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70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

sfgate.com

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Re: 70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

#21
post #11
post #6

Dupe of: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27724699

Both are posted by relatively new accounts (green usernames). This one's most recent comment is shallow complaining about diversity/equity/enclusion. The previous one is named "FreeSpeech" and linked in the comments to a post about Soros. People are pushing an agenda on you. Sam Altman himself has now started saying that if the facts don't match his feelings, we need to look harder until we find facts that do: https:…

I looked, and found no evidence at all that those two accounts are related.

Be careful not to read too much into specific data points. Randomness plus cognitive bias equals narrative—and making a big rhetorical narrative about it is almost certainly a bad idea.

Re: 70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

#22
post #2

As a former resident, I'd be curious how the 30% who haven't had a decline in quality of life... live? How are they avoiding all of the change?

Maybe they are criminals. They can steal all they want and not go to prison. Sounds like heaven for a thief.

Re: 70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

#23
post #11
post #6

Dupe of: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27724699

Both are posted by relatively new accounts (green usernames). This one's most recent comment is shallow complaining about diversity/equity/enclusion. The previous one is named "FreeSpeech" and linked in the comments to a post about Soros. People are pushing an agenda on you. Sam Altman himself has now started saying that if the facts don't match his feelings, we need to look harder until we find facts that do: https:…

1) Who cares what Sam Altman says? By SV standards, he's not successful.

2) What Jeff Bezos meant was that people often measure the wrong thing. He wasn't saying facts are bad, he's saying their interpretation can be, so look for the underlying truth.

That's different than valuing feelings over facts, which is what you're referring to. Which is what our current post-fact society looks like, especially the gynocracy.

(An example of the above is that I worked at a place where the monthly availability reports always said 99.99% uptime, yet when you sshed into a random server at any time, the app server was down, and customers said they couldn't log in. We never explained why the metrics were inaccurate, but we went through and fixed 200 servers and at the end the reports matched the customer experience (reduction in support calls) - 99.99%.)

Re: 70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

#24
post #2

As a former resident, I'd be curious how the 30% who haven't had a decline in quality of life... live? How are they avoiding all of the change?

I’ve lived in north beach for about 11 years. Not really sure how to answer your question other than to say I still love it as much as the day I moved in.

I have everything I need within walking distance. The weather is incredible. I’ve never been robbed or had any particularly bad experiences (I’m relatively tall and a man so ymmv).

I don’t know, from my perspective it’s a pretty great city unless you have to spend a lot of time in SOMA or the tenderloin.

I can certainly understand why others haven’t had the same experience. But I don’t think it’s surprising that 3 in 10 are able to say they still enjoy it. It all comes down to when you moved here, where you live, and how much you’re paying.

Re: 70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

#25
post #13

As an SF native, I can absolutely corroborate this. Its never been as bad as it has in the last 5 years. The Poopocalypse started under Gavin in 2003 and has continually gotten far worse. The new DA has made it 10x worse.

Okay, 50% worse or something I could maybe buy, but 1000%? You're giving a single bureaucrat way too much credit. People always seem to believe that there was some magical time when San Francisco was an artist's refuge, and the rent was cheap, and there was no crime. I don't buy it. I was driving with my father a while back, and he pointed out the apartment where he used to live. And the spot down the street where the under-aged prostitutes used to hang out. Parts of the city have been a mess longer than anyone has been alive. Some are improving, some are getting worse. Let's not pretend that firing one person would somehow fix all of that.

Re: 70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

#26
post #2

As a former resident, I'd be curious how the 30% who haven't had a decline in quality of life... live? How are they avoiding all of the change?

Car theft is way up, but goes largely unnoticed by those without cars, or have private parking. Uber/Lyft just doesn't work sometimes now, but those that don't use either service aren't going to notice.

It's sad that eg the bbq joint down the street closed down, but I can't wait to see what ends up there next! Will it be a fancy tea place? or have some sort of interesting delicious fusion food? It's sad they didn't survive covid, but all of the restaurants I'll miss aren't a 30% hit to the quality of life - there are a bunch of restaurants that managed to survive, and even some that opened up during the pandemic!

For those that had never really explored their neighborhood until the pandemic, finding awesome things nearby their house like a hidden garden actually improves life from before the pandemic! I became close friends during the pandemic to some acquaintences, and it's absolutely improved my quality of life.

Change isn't necessarily bad, so the 30% aren't avoiding the change - they're embracing it, celebrating the good parts, complaining about the old and new problems, but not letting it dampen their optimism for the future.

Re: 70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

#27

As an outsider who visits yearly it seems like an opportunity to me. Of course the last time I visited was 2019. I’m in the odd position of not knowing what my job will be in specifically six months, and I know I can find something there. Time will tell, my wife’s job is where I am right now. It’s something I’ve never been able to do and always wanted, and I think I can manage it financially now. I should probably re…

To make myself more clear. SF has jobs, weather, things to do, surrounding nature, a world class airport, and ... high vaccination rates. I can't think of another US city that has all these. With crime and reportedly subpar public schools, I'd probably be thinking differently with a kid. But I can't name a single city that has those as well.

Re: 70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

#28
post #7
post #2

As a former resident, I'd be curious how the 30% who haven't had a decline in quality of life... live? How are they avoiding all of the change?

Probably the homeless folks.

That would still leave SF homeless underrepresented on HN.

Re: 70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

#29
post #13

As an SF native, I can absolutely corroborate this. Its never been as bad as it has in the last 5 years. The Poopocalypse started under Gavin in 2003 and has continually gotten far worse. The new DA has made it 10x worse.

Okay, 50% worse or something I could maybe buy, but 1000%? You're giving a single bureaucrat way too much credit. People always seem to believe that there was some magical time when San Francisco was an artist's refuge, and the rent was cheap, and there was no crime. I don't buy it. I was driving with my father a while back, and he pointed out the apartment where he used to live. And the spot down the street where th…

A lot of strawmanning here.

As someone who lived in SF for over 10 years I can tell you that in the first 7 years there were zero homeless tents at Mission / Van Ness and in the following 3 years the street was lined up with them.

There were zero homeless in the tunnel to Powell station and then the tunnel was lined up with them. You could not only see but also smell.

I don't know how to express going from 0 homeless to "have I been teleported to a favela?" in percentages. You can't divide by 0.

Yeah, SF never was a paradise but now it's definitely a slum.

Re: 70% of respondents say quality of life in San Francisco has declined

#30
post #13

As an SF native, I can absolutely corroborate this. Its never been as bad as it has in the last 5 years. The Poopocalypse started under Gavin in 2003 and has continually gotten far worse. The new DA has made it 10x worse.

Okay, 50% worse or something I could maybe buy, but 1000%? You're giving a single bureaucrat way too much credit. People always seem to believe that there was some magical time when San Francisco was an artist's refuge, and the rent was cheap, and there was no crime. I don't buy it. I was driving with my father a while back, and he pointed out the apartment where he used to live. And the spot down the street where th…

Its a cascade of bad bureaucrats but the latest one takes the cake in being horrendous.

The open violence has exploded, period.

The crime against artists in the 1990's was VERY very low, and the rent was affordable.

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