‘Shark Tank’ investor Kevin O’Leary accused Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (DN.Y.) of being ‘good at killing jobs’ on Friday and making New York City ‘uninvestable’ .
“She’s good at killing jobs. It’s killing jobs by the thousands,” O’Leary said during an interview on “CNN This Morning.”
He also blamed politicians for making New York “uninvestable,” saying Ocasio-Cortez actually “planned to sue ‘Amazon’ if they created jobs.” O’Leary was referring to the company’s decision last summer to cancel its planned warehouse in Newark, NJ
“Sorry. Don’t shoot the messenger; just tell you how it is,” he said, adding that he would “debate” with New York officials “at any time of the day.”
O’Leary was pushed back by the hosts after the comments, with co-presenter Poppy Harlow saying he wasn’t giving the full story.
“There’s a little more to it, but let’s not question that,” Harlow said, with co-host Don Lemon following suit.
“It says what a lot of people say, especially what happened after the Amazon thing here in New York,” Lemon added.
O’Leary also mentioned earlier in the interview that he no longer invests in states such as New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey or California.
“I don’t put companies here in New York or Massachusetts or New Jersey or California anymore. These states are uninvestable,” he said. “The politics here are insane. The taxes are too high.
Instead, O’Leary added, “we put them in Fargo, ND, because 40% of the people work elsewhere, including Boston.”
He said big cities tended to “punish” successful people with higher taxes.
While he blamed Ocasio-Cortez and other politicians for regulations in most cities, he insisted remote work has made a major difference between business and the economy post-pandemic.
O’Leary explained that there’s a new generation that has “no intention” of working in an office post-pandemic – and that’s an important thing to remember when trying to compete in the job market. work. But, he says, it hasn’t changed productivity.
“I found that it didn’t change anything because they didn’t know anything else. Some of them are fresh out of college and have started working from home. They never worked in an office,” O’Leary said. “Fundamentally, what this changes is the project management (of a company)”.
He explained that companies now have to give deadlines and worry less about their employees working from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.
“You tell someone ‘Look, you have to do this by next Friday at noon’, you don’t care when they do it, and they don’t work from 9am to 5pm, as long as it’s done” , O’Leary said. “So it changes the way you run these businesses… However, it’s probably less private time on the weekends.”
“I call my employees 24/7. That’s the deal. If you’re not working in the office, I can call you at 2 a.m.,” he added.