Start-ups and tech companies are irresponsible Bay Area citizens.
As I sit here at the West Oakland BART with my bicycle, sadly watching
the fourth train of sardines go by without room for Fermina and I, it
hit me that I am semi representative of the problem. I'm a white upper
middle-class guy who lives in the East Bay partially because it's
affordable. That's called gentrification. I live in Oakland because
I'm an East Bay punk through, and the east bay owns my heart. Since
the tech economy rebounded San Francisco has turned into a disgusting
yuppy playground that I don't want to be part of, but I have to,
because that's where all of the tech jobs are. This seems normal, doesn't it? White flight to the suburbs. Desirable
urban centers become homes only to the rich, and the jobs created to
support their lavishness are all poverty-wage service jobs. This isn't
even that bad, demographics of neighborhoods and cities change, they
always have and always will. The problem is that it's 2012 and we
don't need offices anymore, and commuting hurts our local communities
while fostering outdated work practices.
Because I commute to San Francisco, I spend a lot of money there, and
here's how it breaks down: San Francisco sees the following monies from me because I work there: - $300-$500 in lunches, dinners, breakfasts
- $220 in payroll tax
- $100 in coffee
- $100/month on BART
- $25 in Muni
- $40-$50 in sales tax on the food and coffee
-----------------------------------------------------------------
$785-$985/month.
Every month in Oakland, while working from home, I spend
- $200 in coffee
- $150 in food.
------------------------------------------------
$300/month
San Francisco wins because it sees $785-$985/month from me that it
doesn't deserve. Oakland gets fucked because I spend that money in San
Francisco. I get fucked because I hate commuting, can never bring my
bicycle on BART (and will never be able to bike over the bay bridge)
so I tend to lose an hour of my life every day to commuting. I also
get fucked because food costs twice as much in San Francisco, and I
have to wait in lines everywhere. Biking in San Francisco is
frightening because of middle-aged white men in german cars trying to
desperately to get home to Marin or Walnut Creek. My fellow Oaklanders
get fucked because I'm not creating local jobs, I'm creating those
shitty service industry jobs in San Francisco. It's 2012 and there is no reason for this. The tech industry needs to
learn to be better citizens to it's communities and either build
cultures that allow working from home, or to build satellite offices
in local communities so that your employees can help bolster their
local economies. San Francisco won't hurt, but if 10k East Bay
engineers could stay home the east bay could reclaim at least $100m in
local economic activity that is stolen by San Francisco. This is a win for everybody. Pollution goes down, infrastructure is
less burdened, employees can live better lives and have more time with
their loved ones. Your company will do better because your employees
are happier. The first obvious target is start-ups. There really is no reason to
locate your startup in San Francisco. There are many hundreds of
thousands of available class A and B office space in downtown Oakland,
close to BART and at a fraction of the premium prices in San
Francisco. All of Oakland is an enterprise development zone, so since
bad citizens like Twitter are addicted to corporate welfare, no
problem, we've got you covered. Working from home or having a
satellite office in the East Bay opens your opportunities to hire in
this incredibly tight market. The restaurants are awesome, the weather
is much nicer, and a software engineer making $150k can actually
afford that american dream of a spouse, two children, and home
ownership. It's bad enough that our industry has devolved into a disgusting
ecosystem to enable advertising, do we have to shit all over our homes
to do it? Why don't we stop chasing the hipster trend of working from
San Francisco and instead start building a better world by thinking
locally instead of just thinking about ourselves.
the fourth train of sardines go by without room for Fermina and I, it
hit me that I am semi representative of the problem. I'm a white upper
middle-class guy who lives in the East Bay partially because it's
affordable. That's called gentrification. I live in Oakland because
I'm an East Bay punk through, and the east bay owns my heart. Since
the tech economy rebounded San Francisco has turned into a disgusting
yuppy playground that I don't want to be part of, but I have to,
because that's where all of the tech jobs are. This seems normal, doesn't it? White flight to the suburbs. Desirable
urban centers become homes only to the rich, and the jobs created to
support their lavishness are all poverty-wage service jobs. This isn't
even that bad, demographics of neighborhoods and cities change, they
always have and always will. The problem is that it's 2012 and we
don't need offices anymore, and commuting hurts our local communities
while fostering outdated work practices.
Because I commute to San Francisco, I spend a lot of money there, and
here's how it breaks down: San Francisco sees the following monies from me because I work there: - $300-$500 in lunches, dinners, breakfasts
- $220 in payroll tax
- $100 in coffee
- $100/month on BART
- $25 in Muni
- $40-$50 in sales tax on the food and coffee
-----------------------------------------------------------------
$785-$985/month.
Every month in Oakland, while working from home, I spend
- $200 in coffee
- $150 in food.
------------------------------------------------
$300/month
San Francisco wins because it sees $785-$985/month from me that it
doesn't deserve. Oakland gets fucked because I spend that money in San
Francisco. I get fucked because I hate commuting, can never bring my
bicycle on BART (and will never be able to bike over the bay bridge)
so I tend to lose an hour of my life every day to commuting. I also
get fucked because food costs twice as much in San Francisco, and I
have to wait in lines everywhere. Biking in San Francisco is
frightening because of middle-aged white men in german cars trying to
desperately to get home to Marin or Walnut Creek. My fellow Oaklanders
get fucked because I'm not creating local jobs, I'm creating those
shitty service industry jobs in San Francisco. It's 2012 and there is no reason for this. The tech industry needs to
learn to be better citizens to it's communities and either build
cultures that allow working from home, or to build satellite offices
in local communities so that your employees can help bolster their
local economies. San Francisco won't hurt, but if 10k East Bay
engineers could stay home the east bay could reclaim at least $100m in
local economic activity that is stolen by San Francisco. This is a win for everybody. Pollution goes down, infrastructure is
less burdened, employees can live better lives and have more time with
their loved ones. Your company will do better because your employees
are happier. The first obvious target is start-ups. There really is no reason to
locate your startup in San Francisco. There are many hundreds of
thousands of available class A and B office space in downtown Oakland,
close to BART and at a fraction of the premium prices in San
Francisco. All of Oakland is an enterprise development zone, so since
bad citizens like Twitter are addicted to corporate welfare, no
problem, we've got you covered. Working from home or having a
satellite office in the East Bay opens your opportunities to hire in
this incredibly tight market. The restaurants are awesome, the weather
is much nicer, and a software engineer making $150k can actually
afford that american dream of a spouse, two children, and home
ownership. It's bad enough that our industry has devolved into a disgusting
ecosystem to enable advertising, do we have to shit all over our homes
to do it? Why don't we stop chasing the hipster trend of working from
San Francisco and instead start building a better world by thinking
locally instead of just thinking about ourselves.
Posted
7 months
ago