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Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

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Re: Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

#251

Post by sokoloff »

triceratops wrote: post #212
sokoloff wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seemed clear enough to me. Your salary is less than or equal to the value you add (companies will usually not knowingly pay you more than you’re worth), not equal to it. The rest was expanding on that core point by computing the expected profit a company gains by hiring someone (value - salary [minus total costs, actually]) and that a company will seek to maximize its profits.

I guess I was confused by the use of the pronoun "it" right at the beginning. With no context, I had trouble deciding what it mean, or deciphering much of the post. What you explained is the only bit I was able to guess at on my own, mostly because it's common sense. The part about the mathematical viability of fairness was particularly quite puzzling.

I read the initial it as “your salary = your value add” giving a single point figure which is the upper bound of the inequality “your salary (It’s actually higher than what a sound company would pay, but if you switch salary out for “total cost to company”, it becomes correct again.)

Re: Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

#252

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

whimsicalism wrote: post #189
ticmasta wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> this makes zero sense to me, the value you add most likely doesn’t change because of where you live Salaries were/are so high because of the limited supply of qualified labour. If they now accept workers from everywhere the supply side constraint just got blown wide open.

Eh.. I think most of the top tech talent in America lives on the West coast or NYC. Sure, might open up to more people - but not "blown wide open."

This is because top tech talent is defined by the people who work in those cities ;)

In other words, I would be very surprised if you were correct, as not everyone has the capability (or desire) to move to large and expensive cities, and the likelihood is that there are lots of very very good people working in the rest of the country due to family situations/age/personal choice.

Re: Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

#253

Post by nomdep »

adamsea wrote: post #191
nomdep wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many techies are individualistic. That used to be considered left-leaning, but in the last years some people have been pushing the idea that is something from the right, instead. We didn't cross the border, the border crossed us.

Do these individualistic people wear masks or is that to collectivist? That’s the dealbreaker question for me right now. Point being, even individualists are part of a community.

Obviuosly. No one is an island. I should have said "individualistic-leaning".

Re: Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

#254

Post by throwaway0a5e »

Barrin92 wrote: post #238
howlgarnish wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "White flight", a largely racist reaction to the civil rights movement involving increased protests and riots in cities I think you have cause and effect reversed here. The original "pull" trigger was the automobile becoming affordable to the middle classes, making suburban living possible and leading to many leaving cities. The racist bit here is that many of these suburbs had covenants prohibiting non-whites. The…

>but here too the push wasn't just racism, but also concerns about falling property values, rising crime, etc. As a non-American you shouldn't be so quick to relativise the importance of racism because, outside of the US, where cars also exist, there never was a white flight. In fact in Europe the affluent pretty much always move into cities, not out of them, even though those cities also have a lot of the issues sur…

> outside of the US, where cars also exist, there never was a white flight.

Outside of the US economic circumstances in the 1950s and 1960 were very different and living in the suburbs and commuting to your job was not a possible option for economic reasons. Also, "slav flight" or whatever your European equivalent is just doesn't have that ring to it. There's plenty of segregation outside the US. It's just mostly between groups of similar skin tones.

Re: Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

#255

Post by throwaway0a5e »

asdff wrote: post #219
whimsicalism wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how your comment is at odds with what you're replying to. > cities are becoming visibly less safe Hm, I do not think this is true.

It's true in LA at least. Petty crime is unenforced and people are well aware of that fact. I've seen people smoking crack or shooting up in broad daylight plenty of times this year, sometimes in front of city workers who do not care. Seems like there is an assault or a stabbing or shooting every day in Hollywood now. People getting drunk every weekend playing with guns on Hollywood blvd watching some other drunk dum…

Not enforcing petty "crime with a victim" is a SoCal thing. You don't really have those issues in NYC, heck even in Baltimore, Newark or Trenton the cops won't pass up an opportunity for an easy arrest if they see someone prowling a bike rack with bolt cutters (and it won't be catch and release either, it'll be enough to make that kind of thing not worth the risk of doing flagrantly)

Regarding the public drug use and other publicly visible low class behavior shenanigans, there's a large portion of the public that just DGAF.

Re: Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

#256

Post by blantonl »

andrewacove wrote: post #208
blantonl wrote: post #82

I own a number of pieces of property in Whitefish Montana, where I decamped to the second my children were released from school for COVID reasons in March (we split time between TX and MT). Given what I felt were going to be significant economic disruptions due to unemployment and drops in income, I prepared myself with the understanding that our little resort town was going to be facing some hard times. Usually, sma…

I loved Whitefish when I was there, and would have considered it for the long term but was concerned about reports of a growing alt-right contingent in town. Have you encountered that?

Whitefish is exactly the opposite of your concerns. It is very similar to the "Austin" of Montana.

Re: Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

#257

Post by davidw »

gregkerzhner wrote: post #180
davidw wrote: post #31

I can't read the article, but this appears to be hitting us hard here in Bend, Oregon. House prices were already high and only appear to be going higher. I think more people could be a great thing if we get them involved locally, and if we add enough housing to accommodate them, which is tricky right now. As someone involved with a local YIMBY group, it's tough to see the prices - it felt like we were making some pro…

Just out of curiosity, how long have you been in Bend? My wife was born and raised in Bend and left in her mid 20s. Due to our out of state license plates and IDs she gets a fair amount of "please don't move here you out-of-stater" gruff, and it always feels silly coming from folks that themselves moved here for exact same reasons that the newcomers are flocking now.

A bit more than 5 years. And yes, there's this inane mentality that goes around about 'the new people ruining everything'. I get that attitude from someone who had relatives in the area in 1491, but from someone who moved here not that long ago, it's silly. I think Bend's a better place than when I was growing up on the other side of the mountains. More opportunities, more things to do, even some local tech companies.

Re: Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

#258

Post by whimsicalism »

asdff wrote: post #219
whimsicalism wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how your comment is at odds with what you're replying to. > cities are becoming visibly less safe Hm, I do not think this is true.

It's true in LA at least. Petty crime is unenforced and people are well aware of that fact. I've seen people smoking crack or shooting up in broad daylight plenty of times this year, sometimes in front of city workers who do not care. Seems like there is an assault or a stabbing or shooting every day in Hollywood now. People getting drunk every weekend playing with guns on Hollywood blvd watching some other drunk dum…

> Petty crime is unenforced and people are well aware of that fact.

a. The evidence just doesn't back up that enforcing petty crime in some way makes cities safer. Peaks of petty crime enforcement were in periods like the late 80s and 90s, which were when violent crime exploded.

> there is an assault or a stabbing or shooting every day in Hollywood now.

b. Crime statistics also don't back up the idea that violent crime is much worse now, especially when you consider the fact that we're talking about a comment comparing with the 80s/90s.

Do these things occur? Yes. Is it much worse than it has been historically? You've provided no evidence of that. Is it something likely to happen to you? Not really at all.

We ended the war on drugs and "broken windows" policing for a reason - it had huge negative impacts on people caught up in it and didn't actually succeed in making people safer. It would often create cycles of policing that made violence worse.

The crime in most cities has not substantially increased, if at all, the number of affluent, white people from suburbs who demand heavy enforcement against minor crimes in the city has.

Re: Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

#259

Post by whimsicalism »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #255
asdff wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's true in LA at least. Petty crime is unenforced and people are well aware of that fact. I've seen people smoking crack or shooting up in broad daylight plenty of times this year, sometimes in front of city workers who do not care. Seems like there is an assault or a stabbing or shooting every day in Hollywood now. People getting drunk every weekend playing with guns on Hollywood blvd watching some other drunk dum…

Not enforcing petty "crime with a victim" is a SoCal thing. You don't really have those issues in NYC, heck even in Baltimore, Newark or Trenton the cops won't pass up an opportunity for an easy arrest if they see someone prowling a bike rack with bolt cutters (and it won't be catch and release either, it'll be enough to make that kind of thing not worth the risk of doing flagrantly) Regarding the public drug use and…

> Baltimore, Newark or Trenton the cops won't pass up an opportunity for an easy arrest

Don't know about the others, but this is not true of Baltimore.

Honestly, the largest predictor of how often I hear about "rampant, unenforced crime" seems to be the proportion of people in the city who moved from the suburbs and are unused to cities.

> Regarding the public drug use and other publicly visible low class behavior shenanigans, there's a large portion of the public that just DGAF.

I'm one of them - visible poverty is sad, but it doesn't make me fear for my life or feel like more jailing is needed.

To me, as someone who grew up in a Baltimore-adjacent city, SF just seems like a city full of people who are city-inexperienced.

Re: Tech Workers Take to the Mountains, Bringing Silicon Valley with Them

#260

Post by code4tee »

ulfw wrote: post #139
code4tee wrote: post #59

I saw a great quote recently that said something like “Everyone loves work from home until you lose a deal to the competition that turned up to your customer in person.” There’s an element of truth to this. Best advice I’ve heard is to say the draw for living in a city may go away but you need to be close. Living in the middle of nowhere isn’t going to look like such a great idea when people start gathering together…

Not everyone is a salesman though. Why would an engineer need to be in an office coding away so "he can turn up to his customer"?

You live in the middle of nowhere and appear on Zoom calls. The rest of your team meets with company leaders in person. Who do you think has the best relationship with the leadership? Not saying it’s impossible to do this remotely but when others don’t it becomes very very hard. Applies to everything, not just sales. Full remote works until someone breaks the chain, then everyone working remotely is at a disadvantage.
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