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The Google Employee Who Opted For a Truck Over Bay Area Rents (dice.com)
Nerval's Lobster writes: A little over a year ago, Google employees on a Quora thread announced they'd discovered an interesting way to live in the ultra-expensive Bay Area: Rather than pay for conventional housing, they resided in trucks and RVs parked near (or on) the company's campus, and took advantage of corporate perks—including free food, gym facilities, and dry cleaning—to get by on a day-by-day basis. Now one Googler, Brandon S., has taken to his blog to describe how he engaged in a little off-grid living within sight of Google's high-tech headquarters. First he spent $10,000 of his Google signing bonus on a 2006 Ford truck with 128 square feet of room in the back, which he filled with a bed, dresser, and coat rack. Google pays for his phone, and he uses the company's gym and cafeterias to eat and shower. For those Bay Area tech pros who think Brandon's lifestyle sounds appealing, his list of drawbacks includes "social suicide," the inconvenience of not having a bathroom or fridge in close proximity, stress, insect infestations, and the upfront costs of purchasing a large-enough vehicle. On the other hand, he's also using the cash savings to rapidly pay down his student loans.
or, you know, google could pay a living wage.
Time to unionize, boys!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
"... He uses the company's gym and cafeterias to eat and shower."
Hopefully not in that order.
Political correctness is really just herd psychology pushed by insecure people who desperately seek social conformity.
Don't Be This Guy! is the takeaway. He isn't living, he's merely existing, and worse, he's existing only to do his corporate masters' bidding.
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
>> 90% of my after-tax income, and throwing that in student loans...$22,434 worth of student loans, and has paid it down to $16,449...four months
That's only $1,500 paid down on student loans per month. If that's 90% of his after-tax income (even in California), he's making maybe $22K/year, and spending just $150 month on other stuff.
Isn't sleeping under your desk while your code is compiling allowed or even encouraged at Google?
Most of the towns in the South Bay have ordinances with prohibitions against motorhomes. You can't live in them, you can't park them on their streets or in driveways. And they certainly don't allow businesses to allow motorhomes to live in their parking lots. So it all has to be on the downlow, it has to look like a regular van and no one has to notice you.
... and I'll never understand the lure of Silicon Valley. I live a couple of miles outside Nashville in the country, in a very nice house I managed to pay off in 10 years. I make a decent living doing high-end computer work (academic HPC) which is pretty fun. Ambitious but realistic 40-hour week schedules, with co-workers as smart as any I've met at the Supercomputing conferences. I can eat out, go to the gym, go on a date, or just go home and watch a movie with my cat in my lap any time I want. I'll probably be able to retire in my 50's should I choose to do so.
Why, other than the hope of becoming an overnight millionaire, do people choose to work in Silicon Valley, with the insane hours, cost-of-living, commutes from hell, and a lack of any social life? Because if money is all they wanted, they can buy Powerball tickets in most states.
I think it's time for companies (and tech companies especially) to start to encourage more remote workers.
Companies with stacked ranking don't do "remote".
This is because stacked ranking is basically a high school popularity contest which pits employees against each other to stay above the bottom part of the bell curve so that they don't end up on a PIP ("Performance Improvement Program") or just plain fired/asked to lead/offered severance.
When Marissa Mayer came into Yahoo from Google, she instituted stacked ranking. It's the main reason she disallowed remote workers, since they were going to be the lowest ranked anyway, and if you are going to be ranked low, you might as well pack your bags before it's an issue.
So... between a remote worker, who you hardly ever have any personal interactions with, and a local worker who you eat lunch with daily, and consider a good work friend/buddy... who are you going to shove under the bus?
Exactly.
So remote workers are strongly discouraged at most companies that originated in the Amazon/Google/Facebook cultures, or hired HR or management out of those cultures, which is to say "Company X is successful; let's act just like company X, and we will be successful, too".
Buddy did this in an RV. he bought one that was fiberglass sides and spent a weekend peeling off the graphics and roller painting on white paint. he then slapped "AT&T" logo stickers around it.
it looks like an AT&T fiber maintenance vehicle. he put mirror tint on all the windows and spent 5 years in works parking lot without problems. put out a couple of orange cones and nobody even questions it.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Housing prices are higher than "the cost to build" in major metropolitan areas all over the world (London, Paris, Rome, Moscow, etc., etc.).
Your definition of 'normal' is abnormal.