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Tech workers swore off the Bay Area, now they’re coming back

nytimes.com

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Re: Tech workers swore off the Bay Area, now they’re coming back

#71

Post by the_third_wave »

yardie wrote: post #46

Most of these articles were written from a certain perspective for a certain demographic. I have friends with kids, who are minorities, who have decent/good paying jobs and they never entertained the idea for a second of moving from the Bay Area. We chatted weighing the good and bad of going full remote and moving to a less expensive city. Racism in SF or LA is bad, but it's a known quantity. Being a minority and hav…

What is it suddenly with all this talk about racism?

> Racism in SF or LA is bad...

> ...having to deal with racism in Boise, Idaho, for example, was something they didn't feel comfortable with...

Who are those racists and in what way do they express their racism?

I'm a European who has been on your side of the Atlantic and Pacific quite often for work- and leisure-related purposes over a period of several decades. If I can believe the current narrative things have been going from bad to worse to black people walk the streets in fear of their lives from racist cops in the last few years. This did not use to be the case, America was the "melting pot" or "salad bowl" or whatever metaphor you want to use where people divided by country of origin, religion, personal story and - yes - skin colour all came together under the stars and stripes to celebrate their country on the 4th of July. Now that same flag is being called a racist symbol by leading politicians, the 4th of July supposedly celebrates independence for only part of the population and more of such nonsensical inflammatory political rhetoric.

Either everyone has been blind for decades or the current narrative about racism is a lie meant to achieve some political purpose. I do not believe the former to be true so the latter seems to be the answer but that makes me wonder why the parent poster brought up the bad racism in SF and LA and the racism in Boise, Idaho.

Maybe I should point out that I use the traditional definition of the word racism as can be found in printed copies of dictionaries and encyclopedias from a few years ago. Is that the change which made it possible to claim racism is everywhere and if so, why do people use the new definition of the word?

Re: Tech workers swore off the Bay Area, now they’re coming back

#72

Post by mapgrep »

8458e112e7b2 wrote: post #4
wil421 wrote: post #3

Who pays for these kinds of articles? Is there some PR firm Big Tech funds to get these kinds of articles? Just doesn't seem like the type of stuff NYTimes really cares about but I guess clicks is all that matters.

It is quite clear that with these types of articles, NYTimes is pushing an agenda.

At least then there would be a consistent narrative, but if you look under the article you can see that in January they had a headline about how everyone was leaving.

Re: Tech workers swore off the Bay Area, now they’re coming back

#73

Post by okareaman »

bgentry wrote: post #56
okareaman wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, they're nice but it's like comparing skiing in New England with skiing in the Rockies or Sierras.

I didn’t say they were comparable to the Sierra Nevada or coastal ranges, was merely trying to understand your “trapped in a flat plane of existence” line. If we want to go for some real good skiing, Utah or Colorado are short flights and will likely have much better & more consistent snow than CA has for the past decade :)

I could fly anywhere, but there's something really nice about driving to the mountains for the weekend

Re: Tech workers swore off the Bay Area, now they’re coming back

#74

Post by ccmonnett »

prohobo wrote: post #13

Honest question: why would any new tech entrepreneur want to move to SF? The prices suck, and if you need to improve your network you can meet the vast majority of tech people online (IRC, Discord, email, online conferences). Weather?

You can hire developers/engineers anywhere but it's hard(er) to find leadership and/or VC connections elsewhere.

I moved from the Bay to Raleigh, NC. If I wanted to start a B2B AI SaaS company here, I could (probably) find dozens of good engineers locally to help me do that. If I want to hire a VPE who's "been there done that" and scaled a B2B SaaS engineering org to 200+ engineers, or 1,000+ customers, or $30M+ revenue... my options are going to be significantly more limited here than SF/SV.

Re: Tech workers swore off the Bay Area, now they’re coming back

#75

Post by salt-thrower »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #42
warglebargle wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

progressivism isn’t the problem in SF, I’m not sure how anyone can think their city level policies are progressive

SF isn’t idealistic/fantasy progressivism, it is what it progressivism looks like in practice.

Can you describe more of what you mean by that? What part of letting the richest companies on earth set up shop in your city and using little to none of that wealth to establish helpful social programs is progressive?

Re: Tech workers swore off the Bay Area, now they’re coming back

#77

Post by NationalPark »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #42
warglebargle wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

progressivism isn’t the problem in SF, I’m not sure how anyone can think their city level policies are progressive

SF isn’t idealistic/fantasy progressivism, it is what it progressivism looks like in practice.

This is obviously farcical because SF does not exist in a vacuum separate from the federal government or the desperately poor conservative areas that siphon tax revenues from the progressive cities. Let alone the fact that SF hyper capitalism is about as far from progressive economic beliefs as possible.

But by the same vacuum-logic, Kansas under Brownback is what conservatism looks like in practice: a massive, unmitigated failure so big that even the conservatives themselves raised taxes. And that’s with all that free tax money from well run states helping out.

Re: Tech workers swore off the Bay Area, now they’re coming back

#78

Post by codingwageslave »

the_third_wave wrote: post #71
yardie wrote: post #46

Most of these articles were written from a certain perspective for a certain demographic. I have friends with kids, who are minorities, who have decent/good paying jobs and they never entertained the idea for a second of moving from the Bay Area. We chatted weighing the good and bad of going full remote and moving to a less expensive city. Racism in SF or LA is bad, but it's a known quantity. Being a minority and hav…

What is it suddenly with all this talk about racism ? > Racism in SF or LA is bad... > ...having to deal with racism in Boise, Idaho, for example, was something they didn't feel comfortable with... Who are those racists and in what way do they express their racism? I'm a European who has been on your side of the Atlantic and Pacific quite often for work- and leisure-related purposes over a period of several decades.…

I completely agree.

Re: Tech workers swore off the Bay Area, now they’re coming back

#79

Post by stephencanon »

okareaman wrote: post #49
bgentry wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you spend any time in the hill country on the south/west parts of town? They have a very different feel than the flat parts.

Yes, they're nice but it's like comparing skiing in New England with skiing in the Rockies or Sierras.

The Sierra are fine if you live in CA, but I would take the VT/NH backcountry every time given a choice. The Rockies are a different story.

Re: Tech workers swore off the Bay Area, now they’re coming back

#80

Post by qshaman »

the_third_wave wrote: post #71
yardie wrote: post #46

Most of these articles were written from a certain perspective for a certain demographic. I have friends with kids, who are minorities, who have decent/good paying jobs and they never entertained the idea for a second of moving from the Bay Area. We chatted weighing the good and bad of going full remote and moving to a less expensive city. Racism in SF or LA is bad, but it's a known quantity. Being a minority and hav…

What is it suddenly with all this talk about racism ? > Racism in SF or LA is bad... > ...having to deal with racism in Boise, Idaho, for example, was something they didn't feel comfortable with... Who are those racists and in what way do they express their racism? I'm a European who has been on your side of the Atlantic and Pacific quite often for work- and leisure-related purposes over a period of several decades.…

As a latino, I can tell you what type of racism I have faced in the east coast, for example: - While chatting on the phone with a friend in Spanish, I get people screaming at me: "Speak English! This is America, go back to your country!!. ......" - "Chinga tu madre!! Mexican!" (I'm not Mexican) - "We dont speak Spanish here, sorry..." even tho I can communicate perfectly well in English. and many more, in my personal experience, the west coast is way better regarding racism, I have Pakistani friends who have had a pretty rough time living in Oklahoma. I agree that racism is being using as a political weapon, and all of that, but is truly more common in some places. If you are a white European, you will have a hard time seeing racism, compared with people who are not white.
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