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Yeah, but he highlights a big reason for this. Nothing new gets built. All those good old days people constricted supply and then got pissed when the demand hik

Yeah, but he highlights a big reason for this. Nothing new gets built. All those good old days people constricted supply and then got pissed when the demand hiked prices and they could no longer afford it. You see this all over. Cool towns try to constrict supply through regulation to stop people from moving to their town, but ultimately just end up making their towns more expensive.

jseliger 14y ago
>Nothing new gets built. All those good old days people constricted supply and then got pissed when the demand hiked prices and they could no longer afford it. Exactly. I wrote this comment yesterday: >If employers offered significantly higher wages then plenty more supply would quickly appear to clear the market This is really a housing supply question as Matt Yglesias makes clear here: http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2012/05/facebook_george_lucas_and_nimbyism_the_idiotic_rules_preventing_silicon_valley_from_building_the_houses_and_offices_we_need_to_power_american_innovation_.html http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2012/05/face... and as others have written (see, for example, Ryan Avent's The Gated City). Housing costs in Silicon Valley are insane, which prices out lower skill workers and forces companies to pay more for highly skilled workers. Allowing to higher building heights and reduce setback requirements alone would do a lot to improve the jobs situation.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- eli_gottlieb 14y ago
  Housing costs in Silicon Valley are insane, which prices out lower skill workers and forces companies to pay more for highly skilled workers. It also reduces the quality of life for those who do live in Silicon Valley, because the salary rises almost never entirely make up for the rise in land prices. (Yes, I've used salary calculators, particularly to compare the Bay Area's and Boston's software engineering salaries to places like Portland and Seattle that are cheaper but still have lots of tech.)
  - akgerber 14y ago
    Because if you can't build much-to-any more housing in Silicon Valley, salary increases there just serve to bid up housing prices further, rather than motivating people to build more & better housing.

jseliger 14y ago

>Nothing new gets built. All those good old days people constricted supply and then got pissed when the demand hiked prices and they could no longer afford it. Exactly. I wrote this comment yesterday: >If employers offered significantly higher wages then plenty more supply would quickly appear to clear the market This is really a housing supply question as Matt Yglesias makes clear here: http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2012/05/facebook_george_lucas_and_nimbyism_the_idiotic_rules_preventing_silicon_valley_from_building_the_houses_and_offices_we_need_to_power_american_innovation_.html http://www.slate.com/articles/business/moneybox/2012/05/face... and as others have written (see, for example, Ryan Avent's The Gated City). Housing costs in Silicon Valley are insane, which prices out lower skill workers and forces companies to pay more for highly skilled workers. Allowing to higher building heights and reduce setback requirements alone would do a lot to improve the jobs situation.

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
eli_gottlieb 14y ago
Housing costs in Silicon Valley are insane, which prices out lower skill workers and forces companies to pay more for highly skilled workers. It also reduces the quality of life for those who do live in Silicon Valley, because the salary rises almost never entirely make up for the rise in land prices. (Yes, I've used salary calculators, particularly to compare the Bay Area's and Boston's software engineering salaries to places like Portland and Seattle that are cheaper but still have lots of tech.)
- akgerber 14y ago
  Because if you can't build much-to-any more housing in Silicon Valley, salary increases there just serve to bid up housing prices further, rather than motivating people to build more & better housing.