11 ms·

The homeowners have much of the blame, you're right, but tech has made things worse by rapid job growth that contributed to rising rent costs.

adventured 8y ago
Tech is a bountiful solution, not a problem. The problem is in not properly taxing the output of the hyper rich tech industry. The taxation then goes into trivially solving the homelessness problem in SF. We're talking about 5,000 people, not 50k or 500k. It is not a problem compared to the enormity of the tech riches. SF is an extremely affluent city that refuses to act.
- deadmetheny 8y ago
  >The taxation then goes into trivially solving the homelessness problem in SF Homelessness is not a trivial problem that can just be solved by throwing a lot of money at it. It's certainly a start in SV though, all things considered.
  - Kalium 8y ago
    You're right. Homeless is not an easy problem that can be solved with big dollops of cold, hard, cash. Rather, tt's a trivial problem that can just be solved by throwing a lot of housing at it. Incidentally, housing is the one thing that everywhere between Ocean Beach and Diridon are allergic to...
    - deadmetheny 8y ago
      Homelessness is not a trivial problem, full stop. There is no way around this. It can be lessened with extra housing for those who are only homeless because of cost of living, but that doesn't get to the root causes of what causes people to lack funds for housing and such.
      - ShabbosGoy 8y ago
        It comes down to equality of outcome vs. equality of opportunity. Homelessness can be solved with the former, it’s just that everyone else will suffer as well.
nerfhammer 8y ago
job growth is supposed to be a good thing...
- timr 8y ago
  Job growth is a good thing only if it benefits the people who live in a place before said growth occurs. Otherwise, you're incentivized to just keep shifting high-paid populations around and calling it success.
  - jogjayr 8y ago
    > Job growth is a good thing only if it benefits the people who live in a place before said growth occurs Why so? Even if high-paid populations are being shifted around, it's better for the region as a whole to have more highly-paid people. They'll spend more and pay more in taxes (sales, property, income). The pre-existing population presumably owns property, whose value has increased now because it's close to high-paying jobs so they too benefit. This is exactly what has happened in the Bay Area btw.
    - maxsilver 8y ago
      It's not objectively good to have more highly-paid people, those benefits they bring all carry significant downsides to any regular people in the area. Yes, rich people will spend more. But this is bad for all the regular people, who can't spend that much, and will be outbid on housing+rent, schooling, childcare, entertainment, etc. Yes, rich people will pay more in taxes, but this is generally bad for all the regular people, because taxes are calculated by averages, so rich people increasing property values also makes property more expensive for everyone else. Yes, more rich people help other rich people demand higher salaries, but literally none of this money trickles down into regular people's salaries, which stay roughly locked to the same dollar figure, regardless. (See how San Francisco has some of the highest salaries in the entire US, but their regular people still had to fight just to get $15/hr wages, which in SF is insultingly low to anyone working in any line of work whatsoever). > The pre-existing population presumably owns property, whose property has increased now because it's close to high-paying jobs That's never a safe assumption. Lots of pre-existing populations do not own property. And even for the people who do own property, it's not like those property values actually become cash -- you can only sell out if there's somewhere cheaper to move to. Increasingly, those 'cheaper places' no longer exist anywhere. We have people being gentrified out of their homes in my small hometown city (Grand Rapids, Mich). And they say what you've said, "who cares, they can just sell out their property, take the money and profit". But in truth, they can't do this. Where are they supposed to live? They can't afford to leave for SF, or NYC, or Seattle, or Chicago. Hell, they couldn't afford Minneapolis. They'd have to live in the literal middle of nowhere to afford something cheaper, and there's no jobs in the middle of nowhere, so it's a non-starter. This "property owner wildcard" myth needs to die. You absolutely can (and a meaningful number of people will) economically suffer due to development, even if you/they own property in the newly developed area, and even if you/they sell that property for much more than you bought it for.
Kalium 8y ago
You're absolutely right! Tech has made things worse! With that said, it might be worth discussing where the blame for the problem that has been made worse might lie. To aggravate an underlying problem, one has to already exist. So let's talk about that problem, and its causes, rather than casting aspersions on every group who contributed marginally after the fact - that's a very long list, and it's not even a useful list. Then maybe, having identified the problem and the causes, we can see about solving it. So let's talk about zoning, prop 13, and the way construction permitting processes work and the political systems that support them!
- manno23 8y ago
  This is so passive aggressive iycould only have been written by a woman. Sorry comrade, just joking, I know there are no such thing women!!
  - sctb 8y ago
    If you decide you'd like to comment according to the guidelines, please email us at hn@ycombinator.com. Until then we've banned the account. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- joejerryronnie 8y ago
  Or we could talk about the real underlying cause of the one issue you are referencing (cost of housing) - vastly more people moving to the Bay Area than there are houses available. Since it doesn't matter how fast we can actually build homes as we will never catch up to the current demand, we should implement a new resident tax. Let's say everyone who has not been a Bay Area resident for at least 10 years contributes a little to alleviate the problems they are helping to exacerbate.
  - Kalium 8y ago
    I understand why you feel that way. People are moving here so fast! They're changing everything, and there's no way we could ever keep up with how large the hordes of new migrants are. However, I think it might actually be possible to build homes rapidly enough to meet demand. We should at least try, and if we fail we'll have a lot of new housing. That's a nice prize no matter the outcome. What's convenient about this approach is that if we get rid of the political obstacles to construction, we almost certainly can build enough housing! Failing that, how about we tax people who have helped perpetuate this state of affairs and benefit the most to help address the problem? How about a "created this mess" tax on everyone who has been in the Bay for ten years or more? Maybe they can contribute a little to solving the problem they created, rather than inflicting pain on other people and shouting "STOP HITTING YOURSELF!". No, that's not a serious proposal. It makes more sense than slapping people with taxes for the privilege of moving to one of the most expensive places in the world, but that is not a high bar.
jogjayr 8y ago
That reminds me of the apocryphal story of the drowning man who sued his rescuer for breaking his arm during the rescue. The tech industry is doing what it's supposed to - building their business and making money. Along the way it's created a lot of jobs for a lot of people and paid them plenty of money. These are generally considered to be good things. If anything, industry would love lower housing prices because then they could justify paying lower salaries. That the city can't/won't build enough housing for its inhabitants is the voters' fault, and theirs alone. Every voter in every Bay Area that opposes new construction is responsible for each and every single person rendered homeless due to rising rents.
techbrofounder 8y ago
Everything is fine https://www.compass.com/listing/33-day-street-san-francisco-ca-94110/fb18e77c5d207eced894aebceefa2d3c27c107d7/?origin_type=Listing%20Card&origin=Consumer%20Search https://www.compass.com/listing/33-day-street-san-francisco-...

adventured 8y ago

Tech is a bountiful solution, not a problem. The problem is in not properly taxing the output of the hyper rich tech industry. The taxation then goes into trivially solving the homelessness problem in SF. We're talking about 5,000 people, not 50k or 500k. It is not a problem compared to the enormity of the tech riches. SF is an extremely affluent city that refuses to act.

deadmetheny 8y ago
>The taxation then goes into trivially solving the homelessness problem in SF Homelessness is not a trivial problem that can just be solved by throwing a lot of money at it. It's certainly a start in SV though, all things considered.
- Kalium 8y ago
  You're right. Homeless is not an easy problem that can be solved with big dollops of cold, hard, cash. Rather, tt's a trivial problem that can just be solved by throwing a lot of housing at it. Incidentally, housing is the one thing that everywhere between Ocean Beach and Diridon are allergic to...
  - deadmetheny 8y ago
    Homelessness is not a trivial problem, full stop. There is no way around this. It can be lessened with extra housing for those who are only homeless because of cost of living, but that doesn't get to the root causes of what causes people to lack funds for housing and such.
    - ShabbosGoy 8y ago
      It comes down to equality of outcome vs. equality of opportunity. Homelessness can be solved with the former, it’s just that everyone else will suffer as well.

nerfhammer 8y ago

job growth is supposed to be a good thing...

timr 8y ago
Job growth is a good thing only if it benefits the people who live in a place before said growth occurs. Otherwise, you're incentivized to just keep shifting high-paid populations around and calling it success.
- jogjayr 8y ago
  > Job growth is a good thing only if it benefits the people who live in a place before said growth occurs Why so? Even if high-paid populations are being shifted around, it's better for the region as a whole to have more highly-paid people. They'll spend more and pay more in taxes (sales, property, income). The pre-existing population presumably owns property, whose value has increased now because it's close to high-paying jobs so they too benefit. This is exactly what has happened in the Bay Area btw.
  - maxsilver 8y ago
    It's not objectively good to have more highly-paid people, those benefits they bring all carry significant downsides to any regular people in the area. Yes, rich people will spend more. But this is bad for all the regular people, who can't spend that much, and will be outbid on housing+rent, schooling, childcare, entertainment, etc. Yes, rich people will pay more in taxes, but this is generally bad for all the regular people, because taxes are calculated by averages, so rich people increasing property values also makes property more expensive for everyone else. Yes, more rich people help other rich people demand higher salaries, but literally none of this money trickles down into regular people's salaries, which stay roughly locked to the same dollar figure, regardless. (See how San Francisco has some of the highest salaries in the entire US, but their regular people still had to fight just to get $15/hr wages, which in SF is insultingly low to anyone working in any line of work whatsoever). > The pre-existing population presumably owns property, whose property has increased now because it's close to high-paying jobs That's never a safe assumption. Lots of pre-existing populations do not own property. And even for the people who do own property, it's not like those property values actually become cash -- you can only sell out if there's somewhere cheaper to move to. Increasingly, those 'cheaper places' no longer exist anywhere. We have people being gentrified out of their homes in my small hometown city (Grand Rapids, Mich). And they say what you've said, "who cares, they can just sell out their property, take the money and profit". But in truth, they can't do this. Where are they supposed to live? They can't afford to leave for SF, or NYC, or Seattle, or Chicago. Hell, they couldn't afford Minneapolis. They'd have to live in the literal middle of nowhere to afford something cheaper, and there's no jobs in the middle of nowhere, so it's a non-starter. This "property owner wildcard" myth needs to die. You absolutely can (and a meaningful number of people will) economically suffer due to development, even if you/they own property in the newly developed area, and even if you/they sell that property for much more than you bought it for.

Kalium 8y ago

You're absolutely right! Tech has made things worse! With that said, it might be worth discussing where the blame for the problem that has been made worse might lie. To aggravate an underlying problem, one has to already exist. So let's talk about that problem, and its causes, rather than casting aspersions on every group who contributed marginally after the fact - that's a very long list, and it's not even a useful list. Then maybe, having identified the problem and the causes, we can see about solving it. So let's talk about zoning, prop 13, and the way construction permitting processes work and the political systems that support them!

manno23 8y ago
This is so passive aggressive iycould only have been written by a woman. Sorry comrade, just joking, I know there are no such thing women!!
- sctb 8y ago
  If you decide you'd like to comment according to the guidelines, please email us at hn@ycombinator.com. Until then we've banned the account. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
joejerryronnie 8y ago
Or we could talk about the real underlying cause of the one issue you are referencing (cost of housing) - vastly more people moving to the Bay Area than there are houses available. Since it doesn't matter how fast we can actually build homes as we will never catch up to the current demand, we should implement a new resident tax. Let's say everyone who has not been a Bay Area resident for at least 10 years contributes a little to alleviate the problems they are helping to exacerbate.
- Kalium 8y ago
  I understand why you feel that way. People are moving here so fast! They're changing everything, and there's no way we could ever keep up with how large the hordes of new migrants are. However, I think it might actually be possible to build homes rapidly enough to meet demand. We should at least try, and if we fail we'll have a lot of new housing. That's a nice prize no matter the outcome. What's convenient about this approach is that if we get rid of the political obstacles to construction, we almost certainly can build enough housing! Failing that, how about we tax people who have helped perpetuate this state of affairs and benefit the most to help address the problem? How about a "created this mess" tax on everyone who has been in the Bay for ten years or more? Maybe they can contribute a little to solving the problem they created, rather than inflicting pain on other people and shouting "STOP HITTING YOURSELF!". No, that's not a serious proposal. It makes more sense than slapping people with taxes for the privilege of moving to one of the most expensive places in the world, but that is not a high bar.

jogjayr 8y ago

That reminds me of the apocryphal story of the drowning man who sued his rescuer for breaking his arm during the rescue. The tech industry is doing what it's supposed to - building their business and making money. Along the way it's created a lot of jobs for a lot of people and paid them plenty of money. These are generally considered to be good things. If anything, industry would love lower housing prices because then they could justify paying lower salaries. That the city can't/won't build enough housing for its inhabitants is the voters' fault, and theirs alone. Every voter in every Bay Area that opposes new construction is responsible for each and every single person rendered homeless due to rising rents.

techbrofounder 8y ago

Everything is fine https://www.compass.com/listing/33-day-street-san-francisco-ca-94110/fb18e77c5d207eced894aebceefa2d3c27c107d7/?origin_type=Listing%20Card&origin=Consumer%20Search https://www.compass.com/listing/33-day-street-san-francisco-...