Giantaxe

"Traditional" manufacturing and production jobs have also largely disappeared from the US as a whole, not just the Bay Area.

The GM plant is now the Tesla plant.

It must certainly be difficult to live in the Bay Area absent a high tech salary - or having bought a house here a long time ago, thus benefiting from both house price inflation and prop 13.

N1cky

If you came here 30 years ago, presumably you are one of the haves, either that or you invested very badly, maybe that explains why you seem so bitter.

johnwoo

I came here in 1970 do the math.
I'm not at all bitter, I'm pointing out the reality of living in the Bay Area and the effect Tech companies have had on the area. As far as being a have, only in as much as having lived and worked here at a different time, when it was possible for a working class person to buy a house and enjoy a reasonable lifestyle without a $200K salary or what would have been the equivalent.
Being a 'have' doesn't mean I don't have empathy for the have those that have very little.
I guess pointing out the disparities in wages and lack hope of a better life for many people rubs some of the haves the wrong way?

Why are people from Google land so disliked in SF?

johnwoo

.

carcajou

Dude, are you for real? As johnwoo pointed out the tech companies had nowhere near the scope and scale that they do now nor did they dominate the Bay Area economy (nor where they close to that) in the 1980s. These companies were not born as billion-Dollar megacorporations. As they became that and started to dominate the local economy, the city changed, significantly, with it.

This is a rather obvious fact and I have no idea why it has generated such a visceral reaction in you.

You're the strawman. You're out.

fbf2006

To be fair, though I know the Bay area is worse, prices in the Northeast have also risen dramatically. The US generally has a growing divide between the have/have nots. For example, CEO salaries compared to the average worker's salary at the same company didn't use to be as wide as it is today. Also many people used to be able to work to pay for their college education as they went to school. This is almost impossible now due to tuition rates.

N1cky

The only people who seem to dislike people from google land, are the ones who've made millions from their house, being here at the right time. It's like the people who've been here for over 20 years feel they are entitled to have made out like a bandit, but don't want extra houses, buildings over 3 stories high, cars, people...

I like Google, they do lots of good for the local area.

malch

This really isn't very complicated.

In the 1980's, anyone paying some attention to the tech industry or the stock market, could see that Silicon Valley was center of gravity for tech. But most of the products being developed or sold were business (not consumer) products.

It was the 1990's before tech started to ramp up consumer products and marketing. That's when folks outside of tech and the stock market became more aware of Silicon Valley's importance. Netscape and Yahoo were founded in 1994 and 1995 respectively. The attention grabbing "Think Different" campaign from Apple started in 1998, for example.

Having said that, I would say that the more educated/informed half of the population were very aware of Silicon Valley's significance in the mid-late 1980's. They knew where Silicon Valley was and viewed it as an innovative tech center.

In any event, it doesn't really matter and it certainly doesn't help the OP.

johnwoo

Seems Trump like 'alternative facts' way of thinking is catching on.
I fail to see how "extra houses, buildings over 3 stories high, cars, people..." make for a better life for anyone.
Sure I have made out like a bandit in property values, that doesn't stop me being concerned about the upstairs downstairs trends of the Bay Area.
As far as a sense of entitlement, I think that's rather ironic when coming from people that think $200K -$250K is the kind of salary they are entitled to.

Giantaxe

"In the 1980s, Silicon Valley became the widely accepted center of the computer industry."

I will posit that the computer industry, although it has obviously grown a lot since there, was hardly a small industry back then. It has been the driver of economic growth in the Bay Area since at least that time.

Also interesting that you are seemingly unable to argue without resorting to put downs like "Dude, are you for real?", "If you can't understand the difference in what an industry lifer thinks vs what the public at large thinks than I can't help you." and " Really? What planet are you from?". Oh well.

Giantaxe

That's one category. However, there are many in SF who dislike Google because they see it as "gentrification". We are even having bizarre opposition here to the bike share scheme (bikes getting vandalized etc) because a segment of the population thinks that that is another example of said gentrification.

N1cky

They don't make a better life, they don't make a worse life either. It's just life. Growth and expansion in a successful area. Jobs mean people, and people need places to live, building detached homes with gardens isn't a solution that is possible here, it's not like we have tons of land is it?

Telling someone who is looking at moving to the area, that it's got worse over the last 30 years is just a moan really isn't it? There's no advise there.

There are a lot of people here who seem very unhappy with what the area has become. You don't have to stay here you know, you can sell the house you've made a killing on, and move somewhere that you prefer.

I've not made any comment on the salary, but I have no problem with people earning $200k, if you can get it, good luck to you (no matter where in the world you are). I don't make that kind of money, probably because I don't work in the tech industry. I am lucky enough to live here though, there's tons to do, it's beautiful, the weather is fabulous, it's multi-cultural, and full of interesting, intelligent people. It's giving my daughter some great opportunities, and it's given my husband some great work opportunities. Don't misunderstand me, I would love to have not had to give over most of my salary in rent for years, and virtually bankrupt myself to finally buy a house here, but it is what it is, the same as living in central London, or Hong Kong... And while I enjoy living here right now, I know that once my daughter leaves home, we too will look for a new place to call home. Somewhere that suits us at that stage of our life.

Lastly, please don't ever compare anything I say to that wanker.

N1cky

No matter where you are in the world, there are people who don't like change. Drives me crazy.

malch

Some change is good. Some is bad. Some is a pointless wash.

Furthermore, good .v. bad is quite subjective encompassing personal values, preferences, foibles etc.

I use and like a lot of Google products and services. That's good. Google has been great for the Bay Area economy. But Google has brought problems too.

They've driven up property prices which have forced employees to live across the Bay and those commuters have clogged the roads. I (like many) am less than enthralled by Google's data collection policies. I feel that Google has been significantly exacerbated "ageism" in Silicon Valley hiring practices. Google is meddling in the political arena to a degree I think is very dangerous.

So, there's good and bad. Some of the bad is really quite significant so it's hardly surprising that some hold negative views.

N1cky

I was meaning more that I like what Google do for the local community, rather than their business practices.

The money they put into the local schools, free shuttles, paying for bike lanes to be built...

Any big business areas bring house price increases and traffic. When we lived in Yorkshire our commute time was longer than it was in either Los Angeles or the Bay Area, despite us always living around 20 miles from work. The difference for us is the volume of cars on the road, we used to commute mainly on single lane roads as opposed to 6 lane freeways. The main thing that makes commuting such a pain for us, is the fact that you often don't leave the office until 7pm, meaning the commute is just eating more into your day. We normally left the office before 5.30pm in our UK jobs.