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Finding the Downside In San Francisco's Tech Boom
snydeq writes "The NYTimes reports on the San Francisco's shifting socio-economic landscape thanks to a massive influx of tech workers and tax and regulation breaks to big-name startups. 'In a city often regarded as unfriendly to business, Mayor Edwin M. Lee, elected last year with the tech industry's strong backing, has aggressively courted start-ups. But this boom has also raised fears about the tech industry's growing political clout and its spillover economic effects. Apartment rents have soared to record highs as affordable housing advocates warn that a new wave of gentrification will price middle-class residents out of the city. At risk, many say, are the very qualities that have drawn generations of outsiders here, like the city's diversity and creativity. Families, black residents, artists and others will increasingly be forced across the bridge to Oakland, they warn.'"
That this is also an economic boon for Oakland.
And let's be honest, San Francisco isn't exactly priced for 'middle-class residents.' Unless you don't mind sharing a studio, it's expensive to live there.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Who wants all those well paid, self sufficient people around? What good are people who can't be put into government servitude to the sociopaths in office?
And I love the stealth racism in the summary. Successful people moving in means no black people, or simply that a successful, educated population can't be "diverse".
So there's no way a successful and educated population can be diverse and creative. Got it. I do like to check in on ideologythink now and again.
Why not report on the apparent boon that's coming Oakland's way, what with the tide of diverse and creative refugee artist families heading their way.
it takes years to get any large structure built and while you read about politicians and community activist bemoaning the lack of affordable housing you never see real progress. Instead you get locals doing the classic NIMBY maneuver. Oh its fine and dandy if you build it OVER THERE!... which of course the over there crowd don't want it either. Lots of lip service and little action, the point being that the type of construction needed for truly affordable and sustainable housing is not the type that occurs.
then there is the whole concept of what affordable housing really means.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
It's more laid back and the Berkeley/Oakland hills are backed up by thousands of acres of parks and undeveloped reservoir land. Plus both the views and the weather are better. And you can get into the city in a matter of minutes plus have a shorter drive to Tahoe and Yosemite.
Wayne Cooksey joined the flight of African-Americans from this city last year to escape soaring rents and buy a home. Michael Higgenbotham left six years ago for a safer neighborhood and better schools for his three children.
One guy bought a home, and the other guy found a better school? Sounds to me like people are moving up in the world! These are two success stories.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Which is worse: hobos or hipsters?
Diversity is all about which races you need to have to be diverse.
Racial diversity is not what diversity is all about. Its also about differences that tend to break down on financial lines (though that is often just a coincidence of our societal priorities).
A community where a 1400sq ft. house costs $1m has no place for people who devote their lives to educating children, caring for the victims of unpopular maladies like getting old or mental illness, or even ensuring that basic infrastructure is maintained and protected. When the providers of these services are not part of the community, they invisible to residents, the value that they provide is artificially diminished, as is their incentive to perform or even continue to provide services. This drives quality down, and the cost of raising quality up.
If you can't pretend to be a victim, you are not welcome as a participant in "diversity".
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Reading some of the early comments, it seems like people are acting like this just affects artists or poor black people or that this is somehow a reversal of white flight (largely a middle-class phenomenon).
I grew up in San Francisco and still live in the Bay Area. Middle-class and even many (by national standards) upper-middle class people have been and continue to be pushed out of the city. It's not really about racial diversity either. It's a socio-economic and cultural thing. It's also an age thing. To me the quintessential San Francisco resident is a yuppy transplant female in her late 20s or early 30s . She works in tech marketing. She's a foodie and loves visiting all the trendy new brunch places and maybe hitting up a street fair afterwards. She could be white, Asian, hispanic or something else. That doesn't mean it's not monotonous and homogenous. It is homogenous and that's what people are complaining about. And if you want to have a family in San Francisco, you need to be downright wealthy. So there's nothing wrong with being a young professional in itself, but when that's all a city has it's lost a lot of its character.
Anyway, such is life in a market economy. I don't know if there's a right or wrong here and a city like San Francisco has seen waves of demographic changes. But don't think this is like people complaining if white people were to return to inner-city Detroit. This is nothing like that. This is really an entire city becoming like the wealthier parts of Manhattan. I don't expect people from other cities to care, but as a San Francisco native I wish Silicon Valley had been a place in Washington state.