No, the presence of HQ2 in and of itself is not a social policy, and yields no public benefit. It serves the interest of the government, by increasing revenue.

No, the presence of HQ2 in and of itself is not a social policy, and yields no public benefit. It serves the interest of the government, by increasing revenue. Presumably they will spend that money on something that does have social benefits, but that's not directly tied to Amazon's tax incentives. Sure, it is if we adopt a definition of "subsidy" that includes tax incentives that are offered with the goal of increasing tax revenue in the long run, but such a re-framing eliminates the root of a lot of outrage about these "subsidies". It's no longer correct to say that New York and Virginia are giving anything to Amazon, because these governments are still receiving more taxes than they would have without Amazon's presence. The article linked by OP doesn't actually dispute that. The only piece of quantitative data it provides is a correlation between campaign contributions and subsidies. The article claims that the tax incentives (or if you prefer, subsidies) are uneconomical, but it does not actually put forth any data to demonstrate that NY or VA will see a net loss in the Amazon HQ2 deals.