This is why I'm very reluctant to buy a million dollar shack here in Silicon Valley. What if the tech industry goes on the same trajectory as the automobile industry, and San Francisco ends up being the Detroit of the 2020's? Is there something intrinsically "magic" about the Bay Area, or is it just the coincidental clustering of tech companies that makes this place special?
The house I was born in sold for $4000
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Re: The house I was born in sold for $4000
#62More startup needs to move to low cost areas.
It's better for well established players to move to low cost areas. Startups need to be in places where there is abundance of talent. Engineering salary are extremely high as-is, it would be nigh impossible to make them move to the middle of nowhere.
Engineer salaries are not "extremely high". Compared to cost-of-living, they're more than adequate and on the high side by historical standards, but not "extremely high". In fact, most engineers make less than all those supernumerary non-technical VPs and product managers for nonexistent products that plague VC-funded companies.
"Extremely" high starts around $350k per year for a mid-career (10 years) engineer and things aren't at that point right now.
Re: The house I was born in sold for $4000
#63I left Western NY decades ago, a small town 60 miles from Buffalo, because there was nothing there for me. It's not a place for software entrepreneurs. But now, as I struggle with costs in downtown Chicago, I wonder if there's some way to make something of the old place. The answer is no, unless you can attract the right people there, and for that there has to be a good job and at least few amenities. Both can be cre…
a) Chicago is pretty cheap.
b) Why do you have to be downtown? There are lots of suburbs and regional towns connected with good rail.
Re: The house I was born in sold for $4000
#64Location is basically an extortion racket enabled by the economic collapse of the U.S. outside of a handful of star cities. With NIMBY policies, people in economically vibrant locations keep supply artificially low. This way, a class of people who've ceased providing value can still enrich themselves on a self-sustaining pattern of clueless talent rushing in for the gold rush.
What we see is that most of the country is dying-- that's why the real estate is so cheap in places like Jamestown-- but that's driving the costs in the few not-dying stretches to obscene levels.
Re: The house I was born in sold for $4000
#65I zoomed in on google map, was hoping for streetview [ in which I fantasized seeing Jack Reacher walk past for some reason ]
From the OP, I assumed this would be literally 100 miles from the nearest drugstore/711.. but its bang in the urban grid of a small town.
Shouldn't some of the bailout money be towards loans for people to do up cheap homes like this? It would seem a good investment for the future at low cost to enable more people to pick up these low end deals. Are the banks now so stupid they cant get people into homes and paying interest.. instead of this foreclosure fire-sale nonsense ?
Assuming this place can get internet installed, it would make some family a great home which they could gradually renovate, after which they would look after the place and contribute to the town.
Re: The house I was born in sold for $4000
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are you proposing we endorse a shantytown? History has shown us those go downhill fast, and I don't see how temporary shelters won't turn into a shantytown (and amusingly enough become permanent, much like every piece of shanty-code I write)
A shantytown full of rich (at least, in earning potential elsewhere) startup/burningman type people which grows around convenient fiber might be different than one full of labor surrounding a mine.
I don't really buy it. The hallmark of shantytowns is everything is "half-assed". I can't see tech workers breaking out the saws and sandpaper and building quality neighborhoods in their spare time, and nobody will invest real money and labor into something you intend to bulldoze in 3-5 years. You will also get a domino effect; people with money and the desire for a nice place to live will automatically avoid your shantytown, filling it with people that don't mind living in squalor, leading to a more squalid shantytown- thus looping back on itself.
Re: The house I was born in sold for $4000
#67More startup needs to move to low cost areas.
I think we'll see this. I don't think anyone knows for sure where the future is, but it's not in New York or the Bay Area. High housing costs mean that the wrong kinds of people are winning to have innovation or to build the future.
I still have faith that Real Technology will make a comeback when this social media bubble blows up and, after that happens, we're going to start to see an outline of the future emerging.
I hope there won't be a single "winning" location. I don't think that's a good thing for society.
Re: The house I was born in sold for $4000
#68This post struck a chord with me as I'm from the central NY region, not too far from the OP. I get back to my hometown every year or two and the decline is more apparent every trip. Everything from my youth- the places I worked part-time, the schools I went to, the places I used to hang out at, the major local employers, they're all gone or in major decline. Many houses are boarded up, abandoned, and are being slowly…
I'm glad you liked it. I believe I (and other people from the area) look at the world differently than those from more prosperous regions.
There is a constant thought in the back of my head that this could all be temporary. Boom towns go bust. Industries go bust. But I also think I've left opportunity on the table because of my fear.
I've come to realize that the difficult part of life is balancing the upside with the downside -- knowing when to be conservative and when to be risky.
If I could give advice to anyone leaving school or home for the first time it would be: remain cognizant of the downside, but don't let it prevent you from taking advantage of the upside if it presents itself to you.
Re: The house I was born in sold for $4000
#69I'd really like to see a low-tax, low regulation part of the US (WA, NV, TX, or TN) where someone buys a few thousand acres and lets people build "temporary" structures (with power/fiber/wifi/etc.) for living and solo-working, combined with some more permanent structures for offices, meetings, socialization, etc. Essentially like a 2-5 year Burning Man encampment campus for various startup projects. If someone's "per…
Are you proposing we endorse a shantytown? History has shown us those go downhill fast, and I don't see how temporary shelters won't turn into a shantytown (and amusingly enough become permanent, much like every piece of shanty-code I write)
Now you might think that, the way things are going, by 2025 a person born without VC connections (i.e. an EIR position earmarked for him when he's in the womb, somewhat like a trust fund) will have to live in a shantytown in order to have a shot at surviving in VC-istan.
Well, I'm here to tell you that you're wrong. He won't have to inhabit a shantytown. He'll have a nice storage cell to live in.
Re: The house I was born in sold for $4000
#70In his much-quoted column, Friedman says( http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/31/opinion/sunday/friedman-ne... ): "Every middle-class job today is being pulled up, out or down faster than ever." Middle income families who rely on manufacturing has been hit hard, with no prospects of an exit.
yeah, well maybe all manufacturing will be superseded by 3D printing.. in which case you'd want to move into design rather than assembly.
I think eg. Foxcon is going to be a very temporary thing.
I always thought that at some point a robot arm will be cheaper than a human to assemble electronics.. but we may skip that stage altogether. Pretty soon you'll just print your iPhone, bypassing assembly completely.