If If DeSantis claims he’s “pro-business” when he announces his candidacy the responses should be hilarious.
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He’ll just spin it as business not worthy of Florida or any other “true conservative state”.
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There is no ‘spin’ on losing 1B of revenue…
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Yeah and let’s all remember for a minute that there are plenty of people in Florida who are rejecting desantis’s ideas like the folks in Jacksonville did. That makes it harder to bullshit. He can try… But…
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They moved mad magazine to california and all the staff (other than a few of the artists who work freelance long distance) just quit or retired. It was such a NY publication culturally and these people had built whole lives in that city. You cant just expect people like that to move and it was a slap in the face especially since it was such a small company and kind of like a family there. In the end, although they tried to reboot it with new staff and new branding, it wasn’t the same and it flopped. The magazine is still being published but other than the covers and fold-ins (not by Al Jaffee anymore obviously) it’s all re-printed old classic material.
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DeSantis:
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He already got them to change the law to allow him to run for president without resigning. Maybe he’ll pull a michael Bloomberg move and get them to change their laws on term limits too…
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The big difference between Amazon and Disney is Amazon wanted to stick the public with the bill for infrastructure improvements needed for the move. Disney is willing to pay more in taxes to get the stuff built.
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Apples and oranges, Mad has never has the level of power or money that a company like Disney does.
It would not be easy or ‘painless,’ but Disney can indeed leave Florida; there are already other states clamoring to be the next location.
IMO, the people who work for them now are unlikely to just ‘quit or retire’ because of the move, if it happens - Disney is one of the biggest employers in the state and if it pulls up stakes, there won’t be many other viable options for work.
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Annnd they have low unemployment in Fla because they don’t have much in the way of unemployment benefits. When folks lose jobs down there it’s going to hurt.
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‘Lose’, but yeah; other than that, you are spot on.
None of this is/will be good for Florida’s economy.
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I was more talking about feeling bad for the people who were going to be forced to move from california (where imagineering has been for like 75 years) to Florida. I guess someone in the comments above said a lot of people already had made that move, which, good lord the headaches. I’m sure the company would cover moving costs but still what a pain in the ass.
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Respectfully, that’s already been shown to be incorrect. I personally know several people who worked for the company who quit or retired early rather than move when they were asked to. And those were relatively well-paying jobs for Imagineering. Most of the many thousands of workers in the FL parks and hotels are not well paid and could not easy move to another state to follow the company if Disney decided to leave Florida.
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Not just Ca. Now that Disney owns Nat Geo there were many employees were expecting jobs to move from DC to Fla. The folks I know were ready to quit if that happened.
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Seems as with the sinking of the Titanic, you don’t want to be nearby when the boat goes underwater. Unfortunately, most employees of the park don’t have lifeboats.
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Y’know, I did preface my comment by stating that it is my OPINION.
(We are still allowed to have those, right?)
You actually work for the evil mouse, though; so you would know better than I do when it comes to all things Disney, including the mindset and future behavior of everyone else who is employed by your company.
*shrugs
I do have sympathy for all the regular folks who are about to get fucked over by all this BS.
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I’ll spare you the classic Moynihan quote but I was trying to respectfully share some factual information that was definitely relevant to what you said.
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Me too, I just watch these things unfold, as it’s
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Disney is not going to walk away from $2B in theme parks, another $1-2B in resorts, plus 25,000 acres of land. Saying that they ever would is simply wishful thinking. At the end of the day, win or lose, DeSantis is gone in a very short time, and Disney plays the long game.
They’ve looked at starting parks in other US states, and the logistics simply don’t work. Beyond it being a massive investment of capital, and taking a great deal of time, WDW is pretty much irreplaceable. In the internet age, there is no way that Disney could quietly buy up that sort of land without people finding out, heavily increasing prices, and other folks trying to stop the purchase.
Then there is the loss of Revenue. The Magic Kingdom at WDW averages a gross income of $78M per DAY, and represents over $28B in gross revenue per year out of Disney’s $83 billion in annual revenue. Obviously, those are the raw revenue numbers as the profit numbers are lower but the parks worldwide represent 65% of Disney’s revenue and WDW is the lion’s share of that. So, we can add the relocation of Disney out of Florida causing a stockholder revolt.
Not to mention the blow to the company itself if they were to close WDW. WDW is more than a physical asset, the intangible value of the park, Walt’s last project and lifelong dream destination of so many people, is not to be underestimated. Then there is the fact that they would need to demolish the park if they were to sell it, there is no way that Disney lets anyone else have their park. I suppose they could just hold the land (worth over a quarter of a billion dollars on its own) and let nature reclaim it, but that would allow for nightmarish dystopian photos of a crumbling Disney park, and that would certainly not be allowed either.
So, short of tearing it down, they’d need to close the park and then simply continue to maintain it until things settle down… sort of like they are doing right now by keeping the parks open until things settle down.
Mexico is likely a no go due to the cartels and an Island is too prone to storms - much more so than central Florida.
As you mention, they have over $300B in assets. It would be far less expensive for them to simply start financing the campaigns of Democrats in the State (Disney has long backed “pro-business” Republicans here).
“Disney during the 2020 election cycle donated $913,000 to the Republican Party of Florida and another $586,000 to GOP Senate campaigns, records show. The company also donated $313,000 to the Florida Democratic Party and $50,000 directly to DeSantis.”
Sure, that $50k to DeSantis certainly bit them in the ass but, if you look at the overall numbers involved? Less than $2M dollars. THAT kind of money is chump change to Disney. They could easily drop $5-10 Million in SuperPac “dark money” and destroy DeSantis and everyone that has been helping him. Frankly, I’m figuring that they will do so and spend far less money. Not that I’m a fan of ANY company buying an election but…it happens.
I could go on near endlessly on this topic, my father did the initial cost valuations for WDW and was a contractor for them for quite a while (he was even in the room when Roy Disney seized complete ownership of the Contemporary Resort from US Steel). But no, short of the state being wiped out in an apocalyptic event, Disney is never going to leave Florida. Suggesting otherwise is simply not realistic.
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