Battle heats up for US$5b second Amazon HQ

New York

IT'S the prize of a lifetime - a US$5 billion investment creating 50,000 well-paid jobs that everyone wants, but only one American city will get.

From East to West, from North to South, metropolises across the US are locked in a frenzied bidding war desperate to woo Amazon into favouring them as the site of the e-commerce giant's second headquarters.

From US$7 billion in tax breaks in Newark, New Jersey - 50 years ago aflame by deadly race riots - to a giant cactus shipped inter-state, bids range from the colossally ambitious to the silly before Thursday's deadline for submissions.

The e-commerce giant announced last month that it planned to invest more than US$5 billion in opening Amazon HQ2, a second company …