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> Income inequality is growing ever worse, and it is increasingly clear that one of the forces fueling this trend is the technological innovation flowing out of

> Income inequality is growing ever worse, and it is increasingly clear that one of the forces fueling this trend is the technological innovation flowing out of the Bay Area. This claim is unsubstantiated. By what mechanism is Facebook causing income inequality?

sp332 13y ago
For example: http://www.businessinsider.com/google-bus-is-a-sign-of-silicon-valleys-excesses-2013-5 http://www.businessinsider.com/google-bus-is-a-sign-of-silic... or more succinctly http://www.sfgate.com/living/article/Why-we-re-invisible-to-Google-bus-riders-4467574.php http://www.sfgate.com/living/article/Why-we-re-invisible-to-...
- dreamdu5t 13y ago
  Private buses don't cause income inequality. Your income is not the result of other people driving private buses to work. If it is a result of that, you need to show how... not link to articles bitching about how people drive private buses.
  - j_baker 13y ago
    I beg to differ. Do you think a single mother of 4 can easily afford to commute to somewhere in the South Bay to get a better paying job?
    - mwfunk 13y ago
      No, but neither is a Facebook employee commuting on the company bus causing that single mother of 4's poverty, if that's what you're suggesting? Because that's the point of the post you're begging to differ with.
  - Apocryphon 13y ago
    No, but private buses are indicative of how people in the tech economy are effectively shielded from dealing with the same issues of other people- the private buses are a symbol of the bubble they live in, and the callous behavior of that Googler is a symbolic example of someone stuck in that bubble. I suppose one takeaway is that it shows that the Google doesn't do more to encourage its employees to patronize public transportation. And a more speculative idea- maybe large tech corporations should use their influence and power to encourage the cities that host them to reform. The Bay Area has a notoriously shoddy and inefficient public transportation system relative to a metropolis of its size and wealth. Maybe giving back to the communities through ways such as that, they could engage with the Bay, not just create bubbles within it.
    - dreamdu5t 13y ago
      > I suppose one takeaway is that it shows that the Google doesn't do more to encourage its employees to patronize public transportation. Google and its employees have no obligation to patronize public transportation, nor do you. > The Bay Area has a notoriously shoddy and inefficient public transportation system relative to a metropolis of its size and wealth. That would be nice, but the shitty public transportation system built, operated, managed, and owned by the government is not the fault or responsibility of Google and friends. Google is not the reason it's a piece of shit either. > Maybe giving back to the communities through ways such as that, they could engage with the Bay, not just create bubbles within it. Google is the top philanthropist in the Bay Area giving $27.6 million to charities here in 2010. http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2011/07/22/google-is-top-bay-area-philanthropist.html http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2011/07/22/goog...
      - volume 13y ago
        What solution, if any, do you propose?
        dreamdu5t 13y ago
        I'm not. I'm proposing that Google is not the cause of other people's personal income and transportation problems.
        sp332 13y ago
        It's not just an income problem. As the article points out, prices for food have been going up because the tech engineers can afford the higher prices. This makes food more difficult for everyone else to get.
        dreamdu5t 13y ago
        Yes, the article claims such without presenting any evidence or substantiating the claim in any way. Where is the study linking rise in tech worker wages to increases in burrito prices? Oh right... there is none. Burritos in the mission are no more expensive than burritos in Santa Rosa, CA. They're $7-9 anywhere in Northern California.
evanlivingston 13y ago
http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Facebook-Salaries-E40772.htm http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Facebook-Salaries-E40772.htm
- dreamdu5t 13y ago
  Linking to an average of Facebook salaries is not an explanation for why people being paid to work at Facebook is determinate of other people's income.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
tartle 13y ago
by amount of employees compared to market valuation. kodak vs instagram.
graeme 13y ago
Income inequality is, by definition, the gap between those with lower and higher earnings. So if Facebook et al. pay higher salaries, and other salaries don't increase, then income inequality increases. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it seems obvious that soaring tech salaries will increase inequality.
- dreamdu5t 13y ago
  By that logic, the other industries are causing income inequality by not increasing their salaries.
- aetherson 13y ago
  Certainly true. I note that this is causing the "good" half of income inequality, though: the "some people are getting richer" part, not the "other people are getting poorer or staying the same" part. (I digress, but: we all agree that given three different possible worlds, A, B, and C, where in A, everyone's poor, in B, most people are poor and some are rich, and in C, everyone's rich, C is the best, and A is the worst, right? Nobody's here to argue that A is better than B?) To the extent that you can draw a causal line from "tech boom" to the bad half of income inequality (the "lots of people are getting poorer or stagnating" part), it's more about "wealth gets tied up in companies that just intrinsically employ fewer people than the labor-intensive manufacturing companies of the mid 20th Century."

sp332 13y ago

For example: http://www.businessinsider.com/google-bus-is-a-sign-of-silicon-valleys-excesses-2013-5 http://www.businessinsider.com/google-bus-is-a-sign-of-silic... or more succinctly http://www.sfgate.com/living/article/Why-we-re-invisible-to-Google-bus-riders-4467574.php http://www.sfgate.com/living/article/Why-we-re-invisible-to-...

dreamdu5t 13y ago
Private buses don't cause income inequality. Your income is not the result of other people driving private buses to work. If it is a result of that, you need to show how... not link to articles bitching about how people drive private buses.
- j_baker 13y ago
  I beg to differ. Do you think a single mother of 4 can easily afford to commute to somewhere in the South Bay to get a better paying job?
  - mwfunk 13y ago
    No, but neither is a Facebook employee commuting on the company bus causing that single mother of 4's poverty, if that's what you're suggesting? Because that's the point of the post you're begging to differ with.
- Apocryphon 13y ago
  No, but private buses are indicative of how people in the tech economy are effectively shielded from dealing with the same issues of other people- the private buses are a symbol of the bubble they live in, and the callous behavior of that Googler is a symbolic example of someone stuck in that bubble. I suppose one takeaway is that it shows that the Google doesn't do more to encourage its employees to patronize public transportation. And a more speculative idea- maybe large tech corporations should use their influence and power to encourage the cities that host them to reform. The Bay Area has a notoriously shoddy and inefficient public transportation system relative to a metropolis of its size and wealth. Maybe giving back to the communities through ways such as that, they could engage with the Bay, not just create bubbles within it.
  - dreamdu5t 13y ago
    > I suppose one takeaway is that it shows that the Google doesn't do more to encourage its employees to patronize public transportation. Google and its employees have no obligation to patronize public transportation, nor do you. > The Bay Area has a notoriously shoddy and inefficient public transportation system relative to a metropolis of its size and wealth. That would be nice, but the shitty public transportation system built, operated, managed, and owned by the government is not the fault or responsibility of Google and friends. Google is not the reason it's a piece of shit either. > Maybe giving back to the communities through ways such as that, they could engage with the Bay, not just create bubbles within it. Google is the top philanthropist in the Bay Area giving $27.6 million to charities here in 2010. http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2011/07/22/google-is-top-bay-area-philanthropist.html http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2011/07/22/goog...
    - volume 13y ago
      What solution, if any, do you propose?
      - dreamdu5t 13y ago
        I'm not. I'm proposing that Google is not the cause of other people's personal income and transportation problems.
        sp332 13y ago
        It's not just an income problem. As the article points out, prices for food have been going up because the tech engineers can afford the higher prices. This makes food more difficult for everyone else to get.
        dreamdu5t 13y ago
        Yes, the article claims such without presenting any evidence or substantiating the claim in any way. Where is the study linking rise in tech worker wages to increases in burrito prices? Oh right... there is none. Burritos in the mission are no more expensive than burritos in Santa Rosa, CA. They're $7-9 anywhere in Northern California.

evanlivingston 13y ago

http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Facebook-Salaries-E40772.htm http://www.glassdoor.com/Salary/Facebook-Salaries-E40772.htm

dreamdu5t 13y ago
Linking to an average of Facebook salaries is not an explanation for why people being paid to work at Facebook is determinate of other people's income.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

tartle 13y ago

by amount of employees compared to market valuation. kodak vs instagram.

graeme 13y ago

Income inequality is, by definition, the gap between those with lower and higher earnings. So if Facebook et al. pay higher salaries, and other salaries don't increase, then income inequality increases. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it seems obvious that soaring tech salaries will increase inequality.

dreamdu5t 13y ago
By that logic, the other industries are causing income inequality by not increasing their salaries.
aetherson 13y ago
Certainly true. I note that this is causing the "good" half of income inequality, though: the "some people are getting richer" part, not the "other people are getting poorer or staying the same" part. (I digress, but: we all agree that given three different possible worlds, A, B, and C, where in A, everyone's poor, in B, most people are poor and some are rich, and in C, everyone's rich, C is the best, and A is the worst, right? Nobody's here to argue that A is better than B?) To the extent that you can draw a causal line from "tech boom" to the bad half of income inequality (the "lots of people are getting poorer or stagnating" part), it's more about "wealth gets tied up in companies that just intrinsically employ fewer people than the labor-intensive manufacturing companies of the mid 20th Century."