Amazon flowing eastward: analysis

Amazon’s second headquarters is coming to the East Coast, one analysis released Monday predicted.

The most likely place for the e-commerce giant’s second headquarters is Atlanta because it ranked high in the attributes sought by Amazon — including affordable homes, good schools and airports, according to Sperling’s BestPlaces, which crunched the results from several different analyses.

The greater Washington, DC, area was the second-most likely location for Amazon’s so-called HQ2, a $5 billion invest- ment that will employ 50,000 people.

The contest for HQ2 was whittled down last week to 20 city finalists.

The greater New York City area and Newark, NJ, also rated high, according to Sperling.

There are a number of reasons to believe Seattle-based Amazon will choose an East Coast city for HQ2, according to Bert Sperling, the firm’s founder and CEO.

“Amazon is becoming more and more influential in our lives and our society, and I think they realize this,” he said. “It makes a lot of sense to be on the other side of the country and also be near these seats of economic and political power.”

Indeed, when Amazon announced the finalists to receive its coveted HQ2 last week, 14 of the 20 were in the Eastern time zone.

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns the left-leaning Washington Post — leaving Sperling skeptical that the company would put down roots in a red state.

“I can’t imagine him putting the new headquarters in Texas and having to sit across the table from a conservative senator like Ted Cruz and negotiating with him,” Sperling said.