Bay Area tech boom not cause of region's problems • Hacker News Board

Re: Bay Area tech boom not cause of region's problems

#71

Post by malandrew » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 4:38 AM UTC

timr wrote: post #29

So, first off, it needs to be acknowledged that this was written by the "Bay Area Council", which is a PR machine for a dues-paying group of bay area corporations, including Facebook and Google [1]. Consider the source. Second, while I'm the first to acknowledge that SF needs to build up, it's clearly absurd to say that the tech boom is "not the cause" of the city's housing problems -- that's like saying that skiing…

True, but one of the comments on the article is especially telling:

    "The title of this piece expresses a false choice. It's not 
    meaningful to consider the development of industry separately 
    from the development of housing for the workers in industry. We 
    chose in the early 1950s to develop industry in the Bay Area 
    without regard for where the workers in the new workplaces 
    would live. Long before the current wave of tech immigrants 
    reached San Francisco there were people commuting to the Bay 
    Area from Manteca and Mountain Home and Santa Rosa and Santa 
    Cruz. Silicon Valley activists raised alarms in the early 1970s 
    that four new jobs were being created for each new housing unit 
    that was built. It shows an astonishing nearsightedness that 
    the people and the governments of Bay Area cities are only now 
    realizing that this is problematic."

It's observations like that that further support my views that San Francisco (and the Bay Area in general) is managed by children and has been for an incredibly long time. Considering how many people in the Bay Area are inventing the future, the local government here exhibits a level of shortsightedness that I have previously only witnessed in developing countries.

Re: Bay Area tech boom not cause of region's problems

#72

Post by malandrew » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 4:41 AM UTC

timr wrote: post #54

surrealize wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's plain that tech is the proximal cause It's half of the proximal cause. Housing prices have increased because of the interaction of supply and demand. Blaming the tech boom focuses only on the demand side, but the supply constraints (height limits, zoning density limits, etc.) are just as important.

The supply didn't decrease. The demand increased. That's the proximal cause.

The demand has been increasing for like forever. The supply has never reacted to the increase in demand. The complete paralysis when it comes to rezoning is an equally valid proximal cause. The Bay Area hasn't been constructing housing to meet the demand caused by job growth, tech or otherwise, for 30-40 years now.

Re: Bay Area tech boom not cause of region's problems

#73

Post by malandrew » Mon, Jan 20, 2014, 4:42 AM UTC

timr wrote: post #63

surrealize wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you like. The policy levers are all on the supply side, though (unless you want to start kicking out major employers or something). So it's pointless to complain about demand side changes.

"The policy levers are all on the supply side, though" Are you kidding? Remember the big white buses that everyone is mad about? They play a role here. The valley tech companies have mitigated the natural barrier that would ordinarily limit the number of tech employees living in the city -- the pain of commuting. So rather than staying close to work and building communities where they live, they use the city as a glo…

Once enough of the employees are commuting, I would imagine that any smart business would look at the situation and think "Time to move the office to the city or at least build a satellite office there."

Re: Bay Area tech boom not cause of region's problems

#74

Post by hyperlexic » Sun, Jan 26, 2014, 5:24 AM UTC

scoofy wrote: post #69

hyperlexic wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious how Brooklyn dealt/deals with the issue of crime and public safety. I lived in West Oakland for while, and this seems to be the general region where a 'Brooklyn' type of spot is trying to emerge. BART station is right there, and it's close to the bridge for all-night bus lines and bikers too. But it's just such a friggin dangerous place to be (at any hour of the day or night) that I wonder if it's even po…

There are a couple places you just don't get off the train in brooklyn: east new york and brownsville, but on the whole, even areas below the JMZ: east williamsburg/bed stuy/bushwick aren't nearly as dangerous as they may seem by looking at them.

Yeah unfortunately today there really is no area in Oakland near a BART station where I would want to be walking around with a pocket full of cash/tip money late at night. There's a lot of investment and excitement happening in West Oakland, and it's interesting to watch the process. But until they get the public safety issues to a somewhat reasonable level, I don't see it. What I see are young hip people moving in, getting robbed or worse and going back to the City to live in a shared closet for 2k a month.