7 ms·

“Rich People Can’t Stop”: The Luxe Quarantine Lives of Silicon Valley’s Elite

42 points by harambae 6y ago

austincheney 6y ago
Extremely wealthy people and narcissism, who could have made that connection?
- ey6es 6y ago
  Some kind of insane supergenius, I guess. ;)
OldHand2018 6y ago
> One California government official told me that some public school teachers are being enticed away to teach a single child in more affluent areas, like Beverly Hills and Palo Alto—a scenario this person called “fucked up,” and one that’s proving to be a real problem for school systems. Good for those teachers, and if it's causing problems for school systems maybe they should treat their teachers better.
- ergocoder 6y ago
  Yeah, exactly. I cannot believe they use this story as one of the anecdotes about rich people being bad. Teachers are not their slaves. They can choose work that is better.
  - hcknwscommenter 6y ago
    The point is, we all pay taxes. Education is a fundamental right. Schools are already underfunded because of anti-tax fundamentalism that is rampant among those who can most afford to pay taxes. Now, they simply buy our teachers out from under those of us who can't afford to pay 25K per child.
    - patrick451 6y ago
      Education is a service that somebody must pay for. It is only a fundamental right in as much as nobody should forbid you from acquiring an education. On the other hand, forcing me to pay for your education is not fundamental. It is robbery.
      - hcknwscommenter 6y ago
        I see. You don't care to reside in a society with an educated citizenry. Good luck with that.
    - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
      I'm sure some schools are underfunded, but is there a particular amount you think we ought to be spending? Keep in mind that American schools on average are near the top of the world in funding per student, so any kind of cross-cultural comparison isn't going to suggest underfunding.
    - OldHand2018 6y ago
      I don't live in California. Perhaps the only problem in California is money. I doubt it though. I have many family members that work or have worked in education. Sure, they all wished they were paid more. But none of them would have said that money was their #1 complaint. Money wouldn't ever have been in the top ten. Of all the teachers I know who have quit, money wasn't the reason.
    - ergocoder 6y ago
      > Now, they simply buy our teachers out from under those of us who can't afford to pay 25K per child. So, the teachers should be stuck with lower pay because you care about wealth inequality? Why would this specific teacher should be the one who gets punished? I'm sure there are many other examples to make the same point. This teacher example is a bad one.
      - hcknwscommenter 6y ago
        No. The teachers should be better funded in the first place by the tax base so that they can teach in the public school for a decent wage.
  - happytoexplain 6y ago
    I'm not sure how you can possibly confuse such a clear cut example of the rich having unfair access to a critical resource. Nobody is saying the teachers are immoral, and obviously the existence of such an imbalance can be "bad" regardless of the argument about whether an individual rich person is "bad" for benefiting from it, so exactly what angle are you coming at this from?
    - refurb 6y ago
      Plenty of middle class buy homes in the Bay Area in good school districts, while blue collar workers kid’s are stuck in crappy schools. Would you say those middle class parents have “unfair access” as well?
      - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
        Well, I don't agree with the article's tone of moral superiority, but I do think we're facing a more serious problem than the split between good and bad school districts. We're going to come out of this academic year with an unprecedentedly large bifurcation between kids who got the resources to home learn effectively and kids who didn't, and we need to think about what that means for their academic futures.
        refurb 6y ago
        That I agree with. Missing a few months at the tail end of the year is disruptive, but missing 9+ months is seriously disruptive and you're right, parents that can afford to pay a tutor can bridge the gap, but lower income families are going to be permanently disadvantaged.
      - danans 6y ago
        > Would you say those middle class parents have “unfair access” as well? Speaking as one of them, yes. What's unfair is that good schools are only afforded to the middle class and up.
        6y ago
- monkeydreams 6y ago
  > Good for those teachers, and if it's causing problems for school systems maybe they should treat their teachers better. It is causing problems for the school systems, not for the politicians who starve such sectors of resources. This is like claiming that the current issues of the US postal service are the fault of your mailman, rather than the corrupt head of the USPS who is willing to destroy billions of dollars of capital so that his master can win an election.
  - clairity 6y ago
    while money may be an issue for some teachers, money is not the problem for california schools. we spend roughly $12K per student in teaching & support costs, a bit higher than average. certainly not starved for resources. in LA, we had a school construction boom over the past decade or two. no less than 6 brand new schools have popped up near me in that time.
- dhosek 6y ago
  Those people who are enticing teachers away to teach a single student are the same ones who fight tooth and nail to keep from paying the extra taxes that would enable those teachers to earn a decent salary. I stopped reading the article at the bit about private jets (P.J.s? seriously?) when I wanted nothing more than a return of the guillotine.
  - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    I mean, is "P.J.s" serious? The author doesn't really point to evidence suggesting this is a common phrase or quote anyone in particular as having said it. I think it might just be outrage bait.
    - dhosek 6y ago
      Maybe, but that was the least of what made me ready to go all reign of terror.
mips_avatar 6y ago
After reading the paragraph about efoils I just spent the next twenty minutes on the efoil site. Now I really want one. https://liftfoils.com/efoil/ https://liftfoils.com/efoil/
sudeepj 6y ago
Was there an incident/outbreak in history which affected all (or the majority population) and the rich were substantially affected? Take WW1 or WW2 for example. The rich/aristocratic flew away from troubled zones. In the times of famine or drought, I do not recall anyone from rich class suffered. Why covid should be different? It is the way it always have been. Instead of thinking of rich and poor people, I have started to view them as "roles". I bet that the people who are pointing fingers at rich today would behave the same if they were to become rich. The behaviour largely remains same just the actual people keep changing.
- sudosysgen 6y ago
  This is a pretty empty argument. Instead of saying "you would do the same if you were rich", how about we change the system that allows them to do so? Then you can know that even if I become rich I won't do the same.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    Responding to a disaster by leveraging your resources to protect your personal interests is a pretty fundamental human impulse. I doubt any system could prevent that.
    - sudosysgen 6y ago
      Sure there are. I'm not allowed to leverage my resources to get myself out of conscription, why should a rich person be able to? As far as I know the state exists, you can just throw them in jail as soon as they step in, just like what would happen here. As far as a billionaire holding parties during a pandemic that killed over a hundred thousand people, you threaten them with jail time. It works, if you don't have a corrupt state.
      - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
dfee 6y ago
> For those who don’t want to be in America (and let’s be frank, who really wants to be in America right now?) Oh Vanity Fair, how vain is thee. Owned by Condé Nast which is in turn owned by one of the 10-15 wealthiest families in America [0]. Excuse me while puke in my mouth as you go on about classism. https://www.forbes.com/profile/newhouse/#3793bea16580 https://www.forbes.com/profile/newhouse/#3793bea16580
- dlivingston 6y ago
  And you expect a major media company to ultimately not be owned by wealthy person(s)?
- rbg246 6y ago
  Isn't it good that a company owned by rich people can write about the morals of other rich people? Albeit a vapid article.
  - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    It's good, but... do you remember the "stay inside" articles that were coming out in March and April? The ones that explained that responsible people need to find some indoor hobbies, stay there, and only open the door when the Instacart guy comes with food or the Amazon guy comes with craft supplies? I get the same kind of feeling here. Sure, rich billionaires have a lifestyle that largely insulates them from the effects of the pandemic - but so do Vanity Fair reporters, so I don't know where they found this high horse to get on about it.
    - refurb 6y ago
      Let's throw politicians in the mix there too. Lots of "you should do X", but of course, they can't be held to the same standard because they have important business running the country that requires an exception.
    - rbg246 6y ago
      I see your point, I also got that feeling with the noting that him and Travis didn't get along in the article.
CarbyAu 6y ago
Is anyone really surprised? Aside: for me Amazon is now useless. Not living in America means I need to filter by the sender being somewhere near me. Unless I am missing something, Amazon doesn't let me filter such.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  I'm curious, why do you need to filter by the sender being somewhere near you? As far as I know international freight is still travelling uninterrupted.
  - CarbyAu 6y ago
    Internation freight may be travelling in some sense but the time differences for me now are huge. Motorbike parts used to be airfreight. I am now waiting 8-10 weeks as it comes by sea. I use eBay now because - as per sibling comment - it lets me filter by where the sender is. For little bits and pieces - silicon tubing etc - I can often find it in my own city. Otherwise I'd have to wait for it to come from America or China...
- wtracy 6y ago
  eBay makes it easy to filter by location.
patrick451 6y ago
Moral outrage in the age of covid. "Egad, they were socializingi! With testing! The Horror!" Yawn.
jeffbee 6y ago
"Silicon Valley" has come to encompass the entire Pacific coast, I see. Travis Kalanick is a guy who is from LA, went to UCLA, and lives in LA. I mean yeah he got fired from Uber, but that company isn't in Silicon Valley, either.

42 points by harambae 6y ago

austincheney 6y ago

Extremely wealthy people and narcissism, who could have made that connection?

ey6es 6y ago
Some kind of insane supergenius, I guess. ;)

OldHand2018 6y ago

> One California government official told me that some public school teachers are being enticed away to teach a single child in more affluent areas, like Beverly Hills and Palo Alto—a scenario this person called “fucked up,” and one that’s proving to be a real problem for school systems. Good for those teachers, and if it's causing problems for school systems maybe they should treat their teachers better.

ergocoder 6y ago
Yeah, exactly. I cannot believe they use this story as one of the anecdotes about rich people being bad. Teachers are not their slaves. They can choose work that is better.
- hcknwscommenter 6y ago
  The point is, we all pay taxes. Education is a fundamental right. Schools are already underfunded because of anti-tax fundamentalism that is rampant among those who can most afford to pay taxes. Now, they simply buy our teachers out from under those of us who can't afford to pay 25K per child.
  - patrick451 6y ago
    Education is a service that somebody must pay for. It is only a fundamental right in as much as nobody should forbid you from acquiring an education. On the other hand, forcing me to pay for your education is not fundamental. It is robbery.
    - hcknwscommenter 6y ago
      I see. You don't care to reside in a society with an educated citizenry. Good luck with that.
  - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    I'm sure some schools are underfunded, but is there a particular amount you think we ought to be spending? Keep in mind that American schools on average are near the top of the world in funding per student, so any kind of cross-cultural comparison isn't going to suggest underfunding.
  - OldHand2018 6y ago
    I don't live in California. Perhaps the only problem in California is money. I doubt it though. I have many family members that work or have worked in education. Sure, they all wished they were paid more. But none of them would have said that money was their #1 complaint. Money wouldn't ever have been in the top ten. Of all the teachers I know who have quit, money wasn't the reason.
  - ergocoder 6y ago
    > Now, they simply buy our teachers out from under those of us who can't afford to pay 25K per child. So, the teachers should be stuck with lower pay because you care about wealth inequality? Why would this specific teacher should be the one who gets punished? I'm sure there are many other examples to make the same point. This teacher example is a bad one.
    - hcknwscommenter 6y ago
      No. The teachers should be better funded in the first place by the tax base so that they can teach in the public school for a decent wage.
- happytoexplain 6y ago
  I'm not sure how you can possibly confuse such a clear cut example of the rich having unfair access to a critical resource. Nobody is saying the teachers are immoral, and obviously the existence of such an imbalance can be "bad" regardless of the argument about whether an individual rich person is "bad" for benefiting from it, so exactly what angle are you coming at this from?
  - refurb 6y ago
    Plenty of middle class buy homes in the Bay Area in good school districts, while blue collar workers kid’s are stuck in crappy schools. Would you say those middle class parents have “unfair access” as well?
    - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
      Well, I don't agree with the article's tone of moral superiority, but I do think we're facing a more serious problem than the split between good and bad school districts. We're going to come out of this academic year with an unprecedentedly large bifurcation between kids who got the resources to home learn effectively and kids who didn't, and we need to think about what that means for their academic futures.
      - refurb 6y ago
        That I agree with. Missing a few months at the tail end of the year is disruptive, but missing 9+ months is seriously disruptive and you're right, parents that can afford to pay a tutor can bridge the gap, but lower income families are going to be permanently disadvantaged.
    - danans 6y ago
      > Would you say those middle class parents have “unfair access” as well? Speaking as one of them, yes. What's unfair is that good schools are only afforded to the middle class and up.
      - 6y ago
monkeydreams 6y ago
> Good for those teachers, and if it's causing problems for school systems maybe they should treat their teachers better. It is causing problems for the school systems, not for the politicians who starve such sectors of resources. This is like claiming that the current issues of the US postal service are the fault of your mailman, rather than the corrupt head of the USPS who is willing to destroy billions of dollars of capital so that his master can win an election.
- clairity 6y ago
  while money may be an issue for some teachers, money is not the problem for california schools. we spend roughly $12K per student in teaching & support costs, a bit higher than average. certainly not starved for resources. in LA, we had a school construction boom over the past decade or two. no less than 6 brand new schools have popped up near me in that time.
dhosek 6y ago
Those people who are enticing teachers away to teach a single student are the same ones who fight tooth and nail to keep from paying the extra taxes that would enable those teachers to earn a decent salary. I stopped reading the article at the bit about private jets (P.J.s? seriously?) when I wanted nothing more than a return of the guillotine.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  I mean, is "P.J.s" serious? The author doesn't really point to evidence suggesting this is a common phrase or quote anyone in particular as having said it. I think it might just be outrage bait.
  - dhosek 6y ago
    Maybe, but that was the least of what made me ready to go all reign of terror.

mips_avatar 6y ago

After reading the paragraph about efoils I just spent the next twenty minutes on the efoil site. Now I really want one. https://liftfoils.com/efoil/ https://liftfoils.com/efoil/

sudeepj 6y ago

Was there an incident/outbreak in history which affected all (or the majority population) and the rich were substantially affected? Take WW1 or WW2 for example. The rich/aristocratic flew away from troubled zones. In the times of famine or drought, I do not recall anyone from rich class suffered. Why covid should be different? It is the way it always have been. Instead of thinking of rich and poor people, I have started to view them as "roles". I bet that the people who are pointing fingers at rich today would behave the same if they were to become rich. The behaviour largely remains same just the actual people keep changing.

sudosysgen 6y ago
This is a pretty empty argument. Instead of saying "you would do the same if you were rich", how about we change the system that allows them to do so? Then you can know that even if I become rich I won't do the same.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  Responding to a disaster by leveraging your resources to protect your personal interests is a pretty fundamental human impulse. I doubt any system could prevent that.
  - sudosysgen 6y ago
    Sure there are. I'm not allowed to leverage my resources to get myself out of conscription, why should a rich person be able to? As far as I know the state exists, you can just throw them in jail as soon as they step in, just like what would happen here. As far as a billionaire holding parties during a pandemic that killed over a hundred thousand people, you threaten them with jail time. It works, if you don't have a corrupt state.
    - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago

dfee 6y ago

> For those who don’t want to be in America (and let’s be frank, who really wants to be in America right now?) Oh Vanity Fair, how vain is thee. Owned by Condé Nast which is in turn owned by one of the 10-15 wealthiest families in America [0]. Excuse me while puke in my mouth as you go on about classism. https://www.forbes.com/profile/newhouse/#3793bea16580 https://www.forbes.com/profile/newhouse/#3793bea16580

dlivingston 6y ago
And you expect a major media company to ultimately not be owned by wealthy person(s)?
rbg246 6y ago
Isn't it good that a company owned by rich people can write about the morals of other rich people? Albeit a vapid article.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  It's good, but... do you remember the "stay inside" articles that were coming out in March and April? The ones that explained that responsible people need to find some indoor hobbies, stay there, and only open the door when the Instacart guy comes with food or the Amazon guy comes with craft supplies? I get the same kind of feeling here. Sure, rich billionaires have a lifestyle that largely insulates them from the effects of the pandemic - but so do Vanity Fair reporters, so I don't know where they found this high horse to get on about it.
  - refurb 6y ago
    Let's throw politicians in the mix there too. Lots of "you should do X", but of course, they can't be held to the same standard because they have important business running the country that requires an exception.
  - rbg246 6y ago
    I see your point, I also got that feeling with the noting that him and Travis didn't get along in the article.

CarbyAu 6y ago

Is anyone really surprised? Aside: for me Amazon is now useless. Not living in America means I need to filter by the sender being somewhere near me. Unless I am missing something, Amazon doesn't let me filter such.

SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
I'm curious, why do you need to filter by the sender being somewhere near you? As far as I know international freight is still travelling uninterrupted.
- CarbyAu 6y ago
  Internation freight may be travelling in some sense but the time differences for me now are huge. Motorbike parts used to be airfreight. I am now waiting 8-10 weeks as it comes by sea. I use eBay now because - as per sibling comment - it lets me filter by where the sender is. For little bits and pieces - silicon tubing etc - I can often find it in my own city. Otherwise I'd have to wait for it to come from America or China...
wtracy 6y ago
eBay makes it easy to filter by location.

patrick451 6y ago

Moral outrage in the age of covid. "Egad, they were socializingi! With testing! The Horror!" Yawn.

jeffbee 6y ago

"Silicon Valley" has come to encompass the entire Pacific coast, I see. Travis Kalanick is a guy who is from LA, went to UCLA, and lives in LA. I mean yeah he got fired from Uber, but that company isn't in Silicon Valley, either.