Rural North Carolina Experiences Data Center Boom 153
1sockchuck writes "Rural counties in western North Carolina have hit the data center trifecta, landing major projects from Google, Apple and Facebook. These marquee tech companies will invest more than $2 billion in small towns like Forest City, Kings Mountain and Maiden, a town of just 3,300 residents. How did western North Carolina become a tech hub? Aggressive tax incentives and an abundant supply of cheap power, a legacy of the textile mills that once thrived in the region, which narrowly missed winning a $499 million Microsoft data center project that ended up in Virginia."
Isn't it a bit hot there? (Score:4, Interesting)
I thought Google and the rest were looking for cool zones like Western New York and upper New England. The air conditioning bill in Carolina will be lower than California, but not by much.
I wonder if Western NC and VA residents will still be stuck on dialup, or if they'll finally get an upgrade since they are so close to the data stores?
Re:Power supply (Score:3, Interesting)
It's unfortunate that such companies will flock to places that offer cheap but dirty power for their facilities. Google, at least, takes a progressive stance towards these things. Hard to maintain a "green" image if your vital infrastructure intensifies the demand for coal-burning. Harder still if you made the conscious choice to participate in this by moving there.
There's a lot of nuclear power in NC too. Coal-burning in the US isn't particularly dirty either.
Re:Jobs (Score:3, Interesting)
Here's the update on the "cold" New York places... (Score:1, Interesting)
There's a big lawsuit to stop the place(s) in NY from being built...
http://www.buffalonews.com/city/communities/niagara-county/article253768.ece [buffalonews.com]
Re:Jobs (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe not extremely young workers...but perhaps slightly older people, who are wanting to buy a house, and perhaps raise a family?
Places like this can be DIRT cheap to live. Cheap to buy property and build a home, and actually have some land for it to sit on.
Even if you do get a bit less of a bill rate than you would, say on the west coast...with the extremely LOW cost of living, lower taxes, etc, you can really sock some money away. Sure, it will be a bit different lifestyle, but slowing down a bit, getting out of all of the air polution, and actually being able to see some stars at night....well, sometimes, that ain't all bad.
NC State too (Score:1, Interesting)
NC State attracts students from across the state, and plenty of them come to Raleigh, get a CS or CE degree, and would be happy to move to a rural area and do IT of some sort. I don't think they'll have any problem finding folks to do the work.
Personally, I'm a little disappointed that cheap (read: lots of coal, little renewable growth) power was a factor for Apple and Google. Facebook's a whore anyway, but Apple and Google purport to be greener than the average company.
Re:Hey wow, this is true, I live here. (Score:5, Interesting)
The article was light on details, but the reason why companies typically do this is because the states hand out idiotically huge tax incentives that there's no way will ever be paid off by the presence of the company.
I've never heard of them actually paying for the federal taxes, just agreeing to not charge all the normal taxes the state does. So how does the state or locality have to pay off anything to break even? Even if they charge no taxes at all, the presence of the company will bring in income tax, sales tax from employees and all the stuff they buy and all the temporary construction workers in the area.
By the time the jobs would be around for long enough to finally start to break even, it's been long enough that the companies have started looking around for who's going to offer the best tax incentives for them to either upgrade their facilities to stay or move.
I still don't see this "break even" you're talking about. Jobs come in for a while. It's doubtful any of these companies are going to move these data centers ever, as they are huge investments. They might not expand them if they get a better deal elsewhere, but even if they did close one, they'd sell it off and another company would open a datacenter there. Nobody just shutters a billion dollar datacenter and lets it sit empty.
it's almost certainly about nothing other than getting ridiculous handouts given by desperate leaders in order to make them look good at any cost to their constituents. See also sports team stadiums.
I've certainly seen some crazy things with stadiums, like subsidies, but then those stadiums often bring a lot of money into a community as well. I guess I'd just have to see some real hard numbers on the situation before I dismiss this as a political stunt that harms their constituency. I read an article or two on most of these and all I saw were tax breaks with a bunch of conditions (healthcare for employees, move into one of several very poor areas, etc.). As far as I an tell, it's the state giving up tax revenue they would not get anyway if these companies chose another location.
Re:Jobless Recovery?? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Jobless Recovery?? (Score:4, Interesting)
Even if they do import people from other areas in the country, the locals will still see an employment boom. Housing construction, road improvements, restaurants, retail centers, need for more teachers, etc. I have family that lives on the other side of the Appalachians in Tennessee, so I've seen this area of NC a lot. In a lot of areas of western NC, especially up in the mountains, there is nothing. And what there is can be few and far between. This will be a boon not only to the towns they are built by, but all the surrounding towns as well. A lot of these support jobs may not pay much, but it's a lot better than some of the options available there now.
As a side note, I've seen inner city Atlanta and some of the worst areas in that town, and I've seen back in the mountains in the southern Appalachians. If you think inner cities are poverty, you haven't seen anything until you go into the mountains.
Re:Hey wow, this is true, I live here. (Score:5, Interesting)
Historically NC has been called, the vale of humility between two mountains of conceit (SC/VA). I'll admit they have their share of rednecks and old boys, but that state is a hell of a lot more progressive than the adjacent areas. It is a shame that they automatically get lumped into cousin-fucker stereotypes, because they have tried really hard while their neighbors wallow in their own shit, jump for handouts and fight tooth and nail to stay in the past. I say this as a South Carolinian.
Re:Jobs (Score:4, Interesting)