Juan Carlos Ordóñez Oregon Center for Public Policy, December 13th 2024
Here’s a question for Elon Musk, recently appointed to lead a new “Department of Government Efficiency”: isn’t it wasteful to use taxpayer dollars to subsidize corporate jobs at a rate of more than $300,000 per worker? That’s how much Twitter (now X) received in property tax breaks in 2022 for its data center in Washington County.
Musk’s company is but one of the tech giants whose data centers Oregonians have been heavily subsidizing for years. With few benefits and big downsides, these inefficient subsidies grow the wealth and power of the nation’s biggest billionaires, to our detriment. It’s time to change course.
In 2022 alone, big tech companies — Amazon, Facebook, Google, Apple and Twitter — together reaped $180 million in property tax breaks for their data centers, according to extensive reporting by The Oregonian’s Mike Rogoway. The following year, Morrow County gave Amazon yet another massive tax break for data centers, this one valued at $1 billion over 15 years.
