Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

story.californiasunday.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 56 posts

Re: 3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

#41

Post by ThrustVectoring »

closeparen wrote: post #9
oppositelock wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CA's local governments have basically reached crippling levels of stupidity. I live in Mountain View, the home town of Google, but every city around here has made building so difficult, that it barely happens. What we do build are expansive planned "communities", where a developer managed to navigate the web of red tape and got it approved, and the amount of red tape involved is so huge that it's not worth trying to…

These governments aren’t stupid; they’re correctly representing the interests of the majority of their voters who a) are homeowners and b) strongly prefer suburbia. Renters and people who appreciate density need to show up if we’re going to counteract that.

This constituency can't show up because they're priced out of living in the communities in which they work or would work. The only solution is top-down regional planning that runs roughshod over local concerns in order to solve the regional crisis.

Re: 3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

#42

Post by ldoughty »

pkaye wrote: post #13
nojvek wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Welcome to the US. How else do you think we have such a massive income disparity ? We’re a wealthy country but the wealth is in very few hands.

A lot of the people in this forum are part of the wealth. People talk about how after just a few year of working they are making $400k at a FAANG like its now big deal. That is a lot of money compared to the people around them.

See my other comment on this thread, it's not just about the money... it's about the cost of living.

Making $100k+/year now is "easy" in the tech sector, move to any of the major cities. Unfortunately homes cost $750k+ or you take an unpaid part-time job in commuting to the office (2-4 hours/day, 5 days a week).

And yes, that's a HUGE disparity when compared to the people working service industry in the same cities... but it's also a huge disparity compared to C-level and senior managers/owners... that can afford a 1-2 million dollar home and the $15-20+/day "Fast Lanes"... and can often afford to have one of the parents stay at home even!

Re: 3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

#43

Post by kevinventullo »

downrightmike wrote: post #38
Hackbraten wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then again, many workers depend on video calls or video conferences, which easily require a multiple of that bandwidth. Regular security updates are also important. Those add up nowadays, and if they’re slow to download you tend to skimp on them.

requiring video makes no sense

I don’t follow. I support a few remote people on my team now, and it would be much more difficult without video conferencing.

Re: 3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

#44

Post by pkaye »

ldoughty wrote: post #42
pkaye wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of the people in this forum are part of the wealth. People talk about how after just a few year of working they are making $400k at a FAANG like its now big deal. That is a lot of money compared to the people around them.

See my other comment on this thread, it's not just about the money... it's about the cost of living. Making $100k+/year now is "easy" in the tech sector, move to any of the major cities. Unfortunately homes cost $750k+ or you take an unpaid part-time job in commuting to the office (2-4 hours/day, 5 days a week). And yes, that's a HUGE disparity when compared to the people working service industry in the same cities..…

> And yes, that's a HUGE disparity when compared to the people working service industry in the same cities... but it's also a huge disparity compared to C-level and senior managers/owners... that can afford a 1-2 million dollar home and the $15-20+/day "Fast Lanes"... and can often afford to have one of the parents stay at home even!

So do you not consider the $400k FAANG compensation a huge disparity vs the service industry pay? Is it only at the C-level and senior manager/owner level that it becomes a problem?

Re: 3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

#45

Post by oppositelock »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #23
closeparen wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These governments aren’t stupid; they’re correctly representing the interests of the majority of their voters who a) are homeowners and b) strongly prefer suburbia. Renters and people who appreciate density need to show up if we’re going to counteract that.

If renters and those who appreciate density are never close to the majority of constituents, how does showing up help?

Renters are a voting majority here, and successfully passed rent control, at the same time, the city council down-zoned the city, and NIMBYs are able to stop developments via California's crazy environmental review process. So, we have a shortage and rent control, which means Mountain View is becoming more unaffordable to every newcomer, but some renters will have some protection.

The local residents show up in droves to oppose housing, particularly the home owners, with the arguments being "the infrastructure can't take any more". They never hold the city to its responsibility or providing infrastructure, instead, use the bad infrastructure as an excuse to stifle development.

It's a backwards, topsy turvy world here. City governments are meant to serve people, not rule over them.

Re: 3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

#46

Post by toomuchtodo »

oppositelock wrote: post #45
toomuchtodo wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If renters and those who appreciate density are never close to the majority of constituents, how does showing up help?

Renters are a voting majority here, and successfully passed rent control, at the same time, the city council down-zoned the city, and NIMBYs are able to stop developments via California's crazy environmental review process. So, we have a shortage and rent control, which means Mountain View is becoming more unaffordable to every newcomer, but some renters will have some protection. The local residents show up in drove…

> Renters are a voting majority here

> The local residents show up in droves to oppose housing

If renters are the majority, why are they not voting out city government representatives who don't support upvoting and density?

Re: 3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

#47

Post by oppositelock »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #46
oppositelock wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Renters are a voting majority here, and successfully passed rent control, at the same time, the city council down-zoned the city, and NIMBYs are able to stop developments via California's crazy environmental review process. So, we have a shortage and rent control, which means Mountain View is becoming more unaffordable to every newcomer, but some renters will have some protection. The local residents show up in drove…

> Renters are a voting majority here > The local residents show up in droves to oppose housing If renters are the majority, why are they not voting out city government representatives who don't support upvoting and density?

Because they vote in all the Democrats, irrespective of views, as long as the party affiliation is correct. There isn't that much choice. The city council has seven members, three-ish are usually up for re-election, and you'll have a choice of maybe six on the ballot, half Democrats, and that's the half that gets all the votes.

Re: 3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

#48

Post by [deleted] »

DataWorker wrote: post #34
toomuchtodo wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If renters and those who appreciate density are never close to the majority of constituents, how does showing up help?

That’s democracy. The residents get to choose what happens in their community. If they don’t want to fill the Bay Area with slums and housing projects, they can make that choice and keep people out.

[deleted]

Re: 3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

#49

Post by DuskStar »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #39
darren0 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The basis of this article seems to be the statistic. "33% of U.S. carbon dioxide emissions from electricity generation". What does that have to do with gas burned in your home? The statistics is for gas burned to create electricity. That seems like significant different things.

I shared the article for every other paragraph. The one you mention is superfluous. Natural gas is used quite a bit for cooking and home heating, and we need to phase it out where ever possible.

Unfortunately, phasing it out of use for heating in favor of electricity is quite likely counterproductive. Burning natural gas for heat is more efficient than burning it to produce electricity, transporting that electricity, and then sending it through a resistor to create heat.

Which means it's only an emissions win if the electricity is carbon neutral or the multiplier for a heat pump compensates for the generation/transmission losses.

Re: 3 Kids. 2 paychecks. No home

#50

Post by closeparen »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #23
closeparen wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These governments aren’t stupid; they’re correctly representing the interests of the majority of their voters who a) are homeowners and b) strongly prefer suburbia. Renters and people who appreciate density need to show up if we’re going to counteract that.

If renters and those who appreciate density are never close to the majority of constituents, how does showing up help?

How does showing up help any activist campaign? Participation in these decisions is tiny (sometimes unilateral - one retired lawyer can set a project back years), many people don't know about the issue or don't have an opinion, those who do have opinions aren't necessarily showing up to speak and vote for them. Everyone notices the cost of housing, but few realize it's a political issue that they even could vote about.

In general the story is broad and diffuse support for more housing, tightly concentrated and intense opposition to particular projects. There are many more NIMBYs than BANANA.

Post reply on HN