Come on y 'all means y’ll. Put your “R’s” up and represent your city Bro.
No need to go on the attack because we did not get the two tech giants that
everyone fawns over.
Take stock in the companies and people that have been here for the long haul
that have been improving this area over time.
Raleigh has really just recently become a somewhat destination, sometimes
overhyped by media and the “Best Places To” lists by people who don’t even
come here and may have never even stepped foot in the state. Too much hype,
we are what we are, a great small but growing city.
We have changed immensely in the last ten years.
If you really seek and find you will discover some of the greatest companies
and people on earth in our fair city who take stock in our slow and steady
growth forward. Yes, it is frustrating, but doing is much harder than
saying.
I’ve worked with both of these companies at their headquarters. Love the
products and services. But just being cool is not everything you would like
it to be.
Maybe it’s cool to slap on some headphones, strap on your e- charging back
pack with your awesome laptop, slide that great phone into your back pocket,
jump on your e-scooter and wiz by humanity into the next e-coffee shop and
order some nice tight pants and quirky boots from Amazon and then race home
on your e-bike to see if you can beat the 1 hour delivery time.
All that is cool and fun. But who did you actually stop and talk to all day,
most possibly absolutely no one, yes you may have e-mailed and texted into
the e-device but did you really connect.
I remember getting picked up by the company (not to be named) bus (tech
company mass transit) , for the ride to Moffett with 60 other people weaving
through San Jose traffic for hours, donning headphones and putting in work
for the long ride to and from campus, get in my 6 on campus hours and then
rinse and repeat for the ride home, 12 hours of work each day, ground
hogging it every day. Great products, good people from all over the world
but we were just blah, bleary eyed and controlled for “The Man”.
Even if we had pods to fly us in they still would get 12 from us.
Embrace what we have now, we will grow, we will get better, smarter, faster
and all that good stuff.
Take the time to enjoy the great work life mix we have now because it could
all change really fast.
Is having 50,000 to 500,00 more people stuffed into Raleigh going to make
this a better place, how will your life truly change. Make more money, work
more, make less money, work less, make less money, work more. Who knows!
Why is it we can find a ton of millions in tax breaks for the huge IT
companies and burden our tax payers when we could just as well offer help to
current companies that are here and could most likely expand and provide
more jobs at a fraction of the cost.
When these companies don’t meet the agreed upon employee totals they just
walk away leaving the tax payer to shrug shoulders and a nice listing of
success for bringing them on some politions resume.
Why should we provide our tax money to companies that have enough in profits
to actually buy the city and maybe even the county.
If they really care and want to 'change the world" they should just come for
our quality of life and talented work force and then continue to make
gazzilions across the globe.
Could it be that tax breaks and political environments really don’t matter,
maybe it’s that we are just not meeting the needs.
You can only fit so many humans in a certain amount of space. Sooner or
later it exceeds is limitations.
It is never good to start eating our state, city and citizens alive because
some tech company did not choose us.
WE are our state, our county, our city and our people. WE will make it what it can and
will be. It may not be two big tech companies, it may be 500 small companies
that pay just as well that provide useful products and services and that get
to know and care about who WE really are, may speak with you on a daily
basis, take an interest in your family and your life in some meaningful way
other than free beer.
Get to know our neighbor and think freely. Enjoy Raleigh, its an awesome
place to work and play.
The rush on Raleigh will come, in due time, it may be what you want and it
may end up being what you don’t want.
Raleigh is a great place, great people, with great communities. Yes, maybe
we are a little 'slow" but we are not stupid.
Life is short, we don’t get to do or see it all.
No one or two companies will build Raleigh, WE will!