Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

wsj.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 1001 posts

Re: Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

#51

Post by vmception »

kbos87 wrote: post #24

It seems very tough to draw any conclusions on this just yet. The media has clearly latched onto a storyline of a mass exodus from American cities, but the reality is probably much more complex. It seems plausible that SF already had such low inventory numbers that any change would look huge on a chart like this, though that doesn’t appear to be the case in the other highly competitive markets seen here. I’d love to…

> SF already had such low inventory numbers that any change would look huge on a chart like this

Bingo

Its a delta of a delta

I like the ones that show rent and pricing drops more

This chart is an additional footnote but not one to make an article about in isolation

Re: Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

#52

Post by ghaff »

ravenstine wrote: post #47

Putting any valid criticism of this article aside, anecdotally, I know a bunch of people who have either left or are in the process of leaving California in the last few months. One of them just left SF. In other news, one of my cousins is seriously working towards moving out of NY. 3 of my team members have moved to smaller parts of the country. Simply speaking, my gut tells me this isn't just about San Francisco. T…

And, as many other articles have noted, there is a danger of death spirals as in the past. Transit systems are having serious problems. City services in general are going to have very serious budget issues. And so forth. If you now have to buy a car to live in the city will you still stay?

Re: Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

#53

Post by roenxi »

wwwwwwwww wrote: post #34
Shivetya wrote: post #19

Somehow completely ignoring the issue with how the homeless have made many areas of the city uninviting. The pandemic is being exploited by both business and politicians alike to mask underlying issues in hopes of getting a free pass. The old don't look behind the curtain. Protest violence isn't helping any city; and the lie about Federal agents causing it was silences with continued violence long after they left; an…

> how the homeless have made many areas of the city uninviting That's a very ugly sentence. Its is not "the homeless" who made the city uninviting. That is like saying "the sick made this hospital uninviting". Homeless people need help. They are people in distress. Those who made the city uninviting are self-centered voters, who apparently can't give two shits about the situation, and keep voting people into power wh…

All analogies break down fairly quickly, so I'll preface this with a clear vote of support for what you said. But in this case the purpose of a hospital is to provide for the sick. The purpose of a city is to do the opposite of homelessness - a city is a massive collection of homes.

The existence of a large homeless population is concerning for reasons you allude to, but because a more appropriate analogy might be "the piles of corpses made the hospital uninviting". The point of a city is to not have homeless people and so something fundamental went wrong if there is a big homeless population.

Re: Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

#54

Post by 627467 »

For now my gut will just consider this trend to be of slowing down in urbanization (of large metropolis) trend rather than a reversal or collapse of large (quasi-)city-states.

If anything, this will improve the live of those who can't move out of big cities. And cities will hopefully have some breathing room to make different kind of decisions now that some of the citizens have left.

Re: Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

#55

Post by lucidguppy »

ghaff wrote: post #49
bamboozled wrote: post #40

Have others noticed this kind of "revolt against cities" attitude lately too? I do wonder if people consider the huge advantages city living can provide? I'm reading constantly that current dream is buying a plot of land in the middle no where, signing up for StarLink and growing watermelons while trying to work a full time engineering job. The thing is though, this is all just a temporary thing, even if this pandemi…

On the other hand, in the US, people had been net migrating out of many cities--including today's "elite" cities--until around the late 90s for about the previous 40-50 years. The current idea that young people all want to live in cities is relatively recent. When I graduated from grad school in the mid-80s, essentially no one from my class who went to work in the Boston area actually lived in the city.

I wonder when the country will realize that the rush hour traffic of the nation is a drag on the economy and should be addressed as serious as any emergency.

We need livable towns and cities with good schools where anybody can move anywhere.

Re: Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

#56

Post by BurningFrog »

_8j50 wrote: post #36
Shivetya wrote: post #19

Somehow completely ignoring the issue with how the homeless have made many areas of the city uninviting. The pandemic is being exploited by both business and politicians alike to mask underlying issues in hopes of getting a free pass. The old don't look behind the curtain. Protest violence isn't helping any city; and the lie about Federal agents causing it was silences with continued violence long after they left; an…

Ok, give the homeless homes and don't complain about homeless shelters in your upscale neighborhood. Reform police, there are major american cities with protests and minimal violence. You complain about symptoms with no regard for the root cause.

No one can fix the root causes.

But everyone can move to somewhere functional.

Re: Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

#57

Post by vmception »

ravenstine wrote: post #47

Putting any valid criticism of this article aside, anecdotally, I know a bunch of people who have either left or are in the process of leaving California in the last few months. One of them just left SF. In other news, one of my cousins is seriously working towards moving out of NY. 3 of my team members have moved to smaller parts of the country. Simply speaking, my gut tells me this isn't just about San Francisco. T…

> I would love to live in a city if it didn't both punish success and fail to help those whom are truly in need.

I’ve never heard this put so succinctly, or I can relate to it more now.

I like dating “spiritual” women but I have seriously considered living in a shittier place in SF so they didn't feel uneasy or “misaligned” as they say. I have literally heard “makes me suspicious” [0]. Working professionals love the place/decor/view though but they aren’t as fun.

There are self-proclaimed communists in SF and coastal east bay towns. Its a little jarring.

[0] One of my boys - who is twice my age - said “if you want to attract trust funded hippies, just say you are a drug dealer but that you only have thc edibles right now”. I have yet to do that but I could see that working well, from my own observations.

Maybe not the best environment if there are places that celebrate material success but also dont cost as much or have favelas literally at the ground level.

Re: Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

#58

Post by ghaff »

627467 wrote: post #54

For now my gut will just consider this trend to be of slowing down in urbanization (of large metropolis) trend rather than a reversal or collapse of large (quasi-)city-states. If anything, this will improve the live of those who can't move out of big cities. And cities will hopefully have some breathing room to make different kind of decisions now that some of the citizens have left.

>If anything, this will improve the live of those who can't move out of big cities.

Maybe. Will that still be true if transit systems and city services generally are in disarray and many of your nice restaurants, cafes, and bars shuttered?

Re: Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

#59

Post by wwwwwwwww »

roenxi wrote: post #53
wwwwwwwww wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> how the homeless have made many areas of the city uninviting That's a very ugly sentence. Its is not "the homeless" who made the city uninviting. That is like saying "the sick made this hospital uninviting". Homeless people need help. They are people in distress. Those who made the city uninviting are self-centered voters, who apparently can't give two shits about the situation, and keep voting people into power wh…

All analogies break down fairly quickly, so I'll preface this with a clear vote of support for what you said. But in this case the purpose of a hospital is to provide for the sick. The purpose of a city is to do the opposite of homelessness - a city is a massive collection of homes. The existence of a large homeless population is concerning for reasons you allude to, but because a more appropriate analogy might be "t…

> the purpose of a hospital is to provide for the sick

And the purpose of society is to provide for its people. All of them.

Re: Remote work is reshaping San Francisco, as tech workers flee and rents fall

#60

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

lucidguppy wrote: post #55
ghaff wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, in the US, people had been net migrating out of many cities--including today's "elite" cities--until around the late 90s for about the previous 40-50 years. The current idea that young people all want to live in cities is relatively recent. When I graduated from grad school in the mid-80s, essentially no one from my class who went to work in the Boston area actually lived in the city.

I wonder when the country will realize that the rush hour traffic of the nation is a drag on the economy and should be addressed as serious as any emergency. We need livable towns and cities with good schools where anybody can move anywhere.

For comparison, US commute times are close to the shortest among developed countries. I don’t know much about school quality, but most towns and cities in the country allow people to easily get where they want to be.

(source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/521886/travel-time-spent...)

Post reply on HN