Live data from Hacker News

California’s population shrinks for third straight year

sacbee.com

71–80 of 413 posts

Re: California’s population shrinks for third straight year

#71
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You get anger and vitriol because your views are part of the problem. NIMBY’s pull up the ladder and try to turn a nice semi-affordable car into a Porsche then tell everyone “sorry, it’s just expensive to be here. Not my fault!”

It's not a problem to me, that's the point. By saying I am a part of the problem, what you really mean is that my views are an obstacle to you getting what you want.

> It's not a problem to me, that's the point.

We get it, you don't care about anyone else, only yourself. This was already clear from your previous comments.

Re: California’s population shrinks for third straight year

#72
post #58

People are doing the math. If you make enough money in California you pay 10% of your income in taxes. First of all, what do you get from that 10% you pay that don't get in other states with lower or no income taxes? For the people paying the taxes the answer is not much. People also fail to account for the fact that the 10% they are paying is 10% of their GROSS income, not net after federal taxes. So if you are alre…

People inflate the amount of state income tax they have to pay in California. Yes the rates are high but so are the deductions. Some years ago I had to deal with California income tax for various reasons. I think at that time you had to earn over 50K to hit 9% marginal. In my state you hit that at about 16K. And this is after deductions where California had a ton more. I believe one needed an income of over 100K befo…

I think overall taxes are undercounted in California because the state taxes absolutely everything. California has the highest income tax and highest sales tax in the US. Throw in the grocery bag taxes, and all the other random taxes in that state you are just paying an absurd amount for nothing.

Re: California’s population shrinks for third straight year

#74
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a problem to everyone. For example, it's not a problem to many homeowners that the value of their homes keep going up and to the right. Living in California is expensive, in more ways than just housing. Not everyone can afford it. Just like not everyone can afford a new BMW. In my corner of the state, people who increasingly cannot afford to live here are noisy. I mostly don't engage because I'm aware that I…

Yes, if we made it illegal to manufacture new lawnmowers or sofas or iPhones, then the value of the existing lawnmowers, sofas, and iPhones would skyrocket, which would be (at least in the naive accounting [0]) very good for the current owners of lawnmowers, sofas, and iPhones -- but hopefully you can see how ridiculous that is as policy. [0] I say "naive accounting," because it's not so great if you ever need to buy…

Like most analogies, those fail.

One person's quality of life is not affected in any way by another person having a sofa.

More housing and population density does lead to increased crowding, which some people consider a decrease in quality of life.

We can argue which QOL argument outweighs the other, but it's plain wrong to say that increasing housing has no impact on existing residents.

Re: California’s population shrinks for third straight year

#75
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing wrong with decreasing population, but when your richest citizens are leaving, and poor migrants are coming in, then you start having fiscal problems, particularly for a state that has decided to fund itself with income and sales taxes rather than property taxes. Another reason why property tax is a more stable funding source -- unlike income, you can't take it with you. There is a whole list of reforms that C…

> when your richest citizens are leaving But the article says "a majority" of those leaving were middle- or low-income people.

That's entirely consistent with 100 billionaires moving out.

Re: California’s population shrinks for third straight year

#76
post #43

Moved from the bay to Texas because of everything i heard. It was such a horrible experience. The heat, the bugs, the lack of density. So few days of good weather. Maybe worth it to some, but a bigger house was not worth it to me at all. We moved back in 6 months. So many people want to live in California which causes more issues

I decide to summer someplace rural in summer 2021 to see how I would do. It was a 5 week rental, nice vacation.

It’s not just being indoors more but also being uncomfortable indoors. Boo

Re: California’s population shrinks for third straight year

#77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well they did just pass a bunch of laws last year to upzone the whole state, crush NIMBY zoning BS and lower permitting requirements for dense development near transit stops. Builder’s remedy is already being applied against NIMBY communities like Santa Monica and Redondo beach, no take backs. It takes time to build the homes and see the impact but it’s hard to say that they’re not moving strongly in the right direct…

> Well they did just pass a bunch of laws last year to upzone the whole state Have you seen the particulars of that law that upzoned the state? It's actually extremely weak: "* Benefits homeowners NOT institutional investors. Recent amendments require a local agency to impose an owner occupancy requirement as a condition of a homeowner receiving a ministerial lot split. This bill also prohibits the development of sma…

local NIMBY density restrictions still have to comply with all the other state laws regarding submitting plans to increase housing units.

If the state says no that’s not enough units you are just jerking us around, then the municipality is out of compliance and builders are basically autopermitted to build whatever they want (oversimplifying but look at builder’s remedy - it’s already being applied).

One of the important wrinkles is that there’s no take backs, once the city is back in compliance they can’t go back and stop things that were permitted in the meantime. It’s a very serious “fix it on your own terms or we’ll fix it for you and you won’t like it” approach.

Santa Monica is getting like 5000 new housing units all at once, 800 of them affordable housing, in tall apartment buildings because they threw a fit and refused to get in compliance and they found out just how serious the state is.

NIMBYs wail and gnash their teeth but all it does is expose that their “plans” are all a load of BS smoke and mirrors to max out boomer property values. If the plans were good enough, they’d be in compliance with the state and get to keep the “character of their neighborhood” or whatever.

Re: California’s population shrinks for third straight year

#78
post #61
post #43

Moved from the bay to Texas because of everything i heard. It was such a horrible experience. The heat, the bugs, the lack of density. So few days of good weather. Maybe worth it to some, but a bigger house was not worth it to me at all. We moved back in 6 months. So many people want to live in California which causes more issues

Sounds like me! I'm moving back to CA after ~2 years in Dallas. I didn't hate Dallas, but my fiancee does. But yeah the weather is awful: 115 degree summers, below-freezing winters.

[deleted]

Re: California’s population shrinks for third straight year

#79
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a problem to everyone. For example, it's not a problem to many homeowners that the value of their homes keep going up and to the right. Living in California is expensive, in more ways than just housing. Not everyone can afford it. Just like not everyone can afford a new BMW. In my corner of the state, people who increasingly cannot afford to live here are noisy. I mostly don't engage because I'm aware that I…

> It's not a problem to everyone. For example, it's not a problem to many homeowners that the value of their homes keep going up and to the right "Increasing price of cars during pandemic not an issue for people who already have cars." Yes, people are upset that the government pushes policies that hurt people, and that make no sense generationally (intentionally targeting rising property values is just a generational…

> If your stance is apathy or even pleasure upon seeing the suffering caused by bad policy, it's no wonder you're being downvoted.

There was absolutely nothing in the comment to imply he derived "pleasure from seeing suffering." You are making that leap in bad faith.

I think the build-or-not argument might be more productive if the "YIMBY" side would acknowledge that a massive increases in housing density (and therefore population density) does have an effect on existing residents.

Re: California’s population shrinks for third straight year

#80
post #43

Moved from the bay to Texas because of everything i heard. It was such a horrible experience. The heat, the bugs, the lack of density. So few days of good weather. Maybe worth it to some, but a bigger house was not worth it to me at all. We moved back in 6 months. So many people want to live in California which causes more issues

You didn’t visit or research local climate before moving?
Post reply on HN