5 ms·

Stories like this are fun and I think they resonate well with a lot of people, but unfortunately the details are actively harmful cynicism that ignore fact that

Stories like this are fun and I think they resonate well with a lot of people, but unfortunately the details are actively harmful cynicism that ignore fact that would ruin the narrative. Look around San Francisco today. What has changed recently? Crime is way down, lower than it has been in 15 years. Homelessness is down, lower than the past 4 years. Did tech companies decide to start paying more taxes? Did the city start spending more? No, the actual cause is boring and simple, but makes anti-establishment folks very uncomfortable. The truth is that our government started operating more effectively, intentionally trying to solve problems that it previously pretended were insoluble. This change was instigated by a relatively small number of rich people where were fed up and decided to and spend their own money to fix the city. Some other nitpicks I have with the sentiment expressed in the article: * Police and firefighters in SF make more on average than tech workers. Is that a source of injustice? Or is unequal pay more complicated? Is inequality only bad when the groups benefitting are aesthetically undesirable to you? * SF remains one of the highest tax cities in the country, and is the highest in the Bay Area. At the margin, businesses are leaving (including Twitter, mentioned in the article). Raising more taxes on these businesses seems unlikely to increase revenue long term. * We spent more per resident on most services than nearly every other city in the country. Aren't you curious why that is, and doesn't it seem like understanding that problem would lead to insights more interesting than "tech bad"?

JSR_FDED 1y ago
> Crime is way down, lower than it has been in 15 years. Homelessness is down, lower than the past 4 years. This makes me so happy. It was heartbreaking to see SF lose the plot the last 10 or so years.
- stefan_ 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - mgraczyk 1y ago
    That's just not true. Our mayor was able to win in part because he is rich, and clearly that has mattered to change the city. Whether that's good or bad is a different question, but it's very obvious a small number of rich people used their wealth to change the city (and IMO the results have been fantastic so far)
    - femiagbabiaka 1y ago
      Believing that a rich guy is going to save us is one of the more worrying trends in the American polity. The downward tend of crime has nothing to do with Lurie. That has been going down since the COVID lockdowns, which.. of course it was. The data lays this out clearly. It's not even clear that Brooke Jenkins has had that much of an effect. Turns out the COVID lockdowns and BLM unrest were generational events that raised crime and after them society pretty much went back to normal. Lurie has been trying to do his version of a crackdown. Mission Local has covered it thoroughly -- he's accomplished very little in reality, because actually, these problems are difficult to solve: https://missionlocal.org/2025/04/tracking-sf-mayor-luries-first-100-days-in-office/ https://missionlocal.org/2025/04/tracking-sf-mayor-luries-fi...
      - CamperBob2 1y ago
        Believing that a rich guy is going to save us is one of the more worrying trends in the American polity. Well, bums aren't going to save us, so...
        femiagbabiaka 1y ago
        The only two people who exist in the world are rich guys and bums. Not meant as an attack: this is a quintessentially American statement.
        CamperBob2 1y ago
        Well, the middle class isn't going to save us, so...
- aplummer 1y ago
  I don’t think this is true though, as this chart from the city indicates: https://www.sf.gov/data--homeless-population https://www.sf.gov/data--homeless-population
boulos 1y ago
> Did tech companies decide to start paying more taxes? Did the city start spending more? No, the actual cause is boring and simple, but makes anti-establishment folks very uncomfortable. We did pass gross receipts taxes and do tax payroll for larger businesses. So yes, companies pay more taxes than 2015 (though they didn't choose to) and our budget per person in inflation adjusted terms is up: A $16 billion question: How did San Francisco’s budget get so huge? https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/city-budget-16-billion-20257757.php https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/city-budget-16-billio... A lot of that is from "self-supporting" segments including SFO.
- mgraczyk 1y ago
  We had 7 years of budgets with that tax before things got better, so it seems unlikely this made the situation better. In fact it seems to have made things much worse.
  - boulos 1y ago
    The percentages and methodology changed over time though (this was the big argument between Benioff and Dorsey, since gross receipts ignoring business model and margins hit very differently). Same thing the large transfer tax changes, vacancy taxes, etc. The inflation adjusted budget is definitely higher.
    - mgraczyk 1y ago
      I think we are not disputing the same claim. I claim the city is much better now than 1 year ago, and spending more cannot explain that difference because large increases in spending did not happen 1 year ago and have not helped in the past.
olddustytrail 1y ago
You just wrote that higher taxes and higher public sector pay have correlated with better outcomes. Do you believe that?
- mgraczyk 1y ago
  No I didn't write that, and I don't believe that's true at the margin in SF. Some cities tax too little and would benefit from taxing more, SF is not one of them
  - olddustytrail 1y ago
    You did write that, you just separated them with a couple of paragraphs. I recall that worked to confuse ChatGPT v2 as it lost context, but it shouldn't confuse a human.
    - mgraczyk 1y ago
      Would you mind quoting the portion of my comment where you think I said anything about public sector pay causing better outcomes?
      - olddustytrail 1y ago
        > We spent more per resident on most services than nearly every other city in the country. And then > Look around San Francisco today. What has changed recently? Crime is way down, lower than it has been in 15 years. Homelessness is down, lower than the past 4 years.
        mgraczyk 1y ago
        Public sector pay does not cause better outcomes in SF. They are not correlated and what you just quoted doesn't make that claim. Specifically, it's compatible with what I actually believe, which is that public sector pay has been high and the causes of lower crime are not related to that
Ancalagon 1y ago
Are these anecdotes? Comments further down are saying the exact opposite and that nothings changed?
- digianarchist 1y ago
  Pretty sure SF has the same story as here in San Diego. Homelessness is not actually down but far less visible thanks to last year's Supreme Court ruling. No more tent cities downtown but now camps have shifted along federal highways. https://www.npr.org/2024/06/28/nx-s1-4992010/supreme-court-homeless-punish-sleeping-encampments https://www.npr.org/2024/06/28/nx-s1-4992010/supreme-court-h...
1024core 1y ago
Agreed. The fact is, SF's city government is fat and bloated with all sorts of cushy jobs for friends and family. This article by the SJ Mercury News captures it best (how much we spend on staff in the city of SF): https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/08/23/5-charts-that-show-how-california-cities-spent-37-billion-on-public-employees-last-year/ https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/08/23/5-charts-that-show-ho...
- deleted 1y ago
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- deleted 1y ago
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dumbledoren 1y ago
> * Police and firefighters in SF make more on average than tech workers. Is that a source of injustice? No. People who perform vital, dangerous jobs for society should be paid their weight in gold. They shouldnt have to worry about anything else than their own duties.
- mgraczyk 1y ago
  Ok so what is the specific annual salary you propose for each police officer? And should they have more influence in local politics than they already do? Currently the police union is either the most or second most powerful entity in San Francisco
  - dumbledoren 1y ago
    > Ok so what is the specific annual salary you propose for each police officer? That would depend on the CoL in their location and would need to be calculated for every region differently. > And should they have more influence in local politics than they already do? Nobody should have any more influence in politics than their singular, individual vote.
    - mgraczyk 1y ago
      In San Francisco. > Nobody should have any more influence in politics than their singular, individual vote. This has never happened anywhere in any political system. As long as people are allowed to talk to one another, they are able to exert power by choosing to vote as a bloc
fragmede 1y ago
Any discussion about San Francisco's fortune is woefully incomplete without touching on the effects that marijuana legalization across the country has had on the industry and thus the economy of not just San Francisco but the also the broader Bay Area and the rest of California. The black market marijuana industry was worth tens, if not hundreds of millions in untracked cash in California. Legalization in California and Oklahoma has moved all of that cash money out of San Francisco, out of the Emerald Triangle, and out of the state because it is no longer lucrative to grow it here. I can't speak how it's related to crime rates, but it means that many people can't afford to live in the area since they're no longer employed by that industry. The area can no longer afford art that was funded by cash money from hippie types that couldn't be used in the mainstream market any other way. as a curious detail, San Francisco used to have tons of illegal grow ops that forced upgraded electrical infrastructure that can now be used to charge electric vehicles instead.

JSR_FDED 1y ago

> Crime is way down, lower than it has been in 15 years. Homelessness is down, lower than the past 4 years. This makes me so happy. It was heartbreaking to see SF lose the plot the last 10 or so years.

stefan_ 1y ago
[flagged]
- mgraczyk 1y ago
  That's just not true. Our mayor was able to win in part because he is rich, and clearly that has mattered to change the city. Whether that's good or bad is a different question, but it's very obvious a small number of rich people used their wealth to change the city (and IMO the results have been fantastic so far)
  - femiagbabiaka 1y ago
    Believing that a rich guy is going to save us is one of the more worrying trends in the American polity. The downward tend of crime has nothing to do with Lurie. That has been going down since the COVID lockdowns, which.. of course it was. The data lays this out clearly. It's not even clear that Brooke Jenkins has had that much of an effect. Turns out the COVID lockdowns and BLM unrest were generational events that raised crime and after them society pretty much went back to normal. Lurie has been trying to do his version of a crackdown. Mission Local has covered it thoroughly -- he's accomplished very little in reality, because actually, these problems are difficult to solve: https://missionlocal.org/2025/04/tracking-sf-mayor-luries-first-100-days-in-office/ https://missionlocal.org/2025/04/tracking-sf-mayor-luries-fi...
    - CamperBob2 1y ago
      Believing that a rich guy is going to save us is one of the more worrying trends in the American polity. Well, bums aren't going to save us, so...
      - femiagbabiaka 1y ago
        The only two people who exist in the world are rich guys and bums. Not meant as an attack: this is a quintessentially American statement.
        CamperBob2 1y ago
        Well, the middle class isn't going to save us, so...
aplummer 1y ago
I don’t think this is true though, as this chart from the city indicates: https://www.sf.gov/data--homeless-population https://www.sf.gov/data--homeless-population

boulos 1y ago

> Did tech companies decide to start paying more taxes? Did the city start spending more? No, the actual cause is boring and simple, but makes anti-establishment folks very uncomfortable. We did pass gross receipts taxes and do tax payroll for larger businesses. So yes, companies pay more taxes than 2015 (though they didn't choose to) and our budget per person in inflation adjusted terms is up: A $16 billion question: How did San Francisco’s budget get so huge? https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/city-budget-16-billion-20257757.php https://www.sfchronicle.com/sf/article/city-budget-16-billio... A lot of that is from "self-supporting" segments including SFO.

mgraczyk 1y ago
We had 7 years of budgets with that tax before things got better, so it seems unlikely this made the situation better. In fact it seems to have made things much worse.
- boulos 1y ago
  The percentages and methodology changed over time though (this was the big argument between Benioff and Dorsey, since gross receipts ignoring business model and margins hit very differently). Same thing the large transfer tax changes, vacancy taxes, etc. The inflation adjusted budget is definitely higher.
  - mgraczyk 1y ago
    I think we are not disputing the same claim. I claim the city is much better now than 1 year ago, and spending more cannot explain that difference because large increases in spending did not happen 1 year ago and have not helped in the past.

olddustytrail 1y ago

You just wrote that higher taxes and higher public sector pay have correlated with better outcomes. Do you believe that?

mgraczyk 1y ago
No I didn't write that, and I don't believe that's true at the margin in SF. Some cities tax too little and would benefit from taxing more, SF is not one of them
- olddustytrail 1y ago
  You did write that, you just separated them with a couple of paragraphs. I recall that worked to confuse ChatGPT v2 as it lost context, but it shouldn't confuse a human.
  - mgraczyk 1y ago
    Would you mind quoting the portion of my comment where you think I said anything about public sector pay causing better outcomes?
    - olddustytrail 1y ago
      > We spent more per resident on most services than nearly every other city in the country. And then > Look around San Francisco today. What has changed recently? Crime is way down, lower than it has been in 15 years. Homelessness is down, lower than the past 4 years.
      - mgraczyk 1y ago
        Public sector pay does not cause better outcomes in SF. They are not correlated and what you just quoted doesn't make that claim. Specifically, it's compatible with what I actually believe, which is that public sector pay has been high and the causes of lower crime are not related to that

Ancalagon 1y ago

Are these anecdotes? Comments further down are saying the exact opposite and that nothings changed?

digianarchist 1y ago
Pretty sure SF has the same story as here in San Diego. Homelessness is not actually down but far less visible thanks to last year's Supreme Court ruling. No more tent cities downtown but now camps have shifted along federal highways. https://www.npr.org/2024/06/28/nx-s1-4992010/supreme-court-homeless-punish-sleeping-encampments https://www.npr.org/2024/06/28/nx-s1-4992010/supreme-court-h...

1024core 1y ago

Agreed. The fact is, SF's city government is fat and bloated with all sorts of cushy jobs for friends and family. This article by the SJ Mercury News captures it best (how much we spend on staff in the city of SF): https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/08/23/5-charts-that-show-how-california-cities-spent-37-billion-on-public-employees-last-year/ https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/08/23/5-charts-that-show-ho...

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

dumbledoren 1y ago

> * Police and firefighters in SF make more on average than tech workers. Is that a source of injustice? No. People who perform vital, dangerous jobs for society should be paid their weight in gold. They shouldnt have to worry about anything else than their own duties.

mgraczyk 1y ago
Ok so what is the specific annual salary you propose for each police officer? And should they have more influence in local politics than they already do? Currently the police union is either the most or second most powerful entity in San Francisco
- dumbledoren 1y ago
  > Ok so what is the specific annual salary you propose for each police officer? That would depend on the CoL in their location and would need to be calculated for every region differently. > And should they have more influence in local politics than they already do? Nobody should have any more influence in politics than their singular, individual vote.
  - mgraczyk 1y ago
    In San Francisco. > Nobody should have any more influence in politics than their singular, individual vote. This has never happened anywhere in any political system. As long as people are allowed to talk to one another, they are able to exert power by choosing to vote as a bloc

fragmede 1y ago

Any discussion about San Francisco's fortune is woefully incomplete without touching on the effects that marijuana legalization across the country has had on the industry and thus the economy of not just San Francisco but the also the broader Bay Area and the rest of California. The black market marijuana industry was worth tens, if not hundreds of millions in untracked cash in California. Legalization in California and Oklahoma has moved all of that cash money out of San Francisco, out of the Emerald Triangle, and out of the state because it is no longer lucrative to grow it here. I can't speak how it's related to crime rates, but it means that many people can't afford to live in the area since they're no longer employed by that industry. The area can no longer afford art that was funded by cash money from hippie types that couldn't be used in the mainstream market any other way. as a curious detail, San Francisco used to have tons of illegal grow ops that forced upgraded electrical infrastructure that can now be used to charge electric vehicles instead.