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Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons

gregkroleski.com

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Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons

#71

Post by codingdave »

sotojuan wrote: post #46
stevoski wrote: post #7

The more I read such articles, the more I think you'd have to be nuts to choose to live in San Francisco. And yet, clearly, plenty of people do choose to live in San Francisco.

As someone who does not want to live there either, I can see why people move there. It's simply where the most opportunities are. The idea is to move there and live uncomfortably until you network your way to an awesome, high paying job. Alternatively, the tech companies there usually do more interesting stuff than in other area. Here in NYC most are related to advertising or media—stuff not easy to get exited about.…

It is absolutely not where the most opportunities are. It is the place where the most startups are, which means the top of the opportunity pile eclipses other locations in terms of earning potential and networking. But quantitatively, the most programming jobs per capita are in Washington, Colorado, and Utah.

Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons

#74

Post by Turing_Machine »

serge2k wrote: post #17
goodJobWalrus wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No need to turn this into another stereotyping Europe vs US issue But it is kind of true that Americans are extremely melodramatic about this stuff. 800 sqft house is often referred as a "tiny house" in American media. In the UK (for example) this is an average house size.

The US is over 10 times larger than the UK. Guess what, tons of land leads to different expectations. I don't understand why Europeans seem to like acting condescending about this stuff?

More like 40 times (3.8 million square miles compared to 94,000 square miles). The UK is smaller than Oregon.

Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons

#75

Post by Turing_Machine »

goodJobWalrus wrote: post #70
douche wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you want to live in a city center, when you could have 40 acres of good land in the country for the same money, or less? Suburbs are a compromise, where you get a little of column A (room enough for decent living) and a little column B (urban wages and access to capital), which equals a lot of column C (long, shitty commutes).

> Why would you want to live in a city center Well, one reason would be: > long, shitty commutes another is that some people prefer urban life. I bet you'd be surprised to hear that in some countries people actually prefer to live in apartments to houses.When I ask why, they often state the fact that it is much less work to upkeep an apartment, so I guess that would be another reason. I personally understand why woul…

"I bet you'd be surprised to hear that in some countries people actually prefer to live in apartments to houses."

One sniff test for the credibility of this is to look at what rich people do.

No matter where you go, the wealthy tend to have large country estates. Sure, they may have a luxury apartment in town as well, but where do they spend their leisure time? Bingo.

Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons

#76

Post by HillRat »

big_youth wrote: post #61
eropple wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plenty of places outside of SF are doing interesting things. Boston has plenty, as does Austin.

I live in Austin and have seen many of my coworkers and friends leave for the bay area. Besides interesting work I think there are more opportunities for career growth. I am in security (but it's similar in many specialties) and while there are very good companies in Austin if I want to to rise become a security architect or director of information security I have to go to the tech headquarters. Companies like Google…

For security you could also look at the DC area, especially if you're an AMCIT who wouldn't mind undergoing an SSBI. The downside is that most of those jobs are playing whack-a-mole with breaches, but for high-paying, high-profile forensics, response and research positions, federal contractors are hard to beat.

Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons

#77

Post by Mz »

This was much, much more thoughtful than I expected. Some of the thought processes resonated with me. I spent a long time getting rid of everything I owned and, yet, after doing this for three years, I didn't have the change in mindset I really needed until I kind of marathon watched "Mission: Organization" on HGTV. I was still stuck in the American mindset of accumulation. I had long wanted to live more spartanly and I was deadest on buying my way there -- cuz, yeah, that makes so much sense.

Anyway, it's a really good read and not at all what I was expecting. I am sort of disappointed that so many of the comments here are about "Boo -- small space living!" or "Ugh! San Francisco!" or "It's even worse in many other countries!" because the piece really was not written that way. It wasn't written as "Ugh! Pity me! Boo hoo!" It is very thoughtful and a really good read.

I just wish the article had a native tweet button. I couldn't find one.

Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons

#78

Post by [deleted] »

BrainInAJar wrote: post #54
kzhahou wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's obviously their choice. OP didn't mean anyone is forced against their will. The question is: why does the vast majority of new tech continue to A) establish themselves in such an uncomfortable location B) not embrace distributed teams It's a terrible cycle at this point.

> why does the vast majority of new tech continue to > A) establish themselves in such an uncomfortable location > B) not embrace distributed teams Hiring networks. You want to hire people based on referrals and not experience or qualifications, you need to hire through your extended friend network, which if you're raised in the SF startup scene, is all in SF. It's also a state of affairs that ends up being unintenti…

[deleted]

Re: Life in a Studio Apartment with My Wife and Two Sons

#79

Post by goodJobWalrus »

Turing_Machine wrote: post #75
goodJobWalrus wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why would you want to live in a city center Well, one reason would be: > long, shitty commutes another is that some people prefer urban life. I bet you'd be surprised to hear that in some countries people actually prefer to live in apartments to houses.When I ask why, they often state the fact that it is much less work to upkeep an apartment, so I guess that would be another reason. I personally understand why woul…

"I bet you'd be surprised to hear that in some countries people actually prefer to live in apartments to houses." One sniff test for the credibility of this is to look at what rich people do. No matter where you go, the wealthy tend to have large country estates. Sure, they may have a luxury apartment in town as well, but where do they spend their leisure time? Bingo.

I wasn't referring to rich people. They have a whole different set of requirements. Also, they typically don't have to clean their own mansion, of take care of the pesky chores around the house.
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