Silicon Valley Wants to Tax Big Tech Just Like Seattle Did

Seattle levied an annual tax of about $50 million on big companies last week to help solve the city's homeless problem. The tax was watered down from the original proposal but it was controversial and pitted the city against its most powerful corporate resident, Amazon.com Inc. Now the action moves to Silicon Valley and the Bay Area. San Francisco, Mountain View, Cupertino and East Palo Alto are all considering similar taxes on large local employers (read: tech companies) to offset growing inequality and overcrowding they blame on the industry that turned them into boomtowns.

The optics don't favor Big Tech. Seattle’s tax measure passed the city council unanimously. In the Democratic enclaves of Northern California, meanwhile, office-holders say the corporate tax cuts enacted last year by a Republican-controlled Congress make cash-flush technology companies an appealing target. Alphabet Inc.’s tax bill alone dropped by almost $1 billion in the first quarter thanks to the tax law championed by President Trump.