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

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

#161

Post by malyk »

ionforce wrote: post #104
typicalrunt wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel exactly the same way except that I'm in another city, Vancouver BC. There is an odd assortment of people in Vancouver consisting of the obscenely rich, wannabe rich, obscenely poor, and singles/couples with no children. Once you have children, you are pushed out of the Vancouver area and into the suburbs due to cost of adequate living conditions [1]. But people say, "oh, it's just the suburbs, it's not that fa…

How can middle class not mean anything? Doesn't it refer to the fat section of the income curve, where there are supposed to be the most number of people?

Sure, except that the perception of the middle class is significantly screwed (at least in the US, but probably similar up north).

In the US, the median household income is $51,404[1]. So, the middle class should probably be centered around that number. Say, $35000 to $75000 or so. I bet your looking at that number and saying "No way! I'm middle class and my household income is $150k!" Well, turns out that basically everyone thinks the same way regardless of what their incomes are.[2]

So it becomes pretty hard to nail down exactly what defines the various classes in the USA. Especially with the cost of living differences across the country.

Take a look at Rich Blocks, Poor Blocks[3] and spend a little time clicking around the map. The zip code I live in has a median household income of $38,646 and the site suggests the middle class income range for the state is $53,264 to $68,300.

Anyway, middle class is a loaded term.

1 - http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/03/29/c...

2 - http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/04/27/everyone-is-mid...

3 - http://www.richblockspoorblocks.com/

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

#162

Post by robbyking »

greghinch wrote: post #112
jaysonelliot wrote: post #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 becaus…

I don't mean this to play into stereotypes etc, but just as a matter of experience, every single person I know who's lived in Oakland for any significant amount of time (say 1 year or more), over the past 5 years, has been robbed at gunpoint at least once, usually while walking within a few blocks of their home. It's not a huge sample, I probably know half a dozen people/couples who live/have lived there. But the fac…

Oakland is currently the 3rd most dangerous city in the United States[1].

What's worse is I worry Oakland will experience the same type of growth the Mission did, where half will become overpriced and homogenized while the other half will continue to be neglected.

[1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/21/most-dangerous-citi...

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

#163

Post by ebiester »

Jgrubb wrote: post #65
necubi wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's pretty reductionist. San Francisco's housing policies are definitely responsible for some of the price difference between here and Tucson, but you can't ignore the geography. SF is a 7x7 mile square surrounded by water on three sides. Tucson is a sprawling mess that go on for dozens of miles. Dense, desirable, naturally bound cities are always going to be more expensive than endless exurbs. Look at housing pri…

Phoenix is the mess you're thinking of. Tucson is fairly reasonable as far as size goes.

Tucson is approximately the same size as Chicago, when talking about the actual city. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_cities_by... -- Tucson is both giant and sparse.

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

#164

Post by enraged_camel »

api wrote: post #30

I've got a possibly great job offer on the table from SF/SV, but may turn it down. I'd love the city I'm sure, but after glancing around I've come to the conclusion that home ownership is unthinkable to anyone who hasn't had a cash-out event. The real estate market is certifiably, utterly bat-dookie insane. NYC is often considered more expensive, and Manhattan is certainly... well... Manhattan. But taken collectively…

>>I'd love the city I'm sure, but after glancing around I've come to the conclusion that home ownership is unthinkable to anyone who hasn't had a cash-out event.

I've never understood this crazy, if not outright insane obsession with home ownership. Why does everyone want to tie significant amounts of their lifetime earnings into physical property that historically has had very low appreciation in value? It's like people have forgotten about the housing bubble popping just five years ago, causing large portions of the population to take big hits financially. (And what is the current real estate craziness in SF, if not another bubble that will inevitably pop?)

Even seemingly rational reasons for home ownership, such as being able to raise a family in good school districts, fail to stand up to critical scrutiny. There are many stable renter neighborhoods with great schools.

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

#165

Post by AnIrishDuck »

GFischer wrote: post #94
api wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And Oakland can get stabby. So it's stabby and overpriced. No thanks. If I wanted stabby I'd go to Detroit and get a Victorian for $25k.

I had to look up "stabby".. Is this what you were talking about? www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=stabby‎ or http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/stabby ?

I imagine what he means by "stabby" is "unsafe and at higher risk of violent crime".

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

#166

Post by digitalsushi »

hayward2 wrote: post #98
king_jester wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Software engineering is not a very middle class occupation, as you can easily earn amounts more than the average middle class family as a single worker, even in areas that are not tech hubs. > 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. 100-200k a year is a lot of money…

I'd agree with you if I was referencing some mysterious elite who lucked into their positions or had ivy league connections. I'm talking about my friends from college who had average grades at a top 30 small private school on the East Coast. Several of the ones who went into finance make more than I do, and some a LOT more. I have friends who frequently clear $300k with bonuses in very average wall street jobs. They…

I think of finance people as financial engineers. They just deal in the stuff, like I play with data structures, and my friends diodes and resistors and such. I think of how easy it is for me to manage my own software, my friend, his electro-static speakers, and to the finance engineer, his giant piles of money. It's just natural.

The sour grapes response for me is to consider that selling drugs earns more than the finance guys.

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

#167

Post by pessimizer »

ionforce wrote: post #104
typicalrunt wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel exactly the same way except that I'm in another city, Vancouver BC. There is an odd assortment of people in Vancouver consisting of the obscenely rich, wannabe rich, obscenely poor, and singles/couples with no children. Once you have children, you are pushed out of the Vancouver area and into the suburbs due to cost of adequate living conditions [1]. But people say, "oh, it's just the suburbs, it's not that fa…

How can middle class not mean anything? Doesn't it refer to the fat section of the income curve, where there are supposed to be the most number of people?

No. It's more complex than that, and depends on who you're talking to.

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

#168

Post by gregd »

jaggederest wrote: post #115
gregd wrote: post #72

I'm moving to Portland Except the bourgeois cannot afford to live in Portland anymore either. Rentals are ungodly expensive, water is expensive (in the PNW no less), garbage is expensive, electricity is expensive and last but not least, parking is expensive. Please don't bring your San Francisco salary to Portland.

I'm pretty bourgeois and it's entirely affordable to me. Rent is 50% less. My total monthly bills for utilities are $245 for a house, with AC. Electricity is half the price it is in the bay area. Parking is a quarter of the price.

Do you have children? The problems OP complains about with San Fran, won't be made any better if he brings his SF salary here. That's the problem. It's pricing locals out of affordable housing. Rentals here in Sellwood/Westmoreland start at $2000/mo. When we got to Portland two years ago, rentals here started at $1100/mo.

Portland is THE most expensive place we've lived in in Oregon. A family of four pays between 150-200/mo for electric/natural gas and water. We've lived in Salem and Eugene for comparisons sake. Our electric bill in Eugene, with central AC (that ran from pretty much March - September) would max out at $75/mo.

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

#169

Post by greghinch »

pdenya wrote: post #142
greghinch wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't mean this to play into stereotypes etc, but just as a matter of experience, every single person I know who's lived in Oakland for any significant amount of time (say 1 year or more), over the past 5 years, has been robbed at gunpoint at least once, usually while walking within a few blocks of their home. It's not a huge sample, I probably know half a dozen people/couples who live/have lived there. But the fac…

East Bay is huge and the BART is fast. You could live in Walnut Creek, Fremont, etc and have a less than 25 min train ride to Oakland. You really can't write off the whole east bay because some of Oakland has a high crime rate.

Sorry I should have been specific about meaning places to live and commute to SF. You could do that from the Nut or Freemont I suppose, but that's a far commute, and a whole separate discussion about why I wouldn't suggest that to anyone from out of the area

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

#170

Post by ebiester »

jseliger wrote: post #2

Even I, who makes a decent salary, have seen the great American dream of home ownership recede into the distance. That's a policy choice. I lived in Tucson for for years, and nice houses there could be bought for $200,000. Sometimes less. SF has made a choice about not allowing people to live there: http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2012/05/face... , and in this respect it's like many other major cities…

Yes, but the job market sucks there, especially if you don't want to work in Defense. :) If you want to live where life is remotely walkable (a la San Francisco), the prices jump considerably. A decent house in a decent neighborhood comfortably around downtown will run 300k. Making half what you do in SF and paying 300k isn't so grand.

I love Tucson. I grew up there. It's just a bad place to be a software developer.

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