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Poor Kids of Silicon Valley

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Re: Poor Kids of Silicon Valley

#71

Post by mgraczyk »

codemac wrote: post #41
mgraczyk wrote: post #20

This may not be the most popular thing to say, but ... Just move? If you are the head of a large household living in an area where the cost of living is too high to support your dependents, you would do a whole lot of good for them and yourself by starting new in some other part of the country. At the very least it would be wise to relocate across the Bay. I realize that people have families, social networks, and sma…

Moving is expensive too. If you're hand-to-mouth poor, you cannot afford a rental truck, let alone time off work and still feed your children. You will probably lose your job if you move, and not find another one where you land, especially if you're in the service industry. Good luck with that East bay -> peninsula commute on your minimum wage. The reason many cannot get jobs other places is due to felonies or other…

When times are tough, moving does not need to be expensive. Before I moved to SV, I sold or donated everything I couldn't fit in two suitcases. I moved into an affordable house where I share a bedroom with 3 other people. I would be able to make rent with only $20k/year.

I know not everybody can divorce themselves from all of their belongings, especially large families. Additionally, I didn't have to worry about schools (no children) or work (my industry has ~0 unemployment). I did, however, have to worry about saving enough to survive between jobs and finding an affordable place to stay.

> This is at it's core class struggle, not individual unawareness. I agree, but I think part of the solution has to involve helping people relocate. We should also strive to encourage a more distributed social life. If we had inexpensive, high quality video telecommunications I believe that people would be more okay with moving away from their families.

Re: Poor Kids of Silicon Valley

#72

Post by nsnick »

tlrobinson wrote: post #45
serge2k wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Revamping zoning laws probably is the solution. Make it easier to build more housing.

I think the parent commenter was being sarcastic and would agree with you.

This is hilarious. California is so liberal that people are taking my sarcastic comment literally.

Re: Poor Kids of Silicon Valley

#73

Post by benten10 »

Domenic_S wrote: post #55
benten10 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you! I can see how one might feel 'just move' is a good argument, but really NO! In chinatowns all over the country, whenever low-income residents are being priced out, the argument is always 'you can just find another place to stay'. They've lived there for decades, if not more. That's where all the people they know are. They are poor but they do have a support system, that lives with them. When they move away…

> some people feel VERY STRONGLY emotionally about where they live Those feelings are a luxury. Taxpayers should not be forced to bear the cost of someone's emotional attachments. I would prefer tax dollars be spent on relocation assistance + job placement to help get people on a sustainable path.

I can also understand that. Now these people, not making a lot of money. They at least had a social support system, happy with friends families etc. They had a place they could call their own, and the pride that comes with it. You've taken their support system out.

In short, it is cheaper to build them houses and put them there, than to put them in prisons. Whether people get happy in places they like, or they get pissed at the system and live in prison, it's your tax dollars either way.

Re: Poor Kids of Silicon Valley

#74

Post by subpixel »

mgraczyk wrote: post #20

This may not be the most popular thing to say, but ... Just move? If you are the head of a large household living in an area where the cost of living is too high to support your dependents, you would do a whole lot of good for them and yourself by starting new in some other part of the country. At the very least it would be wise to relocate across the Bay. I realize that people have families, social networks, and sma…

A big problem with this concept is jobs. The working poor are almost exclusively employed in the service sector at or near minimum wage. Worse yet, many are essentially day laborers, even outside of the sort of fields normally associated with on-demand labor (to wit: startups like workpop.com and shiftgig.com are responding to market realities).

Finding a food service or house cleaning or landscaping job in a depressed, but affordable, city like Redding or its ilk is going to be way, way harder than in a more expensive place.

Add to this that once you lose your car, you can't live or work outside of a city with functional public transportation. None of those are cities are going to be dirt cheap.

Re: Poor Kids of Silicon Valley

#75

Post by onion2k »

mgraczyk wrote: post #20

This may not be the most popular thing to say, but ... Just move? If you are the head of a large household living in an area where the cost of living is too high to support your dependents, you would do a whole lot of good for them and yourself by starting new in some other part of the country. At the very least it would be wise to relocate across the Bay. I realize that people have families, social networks, and sma…

My sentiment is not classist or elitist.

The fact you fail to recognise it as elitist doesn't mean it isn't. You are elitist because you fail to understand that life can be a great deal harder for other people. "I did it so they can too" assumes that other people don't live in circumstances that prevent them doing things. That is plain wrong.

If I had a family to look after, I would have (and arguably ought to have) sacrificed even more.

One of the things you might have had to sacrifice is having enough money to relocate.

Re: Poor Kids of Silicon Valley

#76

Post by 1053r »

cjensen wrote: post #33
andy_boot wrote: post #11

Isn't the simple obvious solution just to build a lot more housing? More supply means lower prices.

No. The Valley is geographically constrained. The mountains enclosing it are too rugged to safely build on. The best you could do would be to permit high-rise housing which would provide some expensive housing to the high-end. A better idea would be to stop permitting any non-housing construction until the housing to job balance is restored.

This is just empirically false. High rise construction is massively cheaper than the current property values. Per square foot, suburban Palo Alto is $1409 per square foot at the median [1]. Heck, even the Burj Khalifa, the tallest building in the world, and hardly a bastion of affordable housing, cost only 1.5B / 3,595,146 = $417 per square foot. [2]

More reasonable construction of 10 - 20 stories could easily be put up for that cost, even once you factor in the high cost of labor in CA.

1 - http://www.trulia.com/real_estate/Palo_Alto-California/ 2 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burj_Khalifa

Re: Poor Kids of Silicon Valley

#77

Post by yitchelle »

nsnick wrote: post #57
doki_pen wrote: post #50

Fix the public education system so that living in a poorer area doesn't mean your kids have zero chance at real success. We are moving more and more towards a caste-system where your parents success is the most important factor in your own success, as a child. It hurts us all when we don't have the most qualified people possible performing the important professions.

You could fix both issues by moving out of California. The children could get a good public education, and the parents could afford a house.

This is the "just move" solution which, as mentioned by someone else, is not as easy or possible as it sounds.

Re: Poor Kids of Silicon Valley

#78

Post by lordnacho »

It's quite unfortunate for these folks. I don't have an immediate solution other than what has already been said about increasing the supply of housing.

But the thing is there's this very valuable network in SV that's been built. Everywhere where some new innovation is happening, anywhere wealth is being created, you are going to get this sort of thing happening. People who are at the cutting edge will be moving ahead in income, but there's always going to be folks who aren't part of the party. So an income gap will pop up where there's all this wealth being generated.

I lived in London for a long time, and you saw the same. Millionaires' apartments in the same neighbourhood as council flats. Kids with chauffeurs, kids with free school meals.

Re: Poor Kids of Silicon Valley

#80

Post by nsnick »

yitchelle wrote: post #77
nsnick wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could fix both issues by moving out of California. The children could get a good public education, and the parents could afford a house.

This is the "just move" solution which, as mentioned by someone else, is not as easy or possible as it sounds.

I don't think moving across the bay is going to fix their terrible public education problem.
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