That's all I said. The article clearly says the company had a host of reasons for wanting out and people here are saying the salary history rule is definitively chasing businesses out of the city for some reason people can't really quantify. All I said was they were going regardless- you don't have to like it or accept it.

No one said it hurts profits directly. It's not the most onerous law in the world, but it's a constraint on operation, and impedes standard business practices that are widely part of the hiring practices and provide some useful data points. As a whole, Philly's business climate has too many hoops and regulations, in addition to poor tax policy. Based on some of your posts, I think a conversation could be had from now till doomsday, and you still wouldn't really get it. Admit it, you're really Darrell Clarke. It's the only explanation.

[jjv007]

Omg 1487's actually Darrell Clarke. Suddenly it all makes sense!

[City Wide]

Originally Posted by summersm343

1. Philadelphia cannot match NYC. I know we don't like to hear that, but it's the unfortunate truth. The quicker we stop trying to compare ourselves to NYC, and start comparing ourselves to Boston, San Francisco, Seattle, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, etc. - the better (By the way, every single one of those cities are doing better than Philadelphia in job growth, population growth, income/wage growth, crime reduction, poverty reduction, etc. etc.). People all over the world want to live in NYC, just like businesses around the world want to be headquartered or have a presence there. It's basically a status symbol. It's the same reason why people will spend 50% of their income on rent to live in NYC, but they wouldn't do that in Philadelphia. We shouldn't be comparing our tax structure to NYC, but to everywhere else.

2. Your point about too many different taxes and the difficulty in paying them is the point I'm trying to make. They need to lower some taxes like the Wage and BIRT taxes, but they need to merge other taxes into one instead of having so many different little taxes. Lowering some taxes, while merging other taxes and making things easier to pay would be a smart way to go. Anything to make running a business in the city is a smart idea that doesn't always involve lowering taxes. As you know in running a business, time = money. The more time it takes to do all of these little extra things that the city requires, makes the city looks less attractive than the suburbs or other cities when you have to do all of this plus pay higher taxes.

Boston is the only city on your list I think that is worth using as a comparison to Philly and I would be interested in knowing how we stack up against them. I honestly don't have any idea but I have a hard time imagining that they are so different. The state of Ma. is well known for its high taxes.
I'd also like to see how Philly compares to Chicago, which has problems both similar to and in many ways greater then ours, but continues to attract business to the City, both from the suburbs and from down state and out of state.
But I think you might have missed my main point, that being a City can never be 'business friendly' enough to satisfy most businesses, unless the city sells out completely and becomes Houston. If all Comcast (or you fill in the name) cared about was taxes and simple bottom line numbers, they wouldn't be headquartered in Philly (or in NYC!). All I'm saying is that being 'business friendly' is just one of many drums to be pounding on, and in my opinion, not even the most important.
My points about taxes and regs comes from my own experience. Larger businesses that I know don't seem to have the same issues. But just about all businesses are going to bitch about the heavy hand of gov't. That is just something that they do. It comes as naturally as seeking tax loopholes and ways to avoid paying parking tickets, its a fact of life. When one signs up for Business Privilege account its almost like you get a handbook on how to bitch about how bad the City is.
If we could get our City fathers and mothers to get off their fat asses and care half as much about the good of the whole City as they do about their next election I believe the quality of life that is offered here would be well worth not having the lowest corporate tax rates. (term limits anyone?)
A race to the bottom to become the most business friendly is one I hope the City does not enter. Its one that by definition can only be lost, never won.

[City Wide]

Now back to construction------------I noticed that CHOP's new building on its main campus, that just opened within the last year (if not a lot more recently then that) has a full sized crane parked on its roof. Is that just a left over from when it was built and I just haven't noticed it before?
I know this building was designed to allow additional floors to be added, but I'd be very pleasantly surprised if CHOP was adding square footage so soon after the building opened.
Does anyone know anything about this?

[GtownFriend]

[QUOTE=summersm343;7701989]Feasibility study for 13th and Callowhill. I wonder if the owner is looking to move forward with or sell the site/plans to a developer because of the Rail Park moving forward.

What is the time frame on this study? something from a while back, or recent?