3 ms·

> Either they can increase supply, or they can decrease the number of high-end bidders somehow by making the city less desirable somehow. Another option (which

• cromwellian 13y ago
  Rent control invariably just increases the evictions and reduces supply and many property owners opt to lease the space for other uses. San Francisco is unable to build high density housing because many of the same people who don't want the city culture to change also don't want it's skyline to change. Large parts of SF are suburb-like and could be replaced with high density high-rises, but it would then lose the "SF charm". Someone else suggested Google shouldn't have built its campus in Mountain View, but Google built the campus there long before the craze of moving back to SF started. In the last .com boom in the 90s, it was Peninsula rents that were sky high. In 1999, I paid $3600 for a 2 bedroom in Foster City. To suggest Google move its campus close to SF would only make things worse. Most Googlers don't live in SF, so you'd be asking a huge number of people who live in the South Bay to uproot and move up north. That plan won't pass go. I certainly wouldn't, for school district alone. San Francisco's problems are bigger than Google. It cannot rescue San Francisco.