alt Hacker NewsGiven that datacenters seem to much more manpower efficient, that seems like a poor trade, to the point it might not be worth viewing them similarly. I'm seeing info reporting about 1 job per 5000 square feet of a datacenter after completion, and 1 job per 800-1500 square feet for a factory, depending on type.
More jobs is good, but if we're going to look at this through the lens of industry returning, it's a lousy return, even before factoring in that we probably lost a lot more factories than we're gaining datacenters.
Sounds probably about right in scale. 5-10x more employees per sqft for common industrial or manufacturing businesses.
But local negative impact on community is not remotely comparable to most industrial development. Everything from traffic, noise, pollution, etc. A few bad projects aside, these things are glorified warehouses typically sited in suburban industrial parks or the middle of nowhere.
It all really just comes down to the electricity needs they demand. Otherwise it’s about as close to as free money to a community as you can get.
The most problematic thing to me with this whole deal are local tax abatements. Those should be outright illegal though for any development.