9 ms·

The hype about an incoming wave of tech IPOs has underscored SF's tensions

54 points by mindgam3 7y ago

MentallyRetired 7y ago
"People generally unhappy. Story at 11."
acconrad 7y ago
This felt like a dispassionate ramble on San Francisco's roots in 60s counterculture while also ironically offering no help to the problem of big money flowing into the Valley (and in a way, being part of the problem she identifies from the technocrats). I found it difficult to get through.
- jkuria 7y ago
  Agreed. I read about half way through and the op still hadn't made his/her point. Too much set up for too small a conclusion.
  - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
    It's The New Yorker. They believe in "It's not the destination, it's the journey" as a writing style.
Apocryphon 7y ago
For what does it profit a city to gain tech tax revenue, yet forfeit its own society?
- rhizome 7y ago
  >gain tech tax revenue Ha ha, that's funny. No, they gave all those companies moratoriums on payroll taxes.
NiceMasque 7y ago
How do people in SF buy happiness then?
robbrit 7y ago
I think the title is a little misleading, I was expecting an article demonstrating that there is little correlation between top salaries or stock payouts and happiness; seems more just a nostalgia rant for the way SF used to be.
- obpacheco 7y ago
  > At the beginning of the current tech boom, it seemed that “old” San Francisco—activists, artists, immigrants—might continue to set the terms of the city, as it grudgingly acclimated to, and resisted, the influx of entrepreneurs and tech workers. It's funny that someone who embraces the immigrant culture of San Francisco, is so anti-immigration when other people also want to immigrate to San Francisco in search of higher wages and a better life.
  - intopieces 7y ago
    The rich and well educated have more options, so it makes sense to be on the side of immigrants who don’t.
    - obpacheco 7y ago
      You seem to be implying that immigrants aren't rich or well educated, the evidence doesn't bare that out. Middle Eastern immigrants are on average more educated that Americans, Asian immigrants make a much higher median wage than average Americans. Source from quartz showing that foreign born citizens earn higher wages: [link](https://qz.com/781527/immigrants-are-getting-more-out-of-americas-recovery-than-native-born-households-are/ https://qz.com/781527/immigrants-are-getting-more-out-of-ame...)
- Loughla 7y ago
  Nostalgia is a powerful driving force. I'm convinced Nostalgia, more than fear or hope is what got Trump elected, and why he'll win again. People seem to be desperate to always want to return to 'how things were'. It's fascinating.
ageek123 7y ago
Most of the problems described in the article are the direct result of the city's refusal to allow adequate housing construction to keep up with demand.
- MagicPropmaker 7y ago
  Right! And she laments old obsolete buildings being torn down to make way for apartment projects.
rxhernandez 7y ago
I've never understood the line: money doesn't buy happiness. Yes, money sitting in my bank account doesn't make me happy. However, my Porsche makes me quite happy. The townhouse I lived in brought me peace on the weekends. Buying plane tickets to wherever on a whim makes me happy. Buying nice clothes and wearing them makes me happy. Spending money to further my knowledge just because makes me happy.
- spaced-out 7y ago
  Adding on to this, I am 100% certain I would be happier if I had enough money to retire right now and maintain my current lifestyle. I might even choose to keep working, but that piece of mind would definitely make me happier in general.
- tunesmith 7y ago
  A certain level of money is necessary but not sufficient.
- bobthepanda 7y ago
  Money is not sufficient on its own to buy happiness if you have more deep-seated issues in your life. At least that‘s what I‘ve always taken the quote to mean.
- ionforce 7y ago
  You don't understand it because the mental model as presented by the statement is too simple. Money can make LOTS of people VERY happy, up to a certain point. Supposedly after 80k$, after you've been relieved of basic stresses like rent and finding food, more money will make you less happy per increment. If you are an unhappy person with a minimum of 80k$, then the bottleneck to your happiness is not money. Merely more money doesn't make ALL people happy ALL the time.
  - RcouF1uZ4gsC 7y ago
    The cutoff is definitely much higher than $80k in the Bay Area. You would basically be homeless at that level of household income.
_bxg1 7y ago
"The store displayed high-end kitchen and grill tools, sets of cheese knives, truffle-flavored potato chips, wine, small-batch chocolate, Wagyu beef jerky, buckets of flowers, and a variety of small, high-design jars containing the sorts of transactional condiments and ephemera that often circulate as hostess gifts: preserved lemon paste; pork lard; red-pepper jam; hand-poured candles. Chunks of pink Himalayan salt were packaged with miniature graters near a Scandinavian-looking guacamole press." San Francisco has become a parody of civilization. This paragraph reads like a description of an Earth-themed tourist stop. A collection of shallow signifiers of what it's like to be a human, that you can take home and show your friends and family to prove you visited.
- ardit33 7y ago
  You never been to NYC have you. There are plenty of ridiculous stores here as well. Once a place is big enough and has enough people with cash that don't know how to spend it, all kind of weird stores spring up, happy to get some of that money. LA is the same. Let's please not bash SF and tech un-deservely. Heck, I'd say places like Miami, Vegas or LA are much worse in this department. (i.e. the ridiculous concept stores).
  - brundolf 7y ago
    It's not that the store is weird, it's that the common thread through all the items it carries is "things that evoke human-ness". It's for people who are far removed from being regular people but who want to experience what they imagine that feels like. We have similar stores here in Austin, but they haven't (yet) taken over completely.
    - nitwit005 7y ago
      Honestly, no idea how you're grading something as having more human-ness than something else.
  - CPLX 7y ago
    I've spent a lot of time in all three cities you mention and live in one of them. San Francisco is not the same, it's visibly pathologically worse.
Balgair 7y ago
Good snapshot! SF, in the post IPO-3.0 glow is sure a short place. It's in transition. The big battles to IPO and get paid for all that delayed gratification, are over. These unicorns are made real in all their off-white reality, trailing glitter scintillae as they trot in fresh mud. Of course, not all the IPOs are mainfest, but all can see them coming. It's like waiting outside the classroom for your friends after your last final of the year, in that early evening light of May, but before they are out of theirs'. The party is coming, but you are very tired from cramming, and your friends are still crunching away. So you sit, watch others plop out of the test, have a cigarette to pass time, enjoy the sun-warm concrete seep into your feet and thighs, and take a nip out of the flask. That's the feeling I get out of SF now, out of this article. The exhausted biding of time.
jerzzhang 7y ago
A fair amount of my friends are on a way to become IPO-millionaires this year. All of them live in SF, obviously. I'm curious to see how this flood of new-made riches will affect the city and its socio-economic and political issues.
nerpderp82 7y ago
IT doesn't buy happiness in Seattle either. Prevents abject sadness at best.
chrisdhoover 7y ago
Ooh she spoke with a 15 year resident, at the pie shop, the twee pie shop that took over the flower shop that had been there for 50 years. I got mine, now everyone else leave. And in passing she name checks Philz as part of her listing all that is gone is replaced by start up millions spiel. I’m not a fan of Phil personally, but thats between me and him. Whats interesting is the story of Philz. He had a corner store on a corner with 2 other corner stores. His wasn’t doing any business. Phil, I assume he’s an immigrant, rolled up his sleeves and went to work. He experimented with coffee and figured out the whole pour over deal. He got a good mention in the SF Weekly back when weekly papers were still vibrant. Word spread. I went to Philz to see what the fuss was. He had one pour over station. The store still had metro racks with canned goods and a cooler with soda pop. Phil made my first drink at Philz. The interesting part is how Phil turned a dying corner store into a growing business with backing. In the passing example of Philz by the author, she shows how shallow and superficial her article really is. She knows nothing really about Philz. She only knows he’s backed by millions. Philz is a classic american success story. And so are many of the tech businesses.

54 points by mindgam3 7y ago

"People generally unhappy. Story at 11."

This felt like a dispassionate ramble on San Francisco's roots in 60s counterculture while also ironically offering no help to the problem of big money flowing into the Valley (and in a way, being part of the problem she identifies from the technocrats). I found it difficult to get through.

jkuria 7y ago
Agreed. I read about half way through and the op still hadn't made his/her point. Too much set up for too small a conclusion.
- AnimalMuppet 7y ago
  It's The New Yorker. They believe in "It's not the destination, it's the journey" as a writing style.

Apocryphon 7y ago

For what does it profit a city to gain tech tax revenue, yet forfeit its own society?

rhizome 7y ago
>gain tech tax revenue Ha ha, that's funny. No, they gave all those companies moratoriums on payroll taxes.

NiceMasque 7y ago

How do people in SF buy happiness then?

robbrit 7y ago

I think the title is a little misleading, I was expecting an article demonstrating that there is little correlation between top salaries or stock payouts and happiness; seems more just a nostalgia rant for the way SF used to be.

obpacheco 7y ago
> At the beginning of the current tech boom, it seemed that “old” San Francisco—activists, artists, immigrants—might continue to set the terms of the city, as it grudgingly acclimated to, and resisted, the influx of entrepreneurs and tech workers. It's funny that someone who embraces the immigrant culture of San Francisco, is so anti-immigration when other people also want to immigrate to San Francisco in search of higher wages and a better life.
- intopieces 7y ago
  The rich and well educated have more options, so it makes sense to be on the side of immigrants who don’t.
  - obpacheco 7y ago
    You seem to be implying that immigrants aren't rich or well educated, the evidence doesn't bare that out. Middle Eastern immigrants are on average more educated that Americans, Asian immigrants make a much higher median wage than average Americans. Source from quartz showing that foreign born citizens earn higher wages: [link](https://qz.com/781527/immigrants-are-getting-more-out-of-americas-recovery-than-native-born-households-are/ https://qz.com/781527/immigrants-are-getting-more-out-of-ame...)
Loughla 7y ago
Nostalgia is a powerful driving force. I'm convinced Nostalgia, more than fear or hope is what got Trump elected, and why he'll win again. People seem to be desperate to always want to return to 'how things were'. It's fascinating.

ageek123 7y ago

Most of the problems described in the article are the direct result of the city's refusal to allow adequate housing construction to keep up with demand.

MagicPropmaker 7y ago
Right! And she laments old obsolete buildings being torn down to make way for apartment projects.

rxhernandez 7y ago

I've never understood the line: money doesn't buy happiness. Yes, money sitting in my bank account doesn't make me happy. However, my Porsche makes me quite happy. The townhouse I lived in brought me peace on the weekends. Buying plane tickets to wherever on a whim makes me happy. Buying nice clothes and wearing them makes me happy. Spending money to further my knowledge just because makes me happy.

spaced-out 7y ago
Adding on to this, I am 100% certain I would be happier if I had enough money to retire right now and maintain my current lifestyle. I might even choose to keep working, but that piece of mind would definitely make me happier in general.
tunesmith 7y ago
A certain level of money is necessary but not sufficient.
bobthepanda 7y ago
Money is not sufficient on its own to buy happiness if you have more deep-seated issues in your life. At least that‘s what I‘ve always taken the quote to mean.
ionforce 7y ago
You don't understand it because the mental model as presented by the statement is too simple. Money can make LOTS of people VERY happy, up to a certain point. Supposedly after 80k$, after you've been relieved of basic stresses like rent and finding food, more money will make you less happy per increment. If you are an unhappy person with a minimum of 80k$, then the bottleneck to your happiness is not money. Merely more money doesn't make ALL people happy ALL the time.
- RcouF1uZ4gsC 7y ago
  The cutoff is definitely much higher than $80k in the Bay Area. You would basically be homeless at that level of household income.

_bxg1 7y ago

"The store displayed high-end kitchen and grill tools, sets of cheese knives, truffle-flavored potato chips, wine, small-batch chocolate, Wagyu beef jerky, buckets of flowers, and a variety of small, high-design jars containing the sorts of transactional condiments and ephemera that often circulate as hostess gifts: preserved lemon paste; pork lard; red-pepper jam; hand-poured candles. Chunks of pink Himalayan salt were packaged with miniature graters near a Scandinavian-looking guacamole press." San Francisco has become a parody of civilization. This paragraph reads like a description of an Earth-themed tourist stop. A collection of shallow signifiers of what it's like to be a human, that you can take home and show your friends and family to prove you visited.

ardit33 7y ago
You never been to NYC have you. There are plenty of ridiculous stores here as well. Once a place is big enough and has enough people with cash that don't know how to spend it, all kind of weird stores spring up, happy to get some of that money. LA is the same. Let's please not bash SF and tech un-deservely. Heck, I'd say places like Miami, Vegas or LA are much worse in this department. (i.e. the ridiculous concept stores).
- brundolf 7y ago
  It's not that the store is weird, it's that the common thread through all the items it carries is "things that evoke human-ness". It's for people who are far removed from being regular people but who want to experience what they imagine that feels like. We have similar stores here in Austin, but they haven't (yet) taken over completely.
  - nitwit005 7y ago
    Honestly, no idea how you're grading something as having more human-ness than something else.
- CPLX 7y ago
  I've spent a lot of time in all three cities you mention and live in one of them. San Francisco is not the same, it's visibly pathologically worse.

Balgair 7y ago

Good snapshot! SF, in the post IPO-3.0 glow is sure a short place. It's in transition. The big battles to IPO and get paid for all that delayed gratification, are over. These unicorns are made real in all their off-white reality, trailing glitter scintillae as they trot in fresh mud. Of course, not all the IPOs are mainfest, but all can see them coming. It's like waiting outside the classroom for your friends after your last final of the year, in that early evening light of May, but before they are out of theirs'. The party is coming, but you are very tired from cramming, and your friends are still crunching away. So you sit, watch others plop out of the test, have a cigarette to pass time, enjoy the sun-warm concrete seep into your feet and thighs, and take a nip out of the flask. That's the feeling I get out of SF now, out of this article. The exhausted biding of time.

jerzzhang 7y ago

A fair amount of my friends are on a way to become IPO-millionaires this year. All of them live in SF, obviously. I'm curious to see how this flood of new-made riches will affect the city and its socio-economic and political issues.

nerpderp82 7y ago

IT doesn't buy happiness in Seattle either. Prevents abject sadness at best.

chrisdhoover 7y ago

Ooh she spoke with a 15 year resident, at the pie shop, the twee pie shop that took over the flower shop that had been there for 50 years. I got mine, now everyone else leave. And in passing she name checks Philz as part of her listing all that is gone is replaced by start up millions spiel. I’m not a fan of Phil personally, but thats between me and him. Whats interesting is the story of Philz. He had a corner store on a corner with 2 other corner stores. His wasn’t doing any business. Phil, I assume he’s an immigrant, rolled up his sleeves and went to work. He experimented with coffee and figured out the whole pour over deal. He got a good mention in the SF Weekly back when weekly papers were still vibrant. Word spread. I went to Philz to see what the fuss was. He had one pour over station. The store still had metro racks with canned goods and a cooler with soda pop. Phil made my first drink at Philz. The interesting part is how Phil turned a dying corner store into a growing business with backing. In the passing example of Philz by the author, she shows how shallow and superficial her article really is. She knows nothing really about Philz. She only knows he’s backed by millions. Philz is a classic american success story. And so are many of the tech businesses.