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Comment by qdpb | Hacker News Reader

> Mr. Reeves said he’s been “amazed at the changes” and has watched housing prices rise. Local companies should take some responsibility, he said.

And to take "some responsibility", he made it easier to push housing prices even higher by subsidizing already well-off employees?

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He is using that phrase in the sense of his (perceived) responsibility to his employees, which is undoubtedly stronger than his responsibility to the overall city.

Other than obeying the law and paying taxes, he has no responsibility to the city. Why has it become so fashionable to project obligation onto others? The guy is creating 20+ jobs this year, what more would he need to do to fulfill this "responsibility to the overall city?"

Why has it become so fashionable to project obligation onto others?

Why have people started talking about responsibility to your environment as if it's something new?

Where does someone's butterfly effect responsibility end?

If I create a startup and hire 20 people, and some of those 20 people like to eat some particular type of food for team lunches, and their presence at that eatery makes the lunch line longer for other patrons, do I have some obligation to apologize to those patrons for the long line?

If my 20 employees don't elect my $500 stipend to live within walking distance, what pennance would adequate for me to apologize to citizens of earth for the increased CO2 emissions from their driving and to the citizens of San Francisco for the extra 40 vehicle trips that would be foist upon the city? For good measure, he's paying people $500 a month extra to live within walking distance. For this, he gets a river of crap?!

At some point, companies employ people, those people get paid, those people spend their money consuming other items, but the company has no responsibility to apologize for that 3rd level effect consumption, IMO.

When you've already hobbled the market mechanism on the seller side the only thing that seems to make sense is to try to browbeat the amorphous tide of the demand side, i.e. shouting at the ocean.

He absolutely can do whatever he wants. Just as long as he doesn't call it "taking some responsibility"*

*correction: as explained elsewhere, this is potentially a misquote: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7265916

I'm the CEO of ZenPayroll and I added a comment to the main thread but wanted to clarify here as well. I chatted with the WSJ reporter about several topics, and she merged some concepts in her write up.

I was born in San Francisco, but grew up in the suburbs. When I was in college, I used to travel through San Francisco to visit my family and I told the reporter it's been amazing to see all of the neighborhood changes over the years. SoMa used to be much emptier, and was not a very residential area. After they built the Giants baseball stadium, there was a big building boom, and Mission Bay is now rapidly developing as well.

Separately, we discussed our housing stipend program. This perk was actually inspired by Facebook, which used to give a housing stipend for employees that lived within one mile of their office in downtown Palo Alto. We would do this program regardless of where our office is located (in SoMa or elsewhere) because we see a big benefit to folks not having to commute.

The reporter at the WSJ merged these two concepts, hence the quote you listed above.

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