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How high do living expenses have to be before a place has trouble hiring low-income or blue collar employees? Or will there always be those who are willing to p

How high do living expenses have to be before a place has trouble hiring low-income or blue collar employees? Or will there always be those who are willing to put in the travel time to fill them?

Kinnard 11y ago
There's a good chance of a large percent of low-income and blue collar employees being replaced by machines. The issue is that we still use money as an allocative technology, which means we have a system where people have to work in order to live. This doesn't make sense any more and people don't actually have to work to live.
- eliben 11y ago
  It's going to take quite a while before the restaurant waiters and dish washers, house cleaners, plumbers and gardeners of the valley will be replaced by machines though.
  - rdl 11y ago
    Very long time for all of them, yes, but marginal employees can be reduced through automation fairly quickly. Go from 3 people to 2 at a restaurant by using more pre-cooked food or automation, buy a better PoS/order management system to remove one waiter from front of house, etc. You don't even need to fire anyone -- just hire more slowly than otherwise when things are growing, and potentially not replace people when they leave (although that's less scheduled).
  - Kinnard 11y ago
    Quite a while like a decade or two? That's not that long for the end of labor, a 10,000+ year human institution.
ng12 11y ago
I have a feeling Palo Alto's going to find the answer to this very soon. The entire peninsula is unaffordable for low-income workers. Crossing the Dumbarton bridge is a ~30m commute in itself and costs $5/day. Downtown Palo Alto just instituted parking restrictions on the surrounding neighborhoods so low income commuters no longer even have a place to park.
- eliben 11y ago
  There will be no inflection point. The process is gradual and is long under way. To clean a house in the area can cost ~$150. Good nannies can make $50-60K a year. Plumbers are expensive. Gardeners are expensive. And so on. This is just basic economics. Also, I think the commutes are somewhat blown-up. Plenty of cheap places in San Jose that aren't much more than 40 minutes away if you avoid rush hour.
  - tailgate 11y ago
    > Also, I think the commutes are somewhat blown-up. Plenty of cheap places in San Jose that aren't much more than 40 minutes away if you avoid rush hour. Leaving aside the question of whether or not 40 min is a reasonable commute, you don't get to determine if you avoid rush hour, and you probobly won't. So 40 min is at best a lower bound rather than what you would expect to see.
cpncrunch 11y ago
It's simple supply and demand. Look at Fort McMurray, where fast food workers currently earn about C$14/hr compared to around $11.50 in other cities across Canada, and was probably higher during the boom years.
mahyarm 11y ago
The pay goes up and they do grueling 3 hour commutes with commuter busses from cheaper places in the deep east bay, like tracey or stockton.
ghshephard 11y ago
When I was working at Netscape in 1996-1998, for the first 18 months I lived in Oakland, on 17th near Lake Merrit ($500/month). The commute was: Walk to Bart, Bart to 22nd (pre millbrae), Muni from 22nd to Caltrain, Caltrain (pre bullet) down to Mountain View, Shuttle to Whisman, Walk to Building. Mostly reverse this at night. My commute was 2 hours in the morning, and 2 1/2 hours back at night. It was miserable, and I would never wish it on anyone. I feel for these people possibly losing their homes (some who have lived there for 30+ years!).
- CyberDildonics 11y ago
  Are people losing their homes or are they getting their homes bought?
  - ghshephard 11y ago
    I think I understand what you are trying to say, but, the ground truth is there are people who've lived there for 30+ years and pay $1000/month for their home (which probably has a net value of $5k or less) - and when the trailer park shuts down, they really have nowhere to go. So look, I read Ayn Rand when I was in college, I get economic impact of rent-control, and how it actually ends up hurting the lower socio economic strata - It's not like I'm ignorant of all these things. It's just, at the end of the day - I can appreciate how it would suck to have your entire world ripped apart.

How high do living expenses have to be before a place has trouble hiring low-income or blue collar employees? Or will there always be those who are willing to put in the travel time to fill them?

Kinnard 11y ago

There's a good chance of a large percent of low-income and blue collar employees being replaced by machines. The issue is that we still use money as an allocative technology, which means we have a system where people have to work in order to live. This doesn't make sense any more and people don't actually have to work to live.

eliben 11y ago
It's going to take quite a while before the restaurant waiters and dish washers, house cleaners, plumbers and gardeners of the valley will be replaced by machines though.
- rdl 11y ago
  Very long time for all of them, yes, but marginal employees can be reduced through automation fairly quickly. Go from 3 people to 2 at a restaurant by using more pre-cooked food or automation, buy a better PoS/order management system to remove one waiter from front of house, etc. You don't even need to fire anyone -- just hire more slowly than otherwise when things are growing, and potentially not replace people when they leave (although that's less scheduled).
- Kinnard 11y ago
  Quite a while like a decade or two? That's not that long for the end of labor, a 10,000+ year human institution.

ng12 11y ago

I have a feeling Palo Alto's going to find the answer to this very soon. The entire peninsula is unaffordable for low-income workers. Crossing the Dumbarton bridge is a ~30m commute in itself and costs $5/day. Downtown Palo Alto just instituted parking restrictions on the surrounding neighborhoods so low income commuters no longer even have a place to park.

eliben 11y ago
There will be no inflection point. The process is gradual and is long under way. To clean a house in the area can cost ~$150. Good nannies can make $50-60K a year. Plumbers are expensive. Gardeners are expensive. And so on. This is just basic economics. Also, I think the commutes are somewhat blown-up. Plenty of cheap places in San Jose that aren't much more than 40 minutes away if you avoid rush hour.
- tailgate 11y ago
  > Also, I think the commutes are somewhat blown-up. Plenty of cheap places in San Jose that aren't much more than 40 minutes away if you avoid rush hour. Leaving aside the question of whether or not 40 min is a reasonable commute, you don't get to determine if you avoid rush hour, and you probobly won't. So 40 min is at best a lower bound rather than what you would expect to see.

cpncrunch 11y ago

It's simple supply and demand. Look at Fort McMurray, where fast food workers currently earn about C$14/hr compared to around $11.50 in other cities across Canada, and was probably higher during the boom years.

mahyarm 11y ago

The pay goes up and they do grueling 3 hour commutes with commuter busses from cheaper places in the deep east bay, like tracey or stockton.

ghshephard 11y ago

When I was working at Netscape in 1996-1998, for the first 18 months I lived in Oakland, on 17th near Lake Merrit ($500/month). The commute was: Walk to Bart, Bart to 22nd (pre millbrae), Muni from 22nd to Caltrain, Caltrain (pre bullet) down to Mountain View, Shuttle to Whisman, Walk to Building. Mostly reverse this at night. My commute was 2 hours in the morning, and 2 1/2 hours back at night. It was miserable, and I would never wish it on anyone. I feel for these people possibly losing their homes (some who have lived there for 30+ years!).

CyberDildonics 11y ago
Are people losing their homes or are they getting their homes bought?
- ghshephard 11y ago
  I think I understand what you are trying to say, but, the ground truth is there are people who've lived there for 30+ years and pay $1000/month for their home (which probably has a net value of $5k or less) - and when the trailer park shuts down, they really have nowhere to go. So look, I read Ayn Rand when I was in college, I get economic impact of rent-control, and how it actually ends up hurting the lower socio economic strata - It's not like I'm ignorant of all these things. It's just, at the end of the day - I can appreciate how it would suck to have your entire world ripped apart.