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'We all suffer': why San Francisco techies hate the city they transformed

theguardian.com

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Re: 'We all suffer': why San Francisco techies hate the city they transformed

#101

Post by mcv »

CalRobert wrote: post #36
mcv wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But why? Why isn't all that wealth being used to make the city more livable? More affordable for the poor? More diverse?

Because making it more affordable to the poor means increasing the housing supply, which means reducing the price of homes, which existing homeowners hate.

But it's the people who live there who are complaining. Besides I doubt that stepping over homeless people is good for the price of homes.

Increasing the housing supply, if there's room for that, seems like a no-brainer.

Re: 'We all suffer': why San Francisco techies hate the city they transformed

#102

Post by A2017U1 »

henrikschroder wrote: post #20
traderjane wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hard to imagine surrounding cities are different because of free mental health care, free housing, and more social service support for homelessness.

Homelessness is not a problem that affects all cities alike. It's not the case that Daly City, Mountain View, Pleasanton etc, have all solved the problem without telling SF how to do it. In reality, the surrounding cities simply don't have the problem for various reasons and environmental factors, so they don't need to solve the problem in the first place.

My experience in very poor metropolises across the plamet is that it's an entirely simple problem to solve. My experience in some of the most expensive cities on Earth is that providing housing for the poor devalues the only nestegg most people have and is widely railed against by the masses.

Its a Ponzi scheme first and foremost, housing simply cannot outpace wages, it's impossible. When it all comes crashing down is someone elses problem though hey :)

Re: 'We all suffer': why San Francisco techies hate the city they transformed

#103

Post by Balgair »

cribbles wrote: post #9

>A million-plus for a home with $300,000 down? Then when we have kids, $30,000 a year for private school? This quote totally confounded me. Why is it a given that their kids have to go to private school? If you're optimizing your budget for home-ownership, why not just send your kids to the schools your taxes are paying for?

So, this is super specific to California public schools and SFUSD. Norms that apply in Germany or Maryland do not necessarily apply in SF. You can start diving in the very complex issues with SFUSD funding here [0].

Two major points are Prop-13 and the LCFF (Local Control Funding Formula):

Property taxes only re-assess upon the sale of a house (kinda, it's complicated [1]). As such, only ~25% of the budget comes from property taxes [2].

The LCFF is such that Sacremento controls the funding for schools[2]. Essentially, the money comes out of the state and does not stay in the local area. How that money is divied out is, again, really complex.

So, your taxes don't pay for your local school, they pay for the state as a whole (again, kinda, its complicated).

[0] http://www.sfusd.edu/en/about-sfusd/budget/faq-budget.html

[1] https://www.californiataxdata.com/pdf/Prop13.pdf

[2] https://ed100.org/lessons/whopays

Re: 'We all suffer': why San Francisco techies hate the city they transformed

#104

Post by panarky »

emblaegh wrote: post #97
cutler wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's called capitalism. So long as property is a free market instead of a public asset this trend will continue. It's not just SF. We're seeing it all over the West.

Housing is not a free market because its supply is artificially restricted by zoning regulations meant to protect the value of current homeowners' properties.

"meant to protect the value of current homeowners' properties"

It's probably not that direct. Sure, you could build up and achieve the population density of Hong Kong, but then SF would lose the "little big city" charm that makes it a great place to be.

And as we see in Hong Kong, simply adding housing units doesn't necessarily reduce the price of housing.

So I'd argue the primary purpose of the zoning regs is to retain what makes SF what it is, not just to maximize price per square foot.

Re: 'We all suffer': why San Francisco techies hate the city they transformed

#105

Post by verinus »

dagw wrote: post #42
majewsky wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> US public education is ... not exactly what one can expect from a first world country. As a European, I slowly wonder if there's any public service in the US that meets the "first-world country" standard. Not education. Certainly not healthcare. Infrastructure is also crumbling from what I hear.

As another European, I wouldn't throw too many stones. It's not like every part of Europe has first rate schools and healthcare, or flawless infrastructure.

I do not see this comment as an attack- just as an impression needing discussion...

Re: 'We all suffer': why San Francisco techies hate the city they transformed

#106

Post by mschuster91 »

jfnixon wrote: post #68
mschuster91 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> why not just send your kids to the schools your taxes are paying for? Because thanks to massive underfunding US public education is ... not exactly what one can expect from a first world country. In some areas children actually only have four days of school because of underfunding ( http://www.ladbible.com/news/news-school-switches-to-four-da... ).

Underfunding? The US spends more than the OECD average on a per pupil basis. Why do you think the education system is underfunded rather than extremely inefficient? "The United States spent $12,800 per FTE student at the elementary/secondary level, which was 35 percent higher than the average3 of $9,500 for OECD member countries reporting data." https://nces.ed.gov/programs/coe/indicator_cmd.asp

When there is not enough funding to provide kids with a 5-day school week and teachers have to buy supplies for the kids with their OWN money, then the system is underfunded.

I'd be interested if that figure included funding for competitive sports teams.

Re: 'We all suffer': why San Francisco techies hate the city they transformed

#107

Post by atlasunshrugged »

CalRobert wrote: post #33
majewsky wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> US public education is ... not exactly what one can expect from a first world country. As a European, I slowly wonder if there's any public service in the US that meets the "first-world country" standard. Not education. Certainly not healthcare. Infrastructure is also crumbling from what I hear.

I'm not sure there is, really. Having moved to Europe I do miss the libraries in the US, but that was in pretty wealthy areas (Santa Monica, San Diego, etc.) But the private services can be top notch if you've got the cash.

Try the library in Downtown LA, you may change your opinion :)

Sorry, don't mean to be snarky, I also now live in Europe and miss my hometown library but many of the public ones in cities are glorified homeless shelters now

Re: 'We all suffer': why San Francisco techies hate the city they transformed

#108

Post by atlasunshrugged »

kaybe wrote: post #50
CalRobert wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure there is, really. Having moved to Europe I do miss the libraries in the US, but that was in pretty wealthy areas (Santa Monica, San Diego, etc.) But the private services can be top notch if you've got the cash.

That's true in third-world countries too though. Service is good about anywhere if you've got the cash.

But is it true at the highest end? If I'm in Russia I can't get a Harvard level education at a private university or in a small nation in Africa I'm unlikely to receive incredible plastic surgery that I could in the U.S. or S. Korea

Re: 'We all suffer': why San Francisco techies hate the city they transformed

#110

Post by RandomInteger4 »

What's the overlap between techies and San Fran's politicians and politically active individuals who prevent the necessary steps from being taken regarding housing policies?

EDIT for clarity: What percentage of those responsible for the horrible laws there were actually techies?

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