The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups • Hacker News Board

Re: The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups

#161

Post by kasey_junk » Fri, Jul 21, 2017, 2:09 PM UTC

jpao79 wrote: post #65

A few questions for HN: 1.) Do you think San Jose will ever become "a thing" for tech startups? Is there enough to do there? There is a WeWork and San Pedro Square in downtown San Jose. Or is a waterfront view what make San Francisco, Seattle and Portland what they are? Also, if you did want to live in San Jose there where are the up and coming places for HNers to live? 2.) Cupertino used to be cherry orchards and su…

> If housing was unconstrained in the Bay Area and at cost parity with the MidWest, wouldn't that remove any reason to live in the MidWest?

That is hilarious. The Bay Area centrism to imply that there is no reason to live any where else besides cost is absolutely ludicrous.

Re: The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups

#162

Post by amyjess » Fri, Jul 21, 2017, 2:10 PM UTC

sulam wrote: post #125

fooker wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And very few people. So, this works only if you develop apps or a cloud service.

Even then you need to be able to hire engineers. It's no accident that the companies located in that vast swathe hire a lot of remote employees.

Alternately, you can do what TI did and grow your own.

When Texas Instruments decided to establish their headquarters in Richardson, TX, they faced a shortage of talent as Richardson hadn't really been built out yet. So the founders of TI (Cecil H. Green, Eugene McDermott, and J. Erik Jonsson) started their own university with an explicit focus on STEM subjects. Eventually, they gave control of the university to the state, and it became the University of Texas at Dallas. It's now the most prominent STEM university in the southwest, and TI is still closely affiliated with it (disclaimer: it's also my alma mater).

Re: The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups

#163

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Jul 21, 2017, 2:16 PM UTC

Retric wrote: post #121

afpx wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I stay here because I've not found any place on Earth that's as good for working in technology. And, every year, this area creeps even further ahead. It's just an amazing place. So, I tolerate the pain for the opportunity to enjoy my career to the fullest.

Odd, I find the bay rather stagnate. It's constantly chasing last weeks fad and a few years behind cutting edge research.

[deleted]

Re: The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups

#164

Post by readhn » Fri, Jul 21, 2017, 2:16 PM UTC

nck4222 wrote: post #136

readhn wrote: post #66

It's a self correcting cycle. Money pours in - salaries and living expenses go up - real estate goes up. Money flows out - everything shrinks. What goes up must come down. Everything is cyclical. SF economy is no exception.

Uhh, ever hear about the depression, dot com bubble, great recession/housing market crash? You're basically advocating "Let's do nothing, the market always corrects itself." Which is true to an extent, but in the extreme it also ruins lives, the country, and itself left unchecked during this process. This is why a completely unregulated market is a horrible idea. Government needs to step in at certain times. This mig…

>> Uhh, ever hear about the depression, dot com bubble, great recession/housing market crash?

All of these are cyclical repeating events. Look at the historical data. This is how humans function. Trying to control cycles is pointless and i would say impossible. You just have to be mindful of them and may be "pad" yourself when you reach the extremes.

Markets are pretty efficient at deciding what things are worth at the current point in time, trying to regulate that is again pointless. The issue we often have is collusion of interests (and government is full of that).

SF will resolve itself. Just let the market do its thing and this too shall pass..

Re: The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups

#165

Post by bluedino » Fri, Jul 21, 2017, 2:18 PM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #77

_pmf_ wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And the best way to fix Bart overcrowding is to build apartments near where people work so they don't HAVE to commute. Why not build businesses where people live? Apple can spend 5 billion on its new campus in the middle of nowhere, but the public has to shoulder the cost for transit. 90 percent of Google's and Apple's domestic workforce could probably do at least 70 percent of their work from home. Apple prides it…

Apple should have build a couple apartment towers next to it.

Then you'd have a bunch of millionaires in a price war to live right next to work

Re: The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups

#166

Post by abalone » Fri, Jul 21, 2017, 2:23 PM UTC

vedanta wrote: post #42

kevinburke wrote: post #6

Both top-level comments have mentioned housing prices. I grew up in the Bay Area and want to stay here and I am trying to work to change policy to help build more housing. Unfortunately due to law, bad policy and NIMBY's the market is not going to solve this problem on its own, without political change rents and housing prices will keep increasing. Here are some political actions you can take to help: - call your Sta…

There are also YIMBY orgs almost everywhere. The south bay YIMBY twitter account has updates on what you can do as well. From following the YIMBY movement ( http://www.slate.com/articles/business/metropolis/2017/06/yi... ) it's hard to not take the YIMBY position. More needs to be built, but we can have ~10% BMR requirements as ways of increasing diversity in a neighborhood and preserving some local control/culture.…

10% is way low. SF has been negotiating for 25% and up.[1]

BMR isn't just about culture and diversity. It's about teachers and service industry workers and everyone a functioning city needs. The gap is so large between market rate and affordability, and there are so many richer people still wanting to move into SF, that it is likely wishful thinking that market rate development will be "enough" to solve the problem.

And that is the reason why the Yimby position is not an obvious choice. Cities need to negotiate with developers to have sufficient BMR housing to be functional.

[1] http://48hills.org/2017/07/18/scott-wiener-trying-undermine-...

Re: The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups

#167

Post by Sleeep » Fri, Jul 21, 2017, 2:24 PM UTC

chrissnell wrote: post #69

fatbird wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People should give up. People should leave the area. They should move where they can find a job and a cost of living that's reasonable. The fact that people don't give up is why landlords can afford to charge $2,800/month for a 1 bedroom. You can't rent at $2,800/month if no one will sign the lease.

As someone living in the Midwest and telecommuting to SFBA, that's almost unbelievable to me. I pay less than that for my brand new and quite nice 5/4 house on almost half an acre of land. With all of the remote work available, why would you stay here? I manage a team with two remote-friendly job openings currently. You could work for me and go live in Telluride, CO for less than that East Bay 1br and still have mone…

What's a 5/4 house?

The Midwest is stereotypical for "affordable living" but I live in New England and it's fairly affordable here too in comparison. I own a three bedroom in town, with 20% down my P+I is $750 a month and PITI is $1275 a month. If I financed the whole thing the PITI would be $1462 a month. I think my housing cost is about average for the US.

Re: The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups

#168

Post by kevinburke » Fri, Jul 21, 2017, 2:25 PM UTC

e40 wrote: post #157

kevinburke wrote: post #6

Both top-level comments have mentioned housing prices. I grew up in the Bay Area and want to stay here and I am trying to work to change policy to help build more housing. Unfortunately due to law, bad policy and NIMBY's the market is not going to solve this problem on its own, without political change rents and housing prices will keep increasing. Here are some political actions you can take to help: - call your Sta…

Four large apartment buildings in the East Bay have been burned by arsonists (likely the same one or group) in the last year. One in Uptown a few weeks ago. One, in Emmeryville was burned down twice . I agree, we need to build more housing. It seems it's not quite that simple, though.

As an example of how Bay Area housing politics are silly.. there is a document that local governments use that purports to show that building more housing creates demand for even more housing, and use it to justify not building things.

By that logic, these arsons will help reduce rents in Oakland... it makes no sense.

Re: The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups

#169

Post by vonmoltke » Fri, Jul 21, 2017, 2:26 PM UTC

sotojuan wrote: post #158

rl3 wrote: post #61

What are the best alternatives to the Bay Area? Off the top of my head I'm thinking Portland, Seattle, Boston, Austin and Chicago in no particular order. The annoying part is that there's so much talent concentrated in the Bay Area that it makes going elsewhere very difficult, especially if you have specific senior talent in mind that have already established their lives there. Hopefully telepresence tech gets so goo…

NYC? It's not as expensive as people say, especially if you have a tech salary (which is about twice the median household income). If you have a family I think that changes things, though.

Depends on whether or not you are fine with either a studio or roommates. Even then it's hard to get an affordable place that is near the jobs.

Re: The Decline of Investment in San Francisco Startups

#170

Post by purplezooey » Fri, Jul 21, 2017, 2:27 PM UTC

amyjess wrote: post #144

Naritai wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you miss the part where BART is packed every commute hour? There are huge numbers of people in Oakland and the rest of the east bay. But the most efficient transportation system is one that doesn't have huge rush hour stresses, i.e. ones where people live close to where they work. So if the offices are getting built in SF, then so must be the housing.

> So if the offices are getting built in SF, This is the problem. Embrace edge cities, people. There's no reason to expect hundreds of thousands of people to commute to a downtown area. Scatter the businesses throughout the suburbs, dammit. Start locating new startups not just in Oakland but even farther out, in places such as Walnut Creek or Santa Rosa. Hell, maybe a tech influx could get the crime down in Stockton.

this. Too much herd-following and fear driving location choice.