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Comment by myroon5 | Hacker News Reader

Almost 80k/year in salary leaves a family stuck in a garage over there? That's absurd

I have to travel to Facebook HQ once a month, unless I'm traveling to some other FB facility. Since I switch hotels and run in the mornings, this has given me a good opportunity to see what's going on in several different neighborhoods. One constant seems to be a pretty high number of camper vans, or sometimes plain old utility vans, parked semi-permanently on side street. I'm sure some of these are just there because there wasn't room in the driveway, as might happen anywhere. I'm equally sure that most are people living there, and not always low-income people. There are surely a fair number of Google and Facebook and whatever-else developers, making well into six figures, saving money that way. That's how bad the housing market is. Even the tiny bit of land for a mobile home is expensive. Glad I don't live there myself.

>I have to travel to Facebook HQ once a month, unless I'm traveling to some other FB facility.

I'm curious, is this because of your role or do all FB employees do this if they work outside of MPK?

Most FB employees are expected to work in a specific local facility most of the time, and have no particular travel requirement. I flipped that on its head; I save on my daily commute by WFH most of the time, and pay it back with the monthly trip. In the end I think it works out roughly equal. It's partly tied to my role, partly to leverage applied when I was being hired, and it seems to be unusual enough that my colleagues often look at me funny when I mention it.

That's incredible! I'd like to do that someday.

The cost of living in the Bay Area is -- and I say this with no figuration -- frightening. It provokes genuine fear in me.

Har, "with no figuration" is a good substitute for old "literally". Thanks.

I only frightens me figuratively, but that may be because I don't plan on moving there.

Totally off-topic but considering the primary sense of `literally' is being figuratively eroded all around me, “with no figuration” might be the best option we'll end up with. I wish I could insure it never came to pass.

I pay almost $50k/year in rent for my family of four well outside of any city center. We live in a very modest apartment/townhome. That's right: my annual rent is just about the same as the median gross income for a household in this country.

It is absurd, but I can easily see a family struggling to live on ~$65k take-home.

That sounds like a good deal for most of SV.

It is. We have a two year contract at our current rate.

80K/y is barely above the poverty line for a family of four in the area.

They are living in his parent's garage, so it's likely rent free or below market, and they would have access to the home I'd imagine.

Only if you need to live in the most expensive housing market in the nation.

...which you do, if your job is tied to a location in that market. Uprooting a family to move elsewhere is more of a burden than a lot of affluent young single people seem to think.

Right. Raising their pay wouldn't even help. Oh, it would help them but whatever place they manage to move into with their improved cash flow would displace someone else. Then those displaced people would have a sob story until they get their pay raised, and displace someone...

The real problem is the lack of housing for the number of people that want to live there.

A few good skyscraper high density developments would fix it better than pay increases.

Yep. A lot of junior people at the large companies roomshare, because they can't afford living by themselves. Many of the slightly more tenured people can finally get a place if they are willing to have a 90-120 minute commute. (Each direction)

The bay area is a giant clusterfuck when it comes to housing.

Currently many Bay Area cities, including ones that are a solid 90 minute drive, have median household incomes in the 75-$125K range. But the payment on a median house is 100% or more of that income. The situation is not yet literally Dickensian, but I don't know it's that far off.

That's contractor salary, so remember no benefits.

Maybe equivalent to 60K normal salary. With 3 kids that's not so easy.

  "Neither Facebook nor the food service contractor, Flagship Facility Services…"

It sounds like he is not a contractor, he is an employee - of the outsourced service provider, Flagship Facility Services.

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