Amazon considers relocating some Seattle employees

E-commerce giant Amazon is considering relocating some employees out of Seattle. Yahoo Finance’s On The Move panel break down the latest developments.

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JULIE HYMAN: We are taking a look at what Amazon is offering to its employees, perhaps the chance to become suburban working moms.

INES FERRE: Perhaps to move out of Seattle to smaller offices outside of Seattle. Amazon reportedly had asked its employees about options, perhaps Tacoma, Redmond, Washington, if they'd prefer.

Now, Amazon has been talking about expanding itself outside of Seattle really because of also tax issues. It's had a little bit of a rocky relationship with city officials in Seattle because of new taxes on big employers. So even before COVID-19, Amazon was looking at making more satellite offices.

So this is just an acceleration of that because of this tax on big employers, wanting to make it more attractive for employees to not have to commute into Seattle and to be able to go to somewhere else that's perhaps a little bit smaller. But this really brings into focus what will happen to cities as people are leaving cities so rapidly and going into suburban life and going into other places. What will happen to cities if businesses as well leave, and especially now at a time when cities need taxes?

JULIE HYMAN: Yes, this is something that we have been talking a lot about, although Seattle is sort of a more suburban city than many, right? I don't know how many people live in downtown Seattle proper who are working at Amazon. But nonetheless, there is definitely this sort of focus on quality of life with so many people who are now working from home.