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Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

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Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#501

Post by kelnos »

015a wrote: post #483
SavantIdiot wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The exodus has been soundly proven to be a myth. [1] But assuming it isn't, there aren't many better places to go. Texas is a joke. Traffic is worse than LA in the major cities and it is run by Christian zealots. Yeah maybe you pay fewer taxes but the other quality-of-life tradeoffs aren't worth it. [1] https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/California-exodus-is-ju...

There are better places to go, hypothetically. Realistically: People are going to Texas. Obviously they are; ranked by GDP per state, California is #1, Texas is #2. The only people who give a shit about the Christian zealots are people hundreds of miles away outside the state; people like Elon Musk don't care, and still move there, and move their companies with them.

> The only people who give a shit about the Christian zealots are people hundreds of miles away outside the state

That seems untrue, given Texas' shift toward purple. Certainly wealthy people in Texas (regardless of their politics) aren't affected too much by who sits in the state house, but there are plenty of Democrats in Texas who aren't wealthy.

And just as a random example, I bet women who are looking to terminate unwanted pregnancies in Texas right now are probably sick of the Christian zealots.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#502

Post by yurishimo »

rupi wrote: post #210
asdff wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Property taxes are higher than California, right? I can't find the source handy at the moment, but I've heard that a house in Austin that looks like a couple hundred grand cheaper than an equivalent house in California for the listing isn't actually any cheaper when you factor in the increased taxes and potentially other costs I'm not aware of.

Property tax is higher but there is no state income tax. Also, property tax increase rates are significantly higher as compared to California. Austin is also growing very fast and is quickly turning into the sprawl that I have always associated more with Dallas and Houston. Financially speaking, either place may turn out advantageous depending on your house's price and income. CA (Bay Area) has a lot of other positiv…

The interesting thing is, the sprawl of Dallas and Houston have now started to work in their favor.

I live in Dallas. We're growing massively, but honestly, I haven't really noticed too many changes in my day to day. It takes just as long to get somewhere as it did 5 years ago.

Because they were large, spread out cities already, the highway infrastructure, suburban development, and local planning have all been optimized to support that reality. Austin tried to keep that smaller college-town feel, which was hip and trendy and cool for visitors like SXSW, but is now leading to the awful growing pains they face today.

I think Austin has the potential to be a really great city, but it's gonna take decades to get anywhere near that reality.

In the meantime, Houston is building another loop, Dallas is extending the DNT practically to Oklahoma, and Ft Worth has a shiny new tollroad on the west side of the city. They'll keep absorbing growth while Austin struggles to get organized. Unfortunately, many of the people flocking to Texas don't know any better so they go to Austin first.

My 2¢.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#503

Post by kelnos »

8note wrote: post #321
danhak wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are many millions of people in the country that don't share your politics. Some of them are even engineers with families.

I don't know which people like sitting in traffic. Wide roads is a sign of sitting in traffic. Family wise though, moving to Texas is bad for half the members of your family. Half the people in your family, aren't going to agree with the Texas government's views, whether you want to force them to or not.

> Half the people in your family, aren't going to agree with the Texas government's views

You do realize that there are plenty of women in Texas (and elsewhere) who support curtailing access to (or even outright banning) abortion, right?

Edit: I didn't expect this number to be so high, but apparently 43% of women in the US identify as pro-life (https://news.gallup.com/poll/244709/pro-choice-pro-life-2018...).

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#504

Post by kelnos »

fighterpilot wrote: post #487
8note wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know which people like sitting in traffic. Wide roads is a sign of sitting in traffic. Family wise though, moving to Texas is bad for half the members of your family. Half the people in your family, aren't going to agree with the Texas government's views, whether you want to force them to or not.

I feel like this should be obvious but wide roads don't imply sitting in traffic. If traffic is 1.5x but road width is 2x then you're less likely to be sitting in traffic.

That's a big "if". Building wider highways seems to just attract more people to drive on them.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#505

Post by tayo42 »

kelnos wrote: post #447
oceanplexian wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a no brainer, my company offered to let me move out of CA a few years ago. My utilities are 50% cheaper and more reliable, crime is lower, the air quality is better, and I bought a new construction with 10G Fiber Internet (You will never get this in California due to failing infrastructure). I miss is the arts, culture, and nightlife, but that was wiped out by government-enacted COVID restrictions so there are f…

> I miss is the arts, culture, and nightlife, but that was wiped out by government-enacted COVID restrictions so there are few redeeming reasons to stay. Isn't that the case pretty much everywhere, though? These things will come back in CA just as they will everywhere else, barring catastrophic economic collapse.

Its not even true, last weekend I went to a watercolor painting show featuring international artists. Been going out for dinner (not much of a drinker), the late night "downtown" area in my town is fully open. Tourists were back during summer. Activities are all back to normal. Concerts are going on, I went to one a couple weeks ago. There is one I really want to go to in the bay area too :( but no time.

Just clueless people on the internet that don't know what they're talking about. Probably because there is nothing else to do in texas besides be mad about things lol.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#506

Post by stakkur »

Apocryphon wrote: post #56

The official reason is because of housing: "To be clear we will be continuing to expand our activities in California," Musk said. "Our intention is to increase output from Fremont and Giga Nevada by 50%. If you go to our Fremont factory it's jammed." But, he added, "It's tough for people to afford houses, and people have to come in from far away....There's a limit to how big you can scale in the Bay Area." https://ww…

Housing cost imbalances are temporary. California migrants to the Portland and Seattle areas are already learning this. So, the real estate arbitrage of taking Bay Area profits and dumping them into Austin houses will be brief, painful, and the market will respond accordingly.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#507

Post by bradknowles »

bruceb wrote: post #150
Apocryphon wrote: post #56

The official reason is because of housing: "To be clear we will be continuing to expand our activities in California," Musk said. "Our intention is to increase output from Fremont and Giga Nevada by 50%. If you go to our Fremont factory it's jammed." But, he added, "It's tough for people to afford houses, and people have to come in from far away....There's a limit to how big you can scale in the Bay Area." https://ww…

Article on the commute some Tesla workers make, getting up at 2:30am. https://www.protocol.com/silicon-valley-tech-shuttles

Not that different from the commute that Apple employees I knew were making. They spent 30 minutes commuting to where they would pick up the shuttle, three or so hours on the shuttle, get off the shuttle and have lunch at Caffe Macs, maybe take a meeting, then get back on the shuttle for their ride home.

The shuttles had Wi-Fi, so they could get all their regular work done while on the shuttle. That was functionally their office, even though they had a desk in the building on Bubb Road.

And they were getting paid well over $150k, and living in group homes east of San Jose, because that’s all they could afford to live in.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#508

Post by pcurve »

bgentry wrote: post #411
scoofy wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Traffic in Austin is insane. Legit insane. Definitely comparable to the Bay Area if not worse. And there is absolutely no transit alternative comparable to BART. There is a morning and evening train, but it's really only effective if you live and work exactly on the stops.

I lived in CA my whole life, including the last 10 years in the Bay Area, before moving to Austin a year ago. I can’t for the life of me understand what you’re talking about. I-35 is bad, that’s about it. The freeways around the rest of Austin are still moving even around rush hour. None of those hold a candle to the Bay Bridge on a Friday afternoon, not even remotely close to as bad.

As someone who lives in northeast, there's just something very unsettling about highway road design in Austin. (and probably TX too).

Where I live, roads, ramps, exits are more integrated into surroundings.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#509

Post by yurishimo »

kelnos wrote: post #472
rupi wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Property tax is higher but there is no state income tax. Also, property tax increase rates are significantly higher as compared to California. Austin is also growing very fast and is quickly turning into the sprawl that I have always associated more with Dallas and Houston. Financially speaking, either place may turn out advantageous depending on your house's price and income. CA (Bay Area) has a lot of other positiv…

> Property tax is higher but there is no state income tax. I do wonder how much this affects salaries, though. Do employers in states with lower or no income taxes tend to pay worse for the same job than employers in states with higher income taxes?

Sorta. From my anecdotal evidence up the road in Dallas, software engineers still make comfortable salaries, but more in the $120k~ range. Nobody I know up here makes $200k+.

One thing to consider though, is that the companies available to work for outside Austin, probably aren't supplementing salaries with generous stock compensation packages. If more startups move to Texas, that could change too.

With two working adults in the house, 120k/ea is a very comfortable living.

Re: Tesla’s headquarters will move to Austin

#510

Post by [deleted] »

darawk wrote: post #189
asdff wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main problem for musk in this case being his tax burden, since he is otherwise entirely insulated from every other issue affecting most californians.

His tax situation really has nothing to do with it. If he sells his Tesla shares, he's still going to owe CA tax. But he never has to sell any Tesla shares, he can just buy hedges against them and take out loans. If you have sufficient capital assets, you never have to actual earn any "income" or generate any "capital gains" if you don't want to.

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