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> best case scenario is walkable neighborhoods with lots of little tasty restaurants at affordable prices around the corner from everybody. According to the wr

> best case scenario is walkable neighborhoods with lots of little tasty restaurants at affordable prices around the corner from everybody. According to the written history, pre-1906 San Francisco had basically that. It seems that the normal middle-class could afford high-quality, delicious food at restaurants, multiple times per week, due to the abundance of local ingredients and overall economic conditions. So, how to get that quality and relative pricing today? Excerpts from "The City That Was: A Requiem of Old San Francisco" by Will Irwin (free eBook, [0], free audiobook [1], HTML version at [2]): > San Francisco was famous for its restaurants and cafes. > they gave the best fare on earth, for the price, at a dollar, seventy-five cents, a half a dollar, or even fifteen cents. > a public restaurant where there was served the best dollar dinner on earth > The eating was usually better than the surroundings. Meals that were marvels were served in tumbledown little hotels. > A number of causes contributed to this. The country all about produced everything that a cook needs and that in abundance—the bay was an almost untapped fishing pound, the fruit farms came up to the very edge of the town, and the surrounding country produced in abundance fine meats, game, all cereals and all vegetables. [0] https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3314 [1] https://librivox.org/san-francisco-before-and-after-the-earthquake-by-william-henry-irwin/ [2] https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3314/pg3314-images.html

crooked-v 1y ago
A starting point would be actually having enough housing, so workers don't automatically need wages that can absorb the overhead of commuting an hour both ways just to make burgers.
- deleted 1y ago
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rootusrootus 1y ago
Adjusted for income, those prices would be $15-$100 today. That seems in the right ballpark to me. I can get a pretty great dinner for $100/plate, especially if I don't need it to be in a fancy restaurant atmosphere.
- realityfactchex 1y ago
  Not really, though? That's what I thought at first, after trying one inflation calculator: $30 for a decent meal, sure, and double that maybe for a pretty tasty meal, is pretty available. (Even then, I think ingredient purity and true preparation aptitude could be pretty suspect, especially at the lower end.) BUT, TRYING AGAIN: Some inflation calculators do not go back to 1900. But looking further, $0.15 to $1.00 in 1900 would be $5.67 to $38.57 in 2025 dollars, according to https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/ https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/ I do wonder if there are discontinuities in inflation calculators for the times before the great fires in each city. Setting that aside, and assuming https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1900?amount=0.15 https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1900?amount=0.15 is accurate, 15 cents in 1900 would be $5.64 in 2025 AFAICT at the moment. It would be very hard to find a decent sandwich for $5.67 just about anywhere in the USA, much less a multi-course, local, fresh, gourmet meal. I think it's the general availability of these kinds of pure foods, and their accessibility all about town, prepared to near perfection, even accessible to the poor, that stands out in the Old San Francisco description. To wit: > ...Hotel de France. This restaurant stood on California street...a big ramshackle house, which had been a mansion of the gold days. Louis, the proprietor, was a Frenchman...his accent was as thick as his peasant soups. The patrons were Frenchmen of the poorer class, or young and poor clerks and journalists who had discovered the delights... > First ...was the soup mentioned before—thick and clean and good. Next, ...a course of fish—sole, rock cod, flounders or smelt—with a good French sauce. The third course was meat. This came on en bloc; the waiter dropped in the centre of each table a big roast or boiled joint together with a mustard pot and two big dishes of vegetables. Each guest manned the carving knife in turn and helped himself to his satisfaction. After that, ...a big bowl of excellent salad.... For beverage, there stood by each plate a perfectly cylindrical pint glass filled with new, watered claret. The meal closed with "fruit in season"—all that the guest cared to eat....the price was fifteen cents! > If one wanted black coffee he paid five cents extra...a beer glass full of it. ...he threw in wine and charged extra for after-dinner coffee... > Adulterated food at that price? Not a bit of it! The olive oil in the salad was pure, California product—why adulterate when he could get it so cheaply? The wine, too, was above reproach.... Every autumn, he brought tons and tons of cheap Mission grapes, ...The fruit was small, and inferior, but fresh...wished his guests would eat nothing but fruit, it came so cheap...

crooked-v 1y ago

A starting point would be actually having enough housing, so workers don't automatically need wages that can absorb the overhead of commuting an hour both ways just to make burgers.

deleted 1y ago
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rootusrootus 1y ago

Adjusted for income, those prices would be $15-$100 today. That seems in the right ballpark to me. I can get a pretty great dinner for $100/plate, especially if I don't need it to be in a fancy restaurant atmosphere.

realityfactchex 1y ago
Not really, though? That's what I thought at first, after trying one inflation calculator: $30 for a decent meal, sure, and double that maybe for a pretty tasty meal, is pretty available. (Even then, I think ingredient purity and true preparation aptitude could be pretty suspect, especially at the lower end.) BUT, TRYING AGAIN: Some inflation calculators do not go back to 1900. But looking further, $0.15 to $1.00 in 1900 would be $5.67 to $38.57 in 2025 dollars, according to https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/ https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/ I do wonder if there are discontinuities in inflation calculators for the times before the great fires in each city. Setting that aside, and assuming https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1900?amount=0.15 https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1900?amount=0.15 is accurate, 15 cents in 1900 would be $5.64 in 2025 AFAICT at the moment. It would be very hard to find a decent sandwich for $5.67 just about anywhere in the USA, much less a multi-course, local, fresh, gourmet meal. I think it's the general availability of these kinds of pure foods, and their accessibility all about town, prepared to near perfection, even accessible to the poor, that stands out in the Old San Francisco description. To wit: > ...Hotel de France. This restaurant stood on California street...a big ramshackle house, which had been a mansion of the gold days. Louis, the proprietor, was a Frenchman...his accent was as thick as his peasant soups. The patrons were Frenchmen of the poorer class, or young and poor clerks and journalists who had discovered the delights... > First ...was the soup mentioned before—thick and clean and good. Next, ...a course of fish—sole, rock cod, flounders or smelt—with a good French sauce. The third course was meat. This came on en bloc; the waiter dropped in the centre of each table a big roast or boiled joint together with a mustard pot and two big dishes of vegetables. Each guest manned the carving knife in turn and helped himself to his satisfaction. After that, ...a big bowl of excellent salad.... For beverage, there stood by each plate a perfectly cylindrical pint glass filled with new, watered claret. The meal closed with "fruit in season"—all that the guest cared to eat....the price was fifteen cents! > If one wanted black coffee he paid five cents extra...a beer glass full of it. ...he threw in wine and charged extra for after-dinner coffee... > Adulterated food at that price? Not a bit of it! The olive oil in the salad was pure, California product—why adulterate when he could get it so cheaply? The wine, too, was above reproach.... Every autumn, he brought tons and tons of cheap Mission grapes, ...The fruit was small, and inferior, but fresh...wished his guests would eat nothing but fruit, it came so cheap...