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Schwab Leaves San Francisco for Texas

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131–140 of 325 posts

Re: Schwab Leaves San Francisco for Texas

#131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"Cheap real estate" And the highest property tax rate in the nation.

High property taxes are one of the most liberal policies of Texas. It's a progressive tax that is largely shouldered by rich landowners and the revenue form a large part of budget for public school systems. I'm not sure why people in California love our regressive Prop 13 tax rebates that largely benefit the wealthy and are a cause of huge budget deficits. Prop 13 is the most Republican policy we have in our state.

If high property taxes are liberal - why wouldn’t high taxes on other forms of wealth be beneficial?

Re: Schwab Leaves San Francisco for Texas

#132
post #106

Am I the only one who thinks nobody is talking about the elephant in the room ? i.e. the cause and effect. Fintech companies like Robinhood have popularized the concept of (a) zero fee trading and (b) better UI/UX and just better service/offering on highly scalable platforms that allow them to introduce new products/services, which are virtually impossible for legacy providers like Schwab. Seems like that is the sing…

Schwab has a great website, and has for a lot longer than Robinhood has been a thing. Also, they stopped charging commissions on trades as well.

Schwab is pretty great. If your only frame of reference is Robinhood, you should really look into it.

Re: Schwab Leaves San Francisco for Texas

#133
post #106

Am I the only one who thinks nobody is talking about the elephant in the room ? i.e. the cause and effect. Fintech companies like Robinhood have popularized the concept of (a) zero fee trading and (b) better UI/UX and just better service/offering on highly scalable platforms that allow them to introduce new products/services, which are virtually impossible for legacy providers like Schwab. Seems like that is the sing…

Will be interested to see robinhoods "financials" when they finally release them. It's likely their business model is of the "give free stuff away and raise more funding" variety.

Re: Schwab Leaves San Francisco for Texas

#134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would the government review a headquarters move?

It sounds like they'll be keeping a sizable amount of staff in SF still. SF has a gross receipts tax on certain companies with HQ's in the city. As such auditors will want to ensure this isn't just a tax avoidance gimmick. By pairing this move with an acquisition Charles Schwab has a stronger defense against such an accusation.

Tax avoidance "scam". Moving to Texas to reduce taxes, especially SF taxes which are basically useless to the payer [1], [2] is a "scam"? What's the legal framework preventing moves out of SF? Is it indentured slavery to the city council if you ever open an office in SF?

[1]: https://www.newsweek.com/san-francisco-district-attorney-pub...

[2]: https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2019/04/15/map...

Re: Schwab Leaves San Francisco for Texas

#135
post #7

Welcome to the Lone Star State! Cheap real estate and friendly folks. And BBQ, metric tons of BBQ...

Westlake does not have cheap real estate.

Austin is the least affordable of the Texas metros. The affordable ones are Houston, San Antonio, and Dallas/Fort Worth (basically any major metro outside of Austin).

Re: Schwab Leaves San Francisco for Texas

#137
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Friendly if you're the right political party and orientation, I hear.

Seriously, Texans in the cities may be redneck compared to the rest of the country, but holy fucking shit are they friendly as hell. If you suck in social situations, you will find plenty of extroverts that will gladly make you feel included in a group of strangers.

It really is best to come experience it in person. Yes, there's always stupid people doing stupid things anywhere and it's certainly a conservative state, but people are generally much more tolerant and intelligent than the stereotypes.

The stereotypes are hilarious. I'm a computer scientist and spent 9 months at IBM's TJ Watson facility up in New York outside the city. Every person I contacted to rent a room from made a point to tell me that I'd have to leave my horse at home because they didn't have a stable. They uniformly were shocked in disbelief when I explained I owned no horses, no cowboy hat, no boots. The horror...

Re: Schwab Leaves San Francisco for Texas

#138

I just moved to the Bay Area and I have no good opinions about living here. It’s a 3 trillion dollar neighborhood that has broken infrastructure, an abysmal housing situation, crime through the roof, homeless people everywhere, traffic, outrageous costs and just generally an awful place to live. I don’t know about the business side, but from an employee standpoint, fuck the Bay Area. Oh, and my car got broken into tw…

Then why are you here? For your own sake, please leave if you are so unhappy.

I would love to leave if I could take my job with me.

Re: Schwab Leaves San Francisco for Texas

#140
post #7

Welcome to the Lone Star State! Cheap real estate and friendly folks. And BBQ, metric tons of BBQ...

And large industrial accidents in your back yard, hooray for no zoning laws!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Fertilizer_Company_explos...

https://www.beaumontenterprise.com/news/article/The-latest-E...

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