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San Francisco, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

tomdale.net

51–60 of 458 posts

Re: San Francisco, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

#51
As an actual native to San Francisco, I think I can put a few things into perspective.

Its always been expensive to live here, it doesn't have much to do with tech, it has more to do with SF being a center for finance AND technology. That said, having a mortgage lower than your rent is true for many people who bought at "the right time" rather than at the peak of demand. Demand is outstripping supply due to the insane people who get elected to the city government, which is largely driven by fresh but naive stream of tech workers and the radicalized longterm residents. The only way to fix this is to oust people who do not support fiscal security and personal freedoms (Leeland Yee is at the top of my list) and replace them with people who eschew cronyism and support a balanced approach (Sean Elsbernd comes to mind).

The so called BART divide is really more about greed and institutionalized mediocracy. Station agents should make minimum wage, the people who make BART actually run are the maintenance staff and the conductors. The conductors shouldn't be people in trains, they should be people in offices as the technology for having fully automated trains has existed for decades. The safety issue is a red herring, as the issue as posed is not for more transit police, but for more lighting. Management is also not blameless as they should be putting less money towards bureaucratic salaries and returning it to the ridership in the form of lower fares and upgrades to cars.

If you feel guilt about living and working in SF, stop it. Spending money is what keeps the economy of SF moving, and what keeps people who don't work in the tech industry employed.

Re: San Francisco, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

#52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The wealthy tech people aren't the ones ruining San Francisco. Start here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gentrification

You didn't actually address any of his points, except to point out that some folks view gentrification as a problem in SF. I actually agree with the comment you replied to. Severe governmental incompetence in SF has been worse for the city than gentrification.

Both of those things are bad in general for cities. However, OP expressed doubt that increased presence of wealthy residents couldn't be anything but good for a city when clearly it is not so obvious.

Re: San Francisco, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

#53
post #8

The reason for San Francisco's high rent/home price is very simple, despite how others like to complicate it more: 1: Its desirable for most people to live here. Possibly the most desirable place in the USA, depending on your tastes. As a result, people are willing to pay more to live here. There are jobs, culture, food, art and much more all in this great city. 2: Rent Control. I wont get too much into it, but my ta…

The main reason why people don't want new residential development is because it will feed into gentrification and push people out because they can no longer afford to live in SF. NYC has been and is going through this problem right now and it is not pretty. EDIT: There are a lot of comments about increasing supply as a way to make housing/apartments cheaper in SF. This is not at all well demonstrated, as in NYC new r…

How does not building new residential units help prevent gentrification?

Last I checked a 1BR in the Mission is approaching $3K. It would seem like gentrification is happening whether SF likes it or not. In fact it seems like gentrification is accelerated, not slowed or prevented, by this housing policy.

Having lived in SF, and now live in NYC, IMO NYC is dealing with the problem of gentrification far better than SF. The transport infrastructure here means that people can be displaced farther but still maintain economic viability. You may be 3 stops further further on the train line, but you're still getting to work.

Compare with SF where, because of just how insanely horrific the transportation infrastructure is, getting pushed out of SF-proper has a litany of consequences for the middle and lower classes.

Re: San Francisco, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

#54
post #13

SF is great for two categories of people: - The wealthy - The homeless (yes, social services and tolerance is much better here than in any other big city in the US) People caught in the middle who own a house will survive 10 years before quitting. If they don't own a house they have already left. I'm doing more than $100K and I had to leave the day I started a family (try to find a rent below $6K for something suitab…

try to find a rent below $6K for something suitable for a couple + 2 children

I guess you mean SF proper.

You can find very nice (but small compared to mid-west) houses in nice areas for less than $3k in the east bay.

Re: San Francisco, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

#55
One of the things that I love about living in Tampa while doing technology consulting traveling around the country is the cost of living. The cost of living is so low that I can afford to do anything that I want to do while still having a lot left over for savings.

Re: San Francisco, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

#57
post #8

The reason for San Francisco's high rent/home price is very simple, despite how others like to complicate it more: 1: Its desirable for most people to live here. Possibly the most desirable place in the USA, depending on your tastes. As a result, people are willing to pay more to live here. There are jobs, culture, food, art and much more all in this great city. 2: Rent Control. I wont get too much into it, but my ta…

The main reason why people don't want new residential development is because it will feed into gentrification and push people out because they can no longer afford to live in SF. NYC has been and is going through this problem right now and it is not pretty. EDIT: There are a lot of comments about increasing supply as a way to make housing/apartments cheaper in SF. This is not at all well demonstrated, as in NYC new r…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cnut_the_Great#Ruler_of_the_wav...

Re: San Francisco, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

#58

I don't understand why tech workers in the Bay Area feel guilty about receiving 'high' salaries of $100 - $200k/year. This is not a lot of money... People on Wall street laugh at these amounts. So do specialized doctors, corporate lawyers, investment bankers, etc. Software engineering is unfortunately a very middle class occupation at this point. I'd love to see it get up into the ranks of the upper class (at least f…

It's because our society simply doesn't value the profession, and those engineers who feel guilty have internalized it. There is a strong undercurrent of social programming in western culture which says that working in computers and other technology fields is a nerdy / oddball profession and that those who choose to do it should be ostracized. People are actually surprisingly open about it, too. See for example the essay from earlier this year by Rebecca Solnit[1] which engages in much hand-wringing about "nerds" (yes, the article actually contains that word) moving into the Bay Area and how "people are ground underfoot" as a result. Such name-calling in the mainstream press is more or less exclusive to tech.

[1] http://www.lrb.co.uk/v35/n03/rebecca-solnit/diary

Re: San Francisco, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

#59
post #8

The reason for San Francisco's high rent/home price is very simple, despite how others like to complicate it more: 1: Its desirable for most people to live here. Possibly the most desirable place in the USA, depending on your tastes. As a result, people are willing to pay more to live here. There are jobs, culture, food, art and much more all in this great city. 2: Rent Control. I wont get too much into it, but my ta…

The main reason why people don't want new residential development is because it will feed into gentrification and push people out because they can no longer afford to live in SF. NYC has been and is going through this problem right now and it is not pretty. EDIT: There are a lot of comments about increasing supply as a way to make housing/apartments cheaper in SF. This is not at all well demonstrated, as in NYC new r…

Almost every semi-desirable city has this problem. Even downtown Detroit is gentrifying.

Google "suburban poverty". Its so broad I can't even link to a good citation, worth reading through a bunch to understand the scope of the problem.

Re: San Francisco, I Love You But You’re Bringing Me Down

#60
I don't understand why the author would move to Portland when we've got our own affordable, culturally rich, tech-friendly cities in the East Bay. Come to Oakland. It's beautiful here.

The weather is better than San Francisco, you can ride your bicycle anywhere, public transit is good, and it's easy to get to SF as well as Silicon Valley (which I do regularly).

There's no need to leave the entire Bay Area just because San Francisco is an overpriced and overcrowded city. I recently came back to the Bay Area after a decade+ in NYC, and my wife and I decided we'd be returning for the East Bay, not SF. For us, it's the best of all possible worlds.

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