6 ms·

As a resident who was born here and left and then came back, I’ve had this idea kicking around in my head of “California is a luxury product”. If you look at t

As a resident who was born here and left and then came back, I’ve had this idea kicking around in my head of “California is a luxury product”. If you look at the entire US, and assume you have the ability to move and live in any state, there are lots of options for everyone at every income level. (Disclaimer that this doesn’t address poverty, DEI, and other limitations to a good chunk of citizens). From the Gold Rush, to Hollywood, to East Coasters moving to health spas like Carlsbad or Calistoga, some moved here for necessity but many out of choice and luxury. A lot more to unpack here but I think it’s interesting.

bhewes 3y ago
As I kid who lived outside the US a couple of times and would boomerang back, I feel that way about the whole country. We have something like 8.8% of our population as millionaires so like 22M people. And I never have to hire guards for routine travel trips.
squokko 3y ago
It's a terrible luxury product though because 1) Prop 13 means that people from 50 years ago are still in the luxury neighborhoods 2) Crime is not sufficiently eradicated even from expensive areas
- esotericimpl 3y ago
  California is in the top quartile of safest states in the US. Your complaint is that rich people wont have their property taxes jacked up and they haven't "eradicated" crime. As a response to the fact that California is as close to the French Riviera as we have in the US.
  - pookha 3y ago
    I've never seen this insanity anywhere in world except for California: https://nypost.com/2023/07/18/san-francisco-stores-lock-up-frozen-food-to-deter-shoplifters/ https://nypost.com/2023/07/18/san-francisco-stores-lock-up-f...
    - mrguyorama 3y ago
      This KIND of thing however is extremely common in poverty stricken areas. Poor areas are crime ridden, because most people in poverty lack other choices, and very few people will choose to just lay down and die quietly like some people seem to think they should. Look at mcdonalds in detroit and stuff like that, they look like banks inside, with bulletproof plastic panels between customers and staff. Californian elitists just get pissy that they have to see it in their back yard, because they want the suffering required to support their profits to be out of sight and out of mind. People bitch and moan that "california already spends a shitload on homelessness" but like, it's california, even the small office you have to have just for a social worker to have a laptop to keep things organized will cost millions a year. If you want to function somewhere that has a land cost ten times anywhere else, you are going to have to pay more. Period. The janitors need to live there too.
    - esotericimpl 3y ago
      [dead]
- ChuckMcM 3y ago
  Just to put a dose of reality here, Prop 13 property taxes reset on sales (there are exceptions when selling to children of the owners but generally they reset) and property turnover rates in California are generally in excess of 10%. What that means is that pretty much all of the taxes are reset every 10 years or so. This is more true of "desirable" places to live (Bay Area, LA, San Diego) than say "less desirable". I have encouraged (without success so far) the County Assessor's office to publish the "net" tax year (average, median, and mode) for the county to help people better understand this.
  - riku_iki 3y ago
    Unless it is the same 10 percent resetting over and over and other 90 percent don't change hands
  - sokoloff 3y ago
    It seems like around 2/3 of the base would be reset in 10 years, if each house has an equal, random chance to be sold. I think the reality is smaller homes change hands more often and larger homes less often, meaning the chance that a larger home changes hands in a given decade could easily be less than half. (And naturally, the longer a house is held, the longer it’s likely to be held, even without Prop 13, but Prop 13 makes it a stronger sticky force.)
  - sib 3y ago
    >> Prop 13 property taxes reset on sales ... and property turnover rates in California are generally in excess of 10%. What that means is that pretty much all of the taxes are reset every 10 years or so That would be assuming certain things, among which would be that if 10% of properties sell every year, there is a consistent 10% chance of a given property selling each year. What I can tell you from looking at the data on all the houses in the neighborhood in which we bought our home in 2019 is that the vast majority of them had been last purchased more than 20 years earlier (and quite a few more than 30). Given the significant economic incentives created by Prop 13, houses in appreciating areas should be less likely to turn over than ones in areas where values are relatively stable.
    - 3y ago
- seizethecheese 3y ago
  Nah, many luxury products (like an Ivy League education) involve lower class people. It adds flavor.
- drcode 3y ago
  crime in Mill valley, just on the other side of the golden gate bridge, is infinitesimal
dontmobile 3y ago
[dead]
detourdog 3y ago
I refer to this idea as making our own inflation. We such stratified groups of spending so that if you want to spend $100 1980 dollars on a pair a jeans you can find that price range. If you never want to spend more than $20 on pants that is possible also. For all but the most constrained the same product category(inherent quality differences may or maynot exist) is available at any price point.
squid_fm 3y ago
It is 100% a luxury product for one reason alone: weather. Having lived in areas with harsh winters and then moving back to CA, you’re basically paying to gain an extra 3 months of life every year.
- meragrin_ 3y ago
  > you’re basically paying to gain an extra 3 months of life every year. Huh? How so?
  - squid_fm 3y ago
    Harsh winters and humid summers are quite miserable. People are less likely to want to go out, certain businesses are closed, specific activities are not possible, etc. The amount of “nice days” you get in CA is much greater than elsewhere in the US.
    - tromp 3y ago
      Even compared to Hawaii?
      - squid_fm 3y ago
        Fair point. I would argue that Hawaii also falls into this category (and it seems reflected in their housing prices).
      - cvhashim04 3y ago
        Hawaii is for sure more expensive than Cali. My pockets were hurting when my vacation ended.
      - cellis 3y ago
        Too distal, and there's not a thriving non-tourism industry to work in.
      - hackeraccount 3y ago
        In terms of cost of living Hawaii is effectively an annex of California.
chrisco255 3y ago
They moved to CA in the 1840s to seek to get rich, not because they were already rich. People moved to CA to try to make it big in movies or music, although most failed, they still lived a pretty good lifestyle throughout most of the 20th century. Not because they were already Brad Pitt or Madonna. People moved to Silicon Valley, initially just to get jobs at a burgeoning semiconductor industry a few decades ago. Then later to start up companies in personal computing or internet businesses. Not because they were already Steve Jobs or Jeff Bezos. Although most people never got that level of success, there was still a pretty good lifestyle available to young adults in the valley throughout most of the late 20th century. Most people throughout California's history moved there for opportunity not as a luxury.
- josephjrobison 3y ago
  For sure, it’s always been a blend of both but you’d have to agree there was more of it than those moving to other parts of the Western US, which impacted many things downstream. And the question is more about whether it’s currently primarily a luxury option as a headline idea, with a thousand different caveats.
francisofascii 3y ago
It reminds me of cost of a minor league baseball game ticket, which is several times cheaper than a major league game. Of course the major league game is "better", but is it really 500% better? The seats, the game, pitching speeds, the hot dogs, beer, etc. are all the same. California is better than most places in the US, but probably not worth the financial hardship that people need to suffer to live there.

bhewes 3y ago

As I kid who lived outside the US a couple of times and would boomerang back, I feel that way about the whole country. We have something like 8.8% of our population as millionaires so like 22M people. And I never have to hire guards for routine travel trips.

squokko 3y ago

It's a terrible luxury product though because 1) Prop 13 means that people from 50 years ago are still in the luxury neighborhoods 2) Crime is not sufficiently eradicated even from expensive areas

esotericimpl 3y ago
California is in the top quartile of safest states in the US. Your complaint is that rich people wont have their property taxes jacked up and they haven't "eradicated" crime. As a response to the fact that California is as close to the French Riviera as we have in the US.
- pookha 3y ago
  I've never seen this insanity anywhere in world except for California: https://nypost.com/2023/07/18/san-francisco-stores-lock-up-frozen-food-to-deter-shoplifters/ https://nypost.com/2023/07/18/san-francisco-stores-lock-up-f...
  - mrguyorama 3y ago
    This KIND of thing however is extremely common in poverty stricken areas. Poor areas are crime ridden, because most people in poverty lack other choices, and very few people will choose to just lay down and die quietly like some people seem to think they should. Look at mcdonalds in detroit and stuff like that, they look like banks inside, with bulletproof plastic panels between customers and staff. Californian elitists just get pissy that they have to see it in their back yard, because they want the suffering required to support their profits to be out of sight and out of mind. People bitch and moan that "california already spends a shitload on homelessness" but like, it's california, even the small office you have to have just for a social worker to have a laptop to keep things organized will cost millions a year. If you want to function somewhere that has a land cost ten times anywhere else, you are going to have to pay more. Period. The janitors need to live there too.
  - esotericimpl 3y ago
    [dead]
ChuckMcM 3y ago
Just to put a dose of reality here, Prop 13 property taxes reset on sales (there are exceptions when selling to children of the owners but generally they reset) and property turnover rates in California are generally in excess of 10%. What that means is that pretty much all of the taxes are reset every 10 years or so. This is more true of "desirable" places to live (Bay Area, LA, San Diego) than say "less desirable". I have encouraged (without success so far) the County Assessor's office to publish the "net" tax year (average, median, and mode) for the county to help people better understand this.
- riku_iki 3y ago
  Unless it is the same 10 percent resetting over and over and other 90 percent don't change hands
- sokoloff 3y ago
  It seems like around 2/3 of the base would be reset in 10 years, if each house has an equal, random chance to be sold. I think the reality is smaller homes change hands more often and larger homes less often, meaning the chance that a larger home changes hands in a given decade could easily be less than half. (And naturally, the longer a house is held, the longer it’s likely to be held, even without Prop 13, but Prop 13 makes it a stronger sticky force.)
- sib 3y ago
  >> Prop 13 property taxes reset on sales ... and property turnover rates in California are generally in excess of 10%. What that means is that pretty much all of the taxes are reset every 10 years or so That would be assuming certain things, among which would be that if 10% of properties sell every year, there is a consistent 10% chance of a given property selling each year. What I can tell you from looking at the data on all the houses in the neighborhood in which we bought our home in 2019 is that the vast majority of them had been last purchased more than 20 years earlier (and quite a few more than 30). Given the significant economic incentives created by Prop 13, houses in appreciating areas should be less likely to turn over than ones in areas where values are relatively stable.
  - 3y ago
seizethecheese 3y ago
Nah, many luxury products (like an Ivy League education) involve lower class people. It adds flavor.
drcode 3y ago
crime in Mill valley, just on the other side of the golden gate bridge, is infinitesimal

dontmobile 3y ago

[dead]

detourdog 3y ago

I refer to this idea as making our own inflation. We such stratified groups of spending so that if you want to spend $100 1980 dollars on a pair a jeans you can find that price range. If you never want to spend more than $20 on pants that is possible also. For all but the most constrained the same product category(inherent quality differences may or maynot exist) is available at any price point.

squid_fm 3y ago

It is 100% a luxury product for one reason alone: weather. Having lived in areas with harsh winters and then moving back to CA, you’re basically paying to gain an extra 3 months of life every year.

meragrin_ 3y ago
> you’re basically paying to gain an extra 3 months of life every year. Huh? How so?
- squid_fm 3y ago
  Harsh winters and humid summers are quite miserable. People are less likely to want to go out, certain businesses are closed, specific activities are not possible, etc. The amount of “nice days” you get in CA is much greater than elsewhere in the US.
  - tromp 3y ago
    Even compared to Hawaii?
    - squid_fm 3y ago
      Fair point. I would argue that Hawaii also falls into this category (and it seems reflected in their housing prices).
    - cvhashim04 3y ago
      Hawaii is for sure more expensive than Cali. My pockets were hurting when my vacation ended.
    - cellis 3y ago
      Too distal, and there's not a thriving non-tourism industry to work in.
    - hackeraccount 3y ago
      In terms of cost of living Hawaii is effectively an annex of California.

chrisco255 3y ago

They moved to CA in the 1840s to seek to get rich, not because they were already rich. People moved to CA to try to make it big in movies or music, although most failed, they still lived a pretty good lifestyle throughout most of the 20th century. Not because they were already Brad Pitt or Madonna. People moved to Silicon Valley, initially just to get jobs at a burgeoning semiconductor industry a few decades ago. Then later to start up companies in personal computing or internet businesses. Not because they were already Steve Jobs or Jeff Bezos. Although most people never got that level of success, there was still a pretty good lifestyle available to young adults in the valley throughout most of the late 20th century. Most people throughout California's history moved there for opportunity not as a luxury.

josephjrobison 3y ago
For sure, it’s always been a blend of both but you’d have to agree there was more of it than those moving to other parts of the Western US, which impacted many things downstream. And the question is more about whether it’s currently primarily a luxury option as a headline idea, with a thousand different caveats.

francisofascii 3y ago

It reminds me of cost of a minor league baseball game ticket, which is several times cheaper than a major league game. Of course the major league game is "better", but is it really 500% better? The seats, the game, pitching speeds, the hot dogs, beer, etc. are all the same. California is better than most places in the US, but probably not worth the financial hardship that people need to suffer to live there.