CRAINSNEW YORK BUSINESS NEW YORK BUSINESS® OCTOBER 2 - 8, 2017 | PRICE $3.00 ALL THE Home health care aides may nally get paid for every hour they work. But the change could bankrupt WORK, the industry PAGE 18 HALF THE PAY VOL. XXXIII, NO. 40 WWW.CRAINSNEWYORK.COM UBER’S WHY DID THE THE LIST TEAM OF WORLD TRADE New York’s RIVALS CENTER MALL largest law SUE A TINY P. 9 rms TENANT? P. 12 P. 10 NEWSPAPER P001_CN_20171002.indd 1 9/29/17 6:51 PM TO CREATE THE POPCORN IN HERE, PIPCORN HAD TO GO OUT THERE. “With the Chase Mobile® app, we could get out of the office and bring our latest idea to life: creating popcorn using the heat of the sun in Death Valley. Not easy when you have a core business to run and expenses to take care of back in New York. Turns out, that’s exactly what the Chase Mobile® app allowed us to do—stay on top of our business finances while on the road. From there, all we had to do was get a desert-ready food truck, grab some solar cookers and create a snack to match the unforgettable place where it was born, Death Valley.” —Jen Martin, co-owner of Pipcorn LEARN MORE AT CHASE.COM/BIZCHECKING All businesses are subject to approval. Additional terms, conditions and restrictions apply. Real business owners compensated for their participation. 3G/4G call coverage and/or WiFi connectivity is required. Chase Mobile® app is available for select mobile devices. Enroll in Chase OnlineSM or on the Chase Mobile app. Message and data rates may apply. Pipcorn is solely responsible for its products and for promotional statements about them and is not affiliated with JPMorgan Chase & Co. or its affiliates. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. Member FDIC ©2017 JPMorgan Chase & Co. CN018363.indd 1 9/19/17 11:25 AM OCTOBER 2 - 8, 2017 CRAINSNEW YORK BUSINESS FROM THE NEWSROOM | JEREMY SMERD | EDITOR IN THIS ISSUE Has NYC lost its soul? 4 AGENDA 5 IN CASE YOU MISSED IT NEW YORK HAS ALWAYS BEEN A BEACON for those seek- 6 ASKED & ANSWERED Bank ing freedom and opportunity. Immigrants, artists, entrepre- shake-up neurs. People of all colors, ethnicities and orientations. If 8 INSTANT EXPERT could roil 9 TRANSPORTATION construction they didn’t t in amid the homogeny of their hometown, lending they could nd a place in the diversity of New York. 10 REAL ESTATE “New York City was an exceptional place,” said Jeremiah 11 VIEWPOINTS Moss, author of the recently published Vanishing New York, 12 THE LIST with its provocative subtitle, How a Great City Lost Its Soul. “It was a place of diversity and a ordability. It was an escape FEATURES from the prying eyes of small towns. e city is a place 18 TAKING A STAND where people go to be free. at is its soul.” It was a place of Moss is a pseudonym for psychoanalyst Gri n Hans- diversity and bury, who catalogs the changing streetscape for his blog, “ Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York, and lives in a rent- affordability. The stabilized apartment in the East Village. With income in- city is a place where equality growing and housing prices up, the city is becom- people go to be free. ing less a ordable. Its soul is vanishing, he says. Moss’s view is shared by many. It explains why the That is its soul P. 24 mayor’s a ordable-housing plan has met resistance from BRIDGETTE MORPHEW critics who say it is not a ordable enough, like those who 24 GOTHAM GIGS showed up last week at our Most Powerful Women in New York luncheon to pro- 25 SNAPS test Deputy Mayor Alicia Glen, the keynote speaker. She wants developers to use some of their pro ts from market-rate apartments to build a ordable housing. In 26 FOR THE RECORD Seattle a boom in apartments has started to slow the growth of housing costs. e 27 PHOTO FINISH same could happen here, said Marisa Lago, the city’s new Planning Commission CORRECTION chair, at our breakfast forum Sept. 28. “ e focus is on a ordable housing but also At 2.4 million square feet, the former Pan Am Building market-rate housing,” she said. “If you look at the housing we’ve produced, it is was the largest commercial tower in the city when appropriately across a range of incomes because we need to house all New Yorkers.” it was completed in 1963. This fact was misstated in the article “Sign language,” published Sept. 18. Moss and other critics say market-rate housing means luxury housing. ey want only a ordable housing. “ e tax breaks that go to developers have to be got- ten rid of,” he said. “We don’t need any more buildings. We have enough.” Never mind that city government cannot a ord to maintain its existing a ordable- housing stock, let alone build enough to meet the demand. New York is growing by leaps and bounds. To remain accessible, investment needs to happen across the income spectrum and in diverse neighborhoods. e soul of the city Moss speaks of might be vanishing in the East Village, but it remains where most newcomers can a ord to live, which is not Manhattan. at out- ON THE COVER ward march is not inherently bad. It has meant private investment and burgeoning PHOTO: BUCK ENNIS commercial hubs in long-ignored neighborhoods. What’s needed is more, not less. DIGITAL DISPATCHES CONFERENCE CALLOUT OCT. 23 Go to CrainsNewYork.com NYC SUMMIT: FIXING READ Speaking at a MASS TRANSIT Crain’s breakfast forum, Planning Com- This year’s NYC Summit will feature > missioner Marisa Lago the country’s top transportation dismissed concerns experts, including Samuel that opponents were Schwartz. They will offer thwarting the insight into how to get mayor’s housing plan. our subways and trains moving again. ■ More than 2 million New Yorkers used Aibnb last year. Their top destination? SHERATON TIMES SQUARE New York. 8 to 10:30 a.m. ■ The Met Opera offered a buyout to 21 of [email protected]. 243 administrative workers just days after opening its season. Vol. XXXIII, No. 40, Oct. 2, 2017—Crain’s New York Business (ISSN 8756-789X) is published weekly, except for double NOMINATE Do you know an up-and- issues the weeks of June 26, July 10, July 24, Aug. 7, Aug. 21 and Dec. 19, by Crain Communications Inc., 685 Third Ave., coming New Yorker? Our nominations are New York, NY 10017. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY, and additional mailing of ces. Postmaster: Send address changes to: Crain’s New York Business, Circulation Department, 1155 Gratiot Ave., Detroit, MI 48207-2912. open for next year’s class of 40 Under 40. For subscriber service: Call 877-824-9379. Fax 313-446-6777. $3.00 a copy, $99.95 one year, $179.95 two years. Go to CrainsNewYork.com/40nominate. A (GST No. 13676-0444-RT) ©Entire contents copyright 2017 by Crain Communications Inc. All rights reserved. $199 processing fee will apply. BUCK ENNIS OCTOBER 2, 2017 | CRAIN’S NEW YORK BUSINESS | 3 P003_CN_20171002.indd 3 9/29/17 6:42 PM WHAT’S NEW OCTOBER 2, 2017 AGENDANew York has everything Amazon needs for its second headquarters ew York City has a lot riding on where Amazon decides to locate the second headquarters it is planning. e online retailer expects to bring 50,000 jobs to the winning location, which is a big number even by Big Apple standards. e city’s Nlargest private employer today is JPMorgan Chase & Co., with about 28,000 workers. Winning the nationwide competition would also signal to the BRANCHING OUT: world that New York is the nation’s preeminent city for businesses that de- Amazon would bring 50,000 jobs pend on young, smart employees. And if Amazon were to locate a substan- to the locale it tial number of them in an outer borough, it would supercharge an incipient chooses for its expansion. trend occurring in Brooklyn. New York is thought to be one of the top candidates to land the Seattle-based company. Amazon is perfectly happy in its pleasant, if rainy, cost will play a role in its decision, but the company is already expanding in native city, but to grow as robustly as it envisions, it needs to attract tal- the city. Our biggest concern is the frosty relationship between Mayor Bill ent that has no interest in moving to the Pacic Northwest. e company de Blasio and Gov. Andrew Cuomo. e good news on that front is that is thought to be strongly considering Denver for its second home but is their respective economic-development chiefs have been in contact about surely asking itself if tech-savvy millennials who balk at Seattle would feel Amazon, and the governor will likely not oer sweeter subsidies for upstate any dierent about Denver. We think not. Amazon is keenly aware that versus downstate. Upstate will not appeal to the company in any case; New its chief competitors for talent—Google and York would be better o with a single, unied Facebook—both have fast-growing oces in The key is a unied approach by the bid from the city and the state. Manhattan. Unfortunately de Blasio has been As business leaders here have been em- city and the state focused on the blabbing to the media that the city will not phasizing, New York has the diversity, uni- talent pipeline Amazon could tap provide discretionary subsidies.