And it's not just the bay area. The populations of Cambridge and Boston have gone down since 1950, because a series of laws were passed that put tight restrictions on residential construction that reduced the allowed density and effectively made almost all of the existing housing stock illegal (but it was grandfathered in) and anything more dense than that, like even building a 5 story residential building in a lot zoned for 4 stories, when that lot is surrounded by 4 and 5 story buildings, is an expensive, long process of arguing with the zoning board and going through arbitrarily subjective design review processes.
Fortunately we have the technology to tear down crappy post-war single family homes and replace them with multi-unit buildings.
If you're wanting that much space between neighbors in a high populations spot, that should be like $1M/y in property taxes
why? because you want to be a dictator and force people to live how you want / like to live?
No one would be forcing people to live a certain way, just forcing them to either pay for the privilege of living in an area that was granted public funding for improved infrastructure, or live somewhere else that received less public investment.
As a thought experiment, I find it easiest to understand the arguments for the Land Value Tax if you imagine a local government building a new subway line. Obviously, the existing homes around the new stops would have their property values increased. After all, many commute times were just cut in half! The local government is interested in more people living near those lines, more people == more tax revenue after all. If the local government had a Land Value Tax implemented, the infrastructure improvements they made to the area would automatically be included in the calculation for the taxes owed by the existing homeowners near the new subway stops. $1M/yr may sound insane, and it would be for a single-family home, but because of the new subway line, local developers are lining up to purchase the homes around that line in order to build new higher-density homes. The existing homeowners can either choose to pay the high tax and enjoy their short commute paid for by other taxpayers, or sell at a nice profit to developers. New higher-density homes get built, more taxpayers move in, the city can now build more infrastructure to improve the city!
Have at it, if you can afford the luxury; just don't expect the rest of us to subsidize your lifestyle.
SF hit 5000k in the 1920 census (506,676), 634k in 1930 and 1940, 775k in 1950k, which was its peak until the 2000 census, at 776k.
The first census besting 800k was 2010, and as of 2020, 873k.
Wikipedia shows the 2021 population as 815,201, a loss of 58,764 (6.72%). I'd heard the population had dropped, but that's a pretty significant town's worth of exits. The city of San Rafael in Marin Country, for example had 61,271 residents --- SF lost very nearly that.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_San_Francisco>
The dissonance comes from the fact that a lot of hackernews readers make apparently high incomes, but the cost of living in their areas keeps them squarely working class.
The best example I can give is in the Bay Area. I lucked out with $2850/month to rent a 1400 square foot house in San Leandro. Except that I worked in South San Francisco, and my commute was 45 minutes to 90 minutes each way, every day. I looked into it, even did the math with average commute times and Health and Human Services housing cost data, and found that if I wanted to cut 15 minutes off of that commute would cost me an extra $1000 a month, or I'd lose the yard and the other bedroom. With a kid, a stay-at-home spouse (a lot cheaper than child care given wages for my wife's field in the bay area) and a dog, that was just a non-starter. I knew people who drove in from Vacaville or Tracey, every day, just to keep the housing prices within their means.
Prior to that experience, I honestly thought $140K a year was the best I could ever hope for. I was top 15% of individual wage earners in the country but I was considerably more stressed out than when I was making minimum wage at an office supply store in suburban Oregon.
You don't need to be on the West Coast to have a tech job.
The problem is, for an intellectual, it's important to live in an environment rich with mental talent. Bay Area is the intellectual capital of the world, and while Einstein could maintain his patent clerkship and have famous physicists visit him in Bern (http://norvig.com/performance-review.html) for the lesser minds in another era settling on another place is a loss.
Lol. Damn, the 0 interest rate era/tech bubble really made you guys cocky didnt it
I grew up surrounded by literally rocket scientists and some of the top minds in biochemistry and mechanical engineering as neighbors. Incredibly intellectual people. I did not grow up in California.
Its not like the Bay Area is the only place with smart people.
Say what?
Switzerland (or possibly Slovenia) has the highest STEM PhDs per capita.
There are many counties and cities in the US with higher PhD rates than any of the Bay Area counties. Most have major R1 unis, but not all.
SV is the VC capital of the world. I'll give you that. But, that's not even remotely the same as being the intellectual capital.
(And that’s not a knock on NM. I being it up as an example of an area that isn’t rarely bright up in these conversational circles)
I'd assume the intellectual capital makes the most intellectual property
There aren't many places where very smart people from all over the world move. New York is one, London used to be one, Bay Area is one. There are a lot of smart people in the bay area.
My eyes rolled straight into the back of my head.
I agree that an 'intellectual' (as a social class construct) might require similar socially oriented individuals to feel like they're among equals. I have no respect for such 'intellectuals'. I have a great deal of respect for people who are curious about the world around them and love to make new and wonderful things and think novel ideas.
I find that those two groups rarely overlap.
Yeah, mine too. It's hard for me to take these kinds of arguments seriously in 2023. I'm willing to concede that geographic proximity was necessary for collaborative intellectual work, but the internet has changed that milieu. I also don't think it was true pre-internet, as Einstein himself showed.
Linus Torvalds didn't need to be in the Bay Area of California when he created the Linux kernel, yet it didn't happen without a massive amount of collaboration enabled by the internet. Solzhenitsyn, after he emigrated to the USA after getting deported by the Soviet Union, continued his intellectual work and writing in Cavendish, Vermont which was and is extremely isolated. And that was pre-internet!
In a more lightweight form - what would you, as somebody interested in the matter, consider good criteria for "being the intellectual capital of the world" and what place would fit them?
I'd say such a place would need to be geared toward minimizing anything that could hinder intellectual capacity. The SF Bay Area (as I learned firsthand) is not such a place; the constant stress of financial insecurity does not bode well for intellectual pursuits. I don't know if any such place really exists, for pretty much the same reason - certainly not here in the US.
In short, it'd need to be someplace where people could engage in intellectual pursuits for their own sake, and where the results of those pursuits are freely available to everyone - no censorship, no profit motives, no IP restrictions, nothing except the free creation and exchange of knowledge.
I firmly believe that any city which institutes a land value tax and uses it to fund a citizens' dividend / universal basic income is much more likely to become an intellectual capital than a city which does not. Land speculation is the major contributor to socioeconomic inequality and consequently the major obstacle preventing cities from being truly amenable to intellectual pursuits (rather than the current status quo of financial pursuits). Directly addressing it - by requiring landowners to internalize the opportunity costs they otherwise externalize onto the rest of society - is IMO the most crucial step toward allowing people to engage in intellectual pursuits without fear of failure and without being bound by concerns like profitability.
Culturally, San Francisco, Seattle, and Boston strike me as good candidates once they address the above; the first of those three to implement LVT+UBI is the one I'd bet on becoming the "intellectual capital of the world". I'm personally hoping Reno evolves into such a candidate, but that's one hell of a long shot :)
What I learned very quickly is that it's rather difficult to stay intellectually engaged when even a six-figure salary is paycheck-to-paycheck living in a studio apartment.
I moved back to Reno shortly before COVID, and since doing so I've found myself to be much more productive. The "intellectual capital of the world" can shove it.
The wages in SV price in the cost of living to a certain extent. I’m assuming if the remote work pattern continues, we can’t be expected to make coastal salaries while living in rural Wyoming any more that we would expect a FAANG company to pay an overseas employee SV salaries.
But even if I wasn't in a field that requires time spent hands-on with the physical hardware, a lot of companies (my former employer in the Bay Area amongst them) insist on in-person work for most positions, even if the position doesn't really require it. And so it goes, people making $60K in Wichita or wherever glibly say "I can get a house for $180K, you make 5 times what I make, complaining about million dollar homes is just a rich person lacking perspective". Even if you do the math and show that holy cow, homes are expensive in tech hubs, even considering the median income, all people see is how high the median income, and assume that there's no real problem.
There are markets other than California and Wyoming though. I'm sure you're aware, but its always good to compare compensation versus living expenses. Almost every time I've been given a chance to move it meant I'd be trading my lifestyle in a negative direction (from my perspective) and smaller savings in the end even if the salary was over 2x my current. Everyone has their own priorities in life though, I hope you find a way to achieve yours.
Good luck in life friend.
I'm still frustrated by the high price of housing, because I fundamentally agree with the thesis of the article: housing, especially single-family housing, should not be expected to appreciate faster than inflation. To that end, so long as my house's worth when the mortgage is paid off (on a 30-year mortgage) is about double when I first bought it, I'll be happy.
I don't share the article's glum outlook. I think if enough people can be convinced that houses aren't, and shouldn't be, viewed as money-makers but just, you know, houses, this problem can be solved. I understand that's a pretty radical and utopia position to take though.
I think part of the problem is the presumed loss aversion of moving from a $300k salary to, say, a $175k one that is remote but allows for a better standard of living (particularly for families).
This is a phenomenon that is prevalent in other industries, without that remote work luxury. Oil and gas workers get paid handsomely but often have to live near the worksite. Even then, rent is astronomical without all the luxuries that SV offers.
This is a huge problem for economic growth. If housing costs in the Bay Area were at US average, easily 10M more people could live here and get high paying jobs. But that path to a better life is very constrained.
Also why people insisting on teleworking as a permanent option haven't really thought it through.
Living in a posh neighbourhood is a luxury, like Ferrari (which, by the way, costs much less) or a golden watch. If you want rich people lifestyle, then you should be prepared to pay rich people money for it.
Hawaii would like to have a word with you, unless you suggest every single non-rich local would just have to move to the mainland. I believe the cheapest home I've seen available, where the neighbors aren't cooking meth, is probably in the $500-600k range and going up.
This is the part of town where the grocery store has security guards all over the place, and the bank has thick bulletproof glass between you and the teller, and the transit options such big time. If you want to live anywhere remotely near where the jobs are, every house is near $1m+ now.
Conclude what you want, you're completely wrong and out of touch with current housing prices in a lot cities.
One reason I would never live in "South Seattle" it's a literal food desert. The WinCo being in Kent is it's only saving grace, but even the QFC a bit north of the Safeway on Rainer - yeah.
The fun part is, all the good brands are routinely on sale/discounted heavily because the local population either does not like or can't afford it - e.g. cheeses. Always 20-40% discount on cheese.
Not so common in north outside Seattle limits, or even along the border - but yeah to go back to point -
"This is the part of town where the grocery store has security guards all over the place, and the bank has thick bulletproof glass between you and the teller, and the transit options such big time. If you want to live anywhere remotely near where the jobs are, every house is near $1m+ now."
Is why the good houses cost 1,000,000+. Community and neighborhood alongside school district.
This isn't rich people houses folks, these are middle (possibly lower middle) class houses. Most people here didn't pay 1M for their homes, they most likely paid a very affordable price many years ago. It's worth repeating that house prices increased an average of ~40% since the beginning of Covid. That should help to put prices on perspective.
Other jobs literally have to move to continue their work in a particular industry. When a factory relocates, line workers need to move too. Nurses often have to move, or learn a new job. Sure, you may not have a high status FAANG job, but there’s way more remote work in tech than probably any other industry. I think it’s more an issue of managing expectations and wanting it all, than lack of opportunity to find a job in an area with a decent quality of life
A person having a jet that costs $100 can do about as much with it as a person with one costing $100 billion.
Same goes with housing, mostly, with some obvious wealth breakpoints. The confounder is location, as defined by time to travel and job availability.
Quantization artifacts dominate. Having access to basics vs not has a much bigger effect than either quality or quantity.
This is why having just one house is not an investment - you cannot afford to not have one unless you're so rich you could outright get multiples of them in some places, get there and live comfortably.
As the saying goes “I would rather be dead in <X> than live in <Y>”.
Here's a fun game you can play: https://www.crackshackormansion.com/part2.html