5 ms·

I feel what you're saying, and that definitely is something that happens. Especially for people who move for the job, it's very easy to keep oneself separate fr

I feel what you're saying, and that definitely is something that happens. Especially for people who move for the job, it's very easy to keep oneself separate from the community. But making it illegal to feed your employees is a very stupid, very authoritarian way of dealing with it that feels like a terrible idea. I don't want to be told where to shop, ever, for any reason, and I dislike that these local governments are trying to force people to spend money at specific places over others. It would be difficult to describe this as any part of a free economy, and if I were starting one of these startups it would be a bad indicator for what might happen in the future and I would be extremely reluctant to set up shop in the town. What if the next move is even more egregious? Can't risk it man.

null000 8y ago
I see these types of comments, and I have a really hard time viewing them as anything but pretty entitled. I mean, yeah, it's unfortunate for those who won't get free lunches anymore (I'm currently part of the group that does, although I'm not in the bay area) but it's not like you deserve free food as a perk any more than any other random worker. If it were my company inflicting the decision on me after a record earnings call, yeah, I'd probably be pretty pissed off. But a city trying to make sure a corporation in a public, mixed use space doesn't insulate itself too much from the surrounding economy? There are pretty obviously people who benefit and people who are harmed, but it's not like this is the end of the world, those employees just aren't getting a benefit 99% of other employees in the world don't get either.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- thecommentary 8y ago
  Why don't you deserve the free food more? It's a job benefit that the company provides to entice talent (and yeah to keep people at their desks). Do you not deserve the high pay as well any more than any other random worker?
  - s73v3r_ 8y ago
    No. I can tell you that most minimum wage workers are working far, far, far harder than most of the people in this board, myself included.
    - briandear 8y ago
      How much revenue is a minimum wage worker generating? There is your answer.
      - s73v3r_ 8y ago
        The answer to that is it doesn't matter.
    - icebraining 8y ago
      And some of them were working in those private cafeterias. Not anymore, though; restaurateurs profits are more important.
- someguydave 8y ago
  Private corporations on private property should be able to make private contracts with employee as they see fit, without government interference.
  - jartelt 8y ago
    If the private corporation didn't like the conditions of the city zoning and development laws, they could build their office elsewhere.
    - stale2002 8y ago
      Or instead we could vote these politicians out of office. There are more techies moving to the bay area every day. Sooner or later those numbers add up and we've got ourselves a real voting bloc.
      - JetSpiegel 8y ago
        So many of them are H1B workers, they don't even vote.
      - nostrademons 8y ago
        These were the politicians that techies voted into office. The politicians that techies voted out of office opposed all development whatsoever - they were the folks that opposed the San Antonio Center development as a whole, and that blocked the North Bayshore redevelopment for over a decade until Googlers actually did form a voting bloc and voted the supervisors opposed to redevelopment out en-masse. There are a surprising number of tech employees who actually do favor smart urbanization, community engagement, and mixed-use developments instead of holing themselves up in their employers and writing code. Tech (and particular Big Tech) has become a lot more extroverted than the days when it was kids who got bullied at recess because they spent all day playing with computers rather than learning social skills. (And IMHO, this is one reason why the industry has become less innovative lately - there are fewer programmers willing to hole themselves up with a computer for years until they solve a hard technical problem, and fewer managers willing to sponsor that kind of work. The Erlich Bachmans are outnumbering the Richard Hendricks.)
jartelt 8y ago
If you build an office in the middle of a city, sometimes you need to be part of the city... The employees can always bring a lunch to work if they don't want to spend money going out to restaurants. Yes, it would suck if you expected free food and got stuck at this FB office. But, it would also suck if Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Sunnyvale became full of offices and private cafeterias and lost all essence of a "downtown". I mean Palo Alto is already full of Palantir buildings.
- hocuspocus 8y ago
  > But, it would also suck if Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Sunnyvale became full of offices and private cafeterias and lost all essence of a "downtown". I mean Palo Alto is already full of Palantir buildings. As an outsider who never lived in the US, I think they are already well beyond saving. At least this isn't my idea of a "downtown". It's not like you can somehow rekindle social diversity in those cities at this point. Outside of tech workers, almost nobody can afford living there. I believe most of these restaurant employees wouldn't mind working at a private cafeteria instead.
- closeparen 8y ago
  Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Sunnyvale residents start frothing at the mouth when development threatens to make any part of their city look like a downtown. They are deeply committed to preventing any hint of such a thing. At most, they want a 1950s small-town Main St.
  - nostrademons 8y ago
    San Antonio Center is very much starting to look like a downtown, complete with the dense apartment blocks over street-level retail, underground parking garages, 11-story apartment buildings, and pedestrian-only alleyways. It's still sort of a hybrid development, because the Walmart side of the block hasn't been redeveloped yet and features a giant parking lot and all around them are tiny 1950s-style strip malls and small apartment complexes that literally were built in the 60s, but you can see in both the zoning codes and satellite photos of the area redeveloped that they were going for a real city in density & usage. I remember thinking, when initial development started around 2010/2011 and all the news was about traffic on 101 and Google shuttle buses making life hell in the Mission, that it looked like the solution was to bring the City to Mountain View rather than bring all the workers from the City. They get away with this because the area was basically barren strip mall & parking lot before redevelopment - it was the old Sears store, plus Shockley Semiconductor (which I think had been turned into a small grocer that nobody except tech tourists visited), plus a few other old-economy retailers that were going bankrupt. There weren't actually any neighbors to get mad, plus I doubt they'd shed a tear.

null000 8y ago

I see these types of comments, and I have a really hard time viewing them as anything but pretty entitled. I mean, yeah, it's unfortunate for those who won't get free lunches anymore (I'm currently part of the group that does, although I'm not in the bay area) but it's not like you deserve free food as a perk any more than any other random worker. If it were my company inflicting the decision on me after a record earnings call, yeah, I'd probably be pretty pissed off. But a city trying to make sure a corporation in a public, mixed use space doesn't insulate itself too much from the surrounding economy? There are pretty obviously people who benefit and people who are harmed, but it's not like this is the end of the world, those employees just aren't getting a benefit 99% of other employees in the world don't get either.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
thecommentary 8y ago
Why don't you deserve the free food more? It's a job benefit that the company provides to entice talent (and yeah to keep people at their desks). Do you not deserve the high pay as well any more than any other random worker?
- s73v3r_ 8y ago
  No. I can tell you that most minimum wage workers are working far, far, far harder than most of the people in this board, myself included.
  - briandear 8y ago
    How much revenue is a minimum wage worker generating? There is your answer.
    - s73v3r_ 8y ago
      The answer to that is it doesn't matter.
  - icebraining 8y ago
    And some of them were working in those private cafeterias. Not anymore, though; restaurateurs profits are more important.
someguydave 8y ago
Private corporations on private property should be able to make private contracts with employee as they see fit, without government interference.
- jartelt 8y ago
  If the private corporation didn't like the conditions of the city zoning and development laws, they could build their office elsewhere.
  - stale2002 8y ago
    Or instead we could vote these politicians out of office. There are more techies moving to the bay area every day. Sooner or later those numbers add up and we've got ourselves a real voting bloc.
    - JetSpiegel 8y ago
      So many of them are H1B workers, they don't even vote.
    - nostrademons 8y ago
      These were the politicians that techies voted into office. The politicians that techies voted out of office opposed all development whatsoever - they were the folks that opposed the San Antonio Center development as a whole, and that blocked the North Bayshore redevelopment for over a decade until Googlers actually did form a voting bloc and voted the supervisors opposed to redevelopment out en-masse. There are a surprising number of tech employees who actually do favor smart urbanization, community engagement, and mixed-use developments instead of holing themselves up in their employers and writing code. Tech (and particular Big Tech) has become a lot more extroverted than the days when it was kids who got bullied at recess because they spent all day playing with computers rather than learning social skills. (And IMHO, this is one reason why the industry has become less innovative lately - there are fewer programmers willing to hole themselves up with a computer for years until they solve a hard technical problem, and fewer managers willing to sponsor that kind of work. The Erlich Bachmans are outnumbering the Richard Hendricks.)

jartelt 8y ago

If you build an office in the middle of a city, sometimes you need to be part of the city... The employees can always bring a lunch to work if they don't want to spend money going out to restaurants. Yes, it would suck if you expected free food and got stuck at this FB office. But, it would also suck if Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Sunnyvale became full of offices and private cafeterias and lost all essence of a "downtown". I mean Palo Alto is already full of Palantir buildings.

hocuspocus 8y ago
> But, it would also suck if Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Sunnyvale became full of offices and private cafeterias and lost all essence of a "downtown". I mean Palo Alto is already full of Palantir buildings. As an outsider who never lived in the US, I think they are already well beyond saving. At least this isn't my idea of a "downtown". It's not like you can somehow rekindle social diversity in those cities at this point. Outside of tech workers, almost nobody can afford living there. I believe most of these restaurant employees wouldn't mind working at a private cafeteria instead.
closeparen 8y ago
Palo Alto, Mountain View, and Sunnyvale residents start frothing at the mouth when development threatens to make any part of their city look like a downtown. They are deeply committed to preventing any hint of such a thing. At most, they want a 1950s small-town Main St.
- nostrademons 8y ago
  San Antonio Center is very much starting to look like a downtown, complete with the dense apartment blocks over street-level retail, underground parking garages, 11-story apartment buildings, and pedestrian-only alleyways. It's still sort of a hybrid development, because the Walmart side of the block hasn't been redeveloped yet and features a giant parking lot and all around them are tiny 1950s-style strip malls and small apartment complexes that literally were built in the 60s, but you can see in both the zoning codes and satellite photos of the area redeveloped that they were going for a real city in density & usage. I remember thinking, when initial development started around 2010/2011 and all the news was about traffic on 101 and Google shuttle buses making life hell in the Mission, that it looked like the solution was to bring the City to Mountain View rather than bring all the workers from the City. They get away with this because the area was basically barren strip mall & parking lot before redevelopment - it was the old Sears store, plus Shockley Semiconductor (which I think had been turned into a small grocer that nobody except tech tourists visited), plus a few other old-economy retailers that were going bankrupt. There weren't actually any neighbors to get mad, plus I doubt they'd shed a tear.