An Amazon headquarters in Maryland would pump $7.7 billion in wages into the economy and deliver more than $750 million in new tax revenues to state and Montgomery County coffers, according to a study released hours before the General Assembly was to host its first hearings on a $5 billion HQ2 incentive package.
Sage Policy Group produced the 12-page report on the “economic and fiscal benefits” of a potential Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) HQ2 on behalf of the Maryland Department of Commerce and Montgomery County. The county is one of 20 areas across the country, and the only one in Maryland, on the HQ2 short list.
“Total economic impact may turn out to be far larger than the estimates in this analysis suggest due to shifting economic structure,” the report states. “Local entrepreneurship would presumably accelerate, local Port activity would blossom more rapidly, and there would be an expected expansion in international travel through BWI. All of this would translate into many more jobs — jobs not built into the estimates supplied in this report.”
Seattle-based Amazon is expected to invest up to $5 billion to build out its 8 million-square-foot second headquarters, which could deliver as many as 50,000 employees to the winning area. Northern Virginia and D.C. also made the short list.