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Why Silicon Valley is not the second coming of the Gilded Age

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Re: Why Silicon Valley is not the second coming of the Gilded Age

#41

Post by jbooth »

pg wrote: post #22
smacktoward wrote: post #19

The fundamental error of this piece is that it assumes that if you vote Democratic, you're by definition not a one-percenter. But this is just wrong. There are lots of one-percenters who vote Democratic. They just mostly feel more strongly about cultural-liberalism issues than they do about economic ones. But when it comes to economic issues, these folks still tend to lean rightward; they overestimate the degree of s…

The fundamental error of this piece is that it assumes that if you vote Democratic, you're by definition not a one-percenter. What? Much of the article is devoted to making the opposite point: that the SV elite overwhelmingly support the Democrats.

Not to mention that there's a line of reasoning for 1%ers to support the democratic party's centrist economic policies in the name of self-interest -- richer consumers to buy stuff means more sales for those selling it, better infrastructure is good for business, etc.

Some might disagree with that reasoning but it's really missing the mark to consider rich democrats as some sort of 'self hating rich' or 'culture voters ignoring economic policy'.

Re: Why Silicon Valley is not the second coming of the Gilded Age

#42

Post by ChuckMcM »

I really loved the insight about how tech companies distribute the wealth created by their growth. When it goes widely you end up with people like Charlie Ayers (Google's chef) who are able to leave and create their own restaurants (more jobs, more creativity). When you keep all the wealth generation to a hand picked set of individuals, it seems you create obligation and cronyism.

And for me, the most amazing part, is that since it looks externally 'easy', success results in a rush of folks who want to do that too.

When people ask my advice about interviewing at a place like Google I tell them, "Don't interview at Google just because you want to work at Google, interview there because there is something you want to accomplish that you can do more easily at Google than anywhere else." Or people asking for advice on creating a startup, where one of the questions is "What should I build?"

Here is a news alert :-) If you don't already feel passionately about building something you don't want to be the person starting the startup. Work at one or two and figure out what it takes to build a company, what works and what doesn't, and be thinking about how your talents might solve a problem in a way that would be useful. Until then, don't quit your day job.

Re: Why Silicon Valley is not the second coming of the Gilded Age

#43

Post by dmix »

> True libertarians would be repulsed at the thought, but the success of Silicon Valley even suggests that governments could do much more to encourage these kinds of internal compensation structures, in the name of better business and social cohesion. (Not to mention old-fashioned fairness.)

Wait, what part did the government play in how tech-companies compensate their employees fairly? Or does he mean the government should be applying to same structure by force on companies in other industries (to share equity with employees)?

Does the author not understand the difference between startup culture vs big business?

Re: Why Silicon Valley is not the second coming of the Gilded Age

#44

Post by dmmalam »

loganfrederick wrote: post #27
dmmalam wrote: post #10

"I would be surprised if there were any new industry in the history of capitalism that distributed its economic rewards to its employees as widely as Silicon Valley has." Wall street has been distributing most of it's profits to employees in the form of bonuses for decades. Though unlike SV, it get criticised heavily (a lot unfairly IMHO) for it. Having worked in both, I feel they are full of the same 'type' of peopl…

Having worked with both, they are not quite the same type of people. You might find some similar personality traits (ego, intelligence, and/or arrogance). But there is one major difference: The typical Silicon Valley worker is much more capable of creating a product or service than the average Wall Streeter. This is anecdotal, but the i-bankers I have worked with and met generally have a limited skillset which boils…

Yea, I did mean personality traits, and moreso sale/trading/asset management than pure i-banking/PE.

However while the typical wall steeter used to be a liberal arts major, it has heavily shifted toward STEM. At most i-banks, something like a third of headcount are tech. Even many of the front office are engineers, though again moreso in trading/asset management. Nowadays a large part of the competitive advantage comes from better software - a classic example of 'software eating the world'.

Anecdotally some of the brightest people I've known were at BGI (now Blackrock), and they all had deep knowledge in finance, math, stats, tech and old school boys club company politics. [my old boss read math cambridge with stephen hawking and created the first and now biggest by AUM electronic portfolio management system for index funds, grinold & kahn literately [1] wrote the book on active portfolio management, etc]

[1] http://www.amazon.com/Active-Portfolio-Management-Quantitati...

Re: Why Silicon Valley is not the second coming of the Gilded Age

#45

Post by jfb »

jbooth wrote: post #41
pg wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fundamental error of this piece is that it assumes that if you vote Democratic, you're by definition not a one-percenter. What? Much of the article is devoted to making the opposite point: that the SV elite overwhelmingly support the Democrats.

Not to mention that there's a line of reasoning for 1%ers to support the democratic party's centrist economic policies in the name of self-interest -- richer consumers to buy stuff means more sales for those selling it, better infrastructure is good for business, etc. Some might disagree with that reasoning but it's really missing the mark to consider rich democrats as some sort of 'self hating rich' or 'culture vote…

Or even that the Democratic party isn't a creature of finance. Since Wall Street has largely captured both parties, a plutocrat can vote on social issues without worrying overmuch about their pocketbook.

Re: Why Silicon Valley is not the second coming of the Gilded Age

#46

Post by cpursley »

strlen wrote: post #28
d4vlx wrote: post #3

This article conflates Libertarians with Republicans which I don't think makes sense in Silicon Valley. Yes, nationwide they tend to be in the same group but not in the valley. Judging from comments on HN the valley does sound quite libertarian but not the kind that register and vote Republican. It seems more intellectual and based in logic while Republicans are more about dogma and scoring political points.

I would say there are few dominant strands of political views in Silicon Valley: * "Liberaltarian" ( http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/liberaltarians ). Generally libertarian views (support for free markets, drug de-criminalization, gay rights, right to bear arms, open borders, etc...) but where views on social issues (namely basic civil liberties, gay rights, drug de-criminalization, open borders) trump (b…

You are spot-on.

Re: Why Silicon Valley is not the second coming of the Gilded Age

#47

Post by cpursley »

jbooth wrote: post #36
jmduke wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Judging from comments on HN the valley does sound quite libertarian but not the kind that register and vote Republican. It seems more intellectual and based in logic while Republicans are more about dogma and scoring political points. I think deciding half the nation eschews logic and intellect in favor of dogma and 'political points' is an extremely unfortunate move. People are not the pastiches you see on TV and Hu…

More like half of that half. There's polls on how many people still think Saddam had WMDs or think Obama was born in Kenya or whatever. That's still enough to swing primaries and give us the current Congress. I think a good number of small-l libertarians would consider voting Republican if they were a reasonable alternative and if Obama was actually the socialist he's made out to be. But the fact is, they're not and…

"But the fact is, they're not and he isn't."

Exactly. And a lot of libertarians (like me) are to busy making stuff to vote. Plus, we don't want that 'lessor of two evils' guilt hanging over our heads.

Re: Why Silicon Valley is not the second coming of the Gilded Age

#48

Post by kyllo »

pyoung wrote: post #20
d4vlx wrote: post #3

This article conflates Libertarians with Republicans which I don't think makes sense in Silicon Valley. Yes, nationwide they tend to be in the same group but not in the valley. Judging from comments on HN the valley does sound quite libertarian but not the kind that register and vote Republican. It seems more intellectual and based in logic while Republicans are more about dogma and scoring political points.

I think he did a good job at making the distinction. Not sure if you got the jist of it, but he clearly states that despite the heavy libertarian leaning culture, SV overwhelmingly voted for Democrats the last few elections, indicating they were not on board with the Republican platform. My take on it is that SV is 'liberaltarian', in that they prefer small, efficient, decentralized organizational structures, but tha…

My take on it is that SV is 'liberaltarian', in that they prefer small, efficient, decentralized organizational structures, but that they also recognize the need for social welfare as a stabilizing force.

That's how I see it as well.

The fact is, that there is a strong demand for social insurance/welfare services (e.g. health insurance, unemployment stipends, retirement pensions, etc), and the supply of those services can either come mostly from the government (as it tends to in Western Europe) or mostly from employers (as it tends to in the US).

"Liberaltarians," I think, believe that we're better off letting the government provide the social insurance services to everyone, so that citizens' access to them is no longer dependent on employment, which will increase liquidity in the labor market and take some of the risk out of entrepreneurship. Then employers also won't have to be burdened with providing and administrating these expensive "benefits." Win-win.

Meanwhile, people that live in sparsely-populated rural areas believe that they have less demand for social services, and that their tax dollars are paying for the social services that are only consumed by low-income city-dwellers. I've read studies that show this is false, and most rural counties consume more tax dollars than they contribute, mostly due to farm subsidies. Regardless, that seems to be the main economic concern of rural Republican voters.

Re: Why Silicon Valley is not the second coming of the Gilded Age

#49

Post by cpursley »

YokoZar wrote: post #32

A much simpler point the author missed is that wealth doesn't exactly cause the housing shortage so much as not building houses. San Francisco has rent control, and most of the peninsula has severe zoning controls. It would be extraordinarily profitable to build commercial buildings with dense lofted apartments in many areas of the peninsula, however they are simply prohibited by local governments. That's neither lib…

One of my first thoughts when he mentioned housing as well.
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