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A wise man once said "you can't always get what you want".
I don't know what you mean by "deserve" to live some where. That's not even a factor. You either can or can't afford a place, it's how life works. The good news is there are lot's of places at lot's of price points so you can live a good life while having something better to shoot for. Wanting something you can't afford is usually what motivates people.
Welcome to the age of entitlement in this country. All you have to do to deserve anything nowadays is to exist.
Doing the deeds so many lackey politician figurehead scum spew that "Americans will not do."
Harvesting your food. loading semi-trailers with the goods you need then driving a multitude of miles then unloading the goods.
I would enjoy watching a cubicle creep unload 18 tons of onions in 55-pound bags.
Masses of despised "commoners" laboring away, often at low pay and NO benefits ensuring the "better classes" have life necessities available allowing you to perform your admittedly needed specialized tasks that pay so much more and allow you to live apart from us commoner scum.
When I was aboard a warship steaming up the Saigon River way back when I looked around at the crew manning the machine guns, M-14s and shotguns and I saw the dregs of USA society. The few folks I kept in contact with over the years were the norm... do the research if you want to verify what I write... the typical American does not rise above the socio-economic group they were raised within.
Oh yes, shout out your exceptions and your belief that the exception disproves numerous studies over the decades indicating that the norm IS remaining in the cohort one was reared within.
Anyway... the topic is extremely complex and I understand the desire to keep the riff-raff at arm's length or more.
Perhaps it is an attitude I detect in some of the comments aboard this thread.
Imagine, if you will, if the folks doing the "dirty work" who receive so little for their efforts decided to just quit working.
Food not harvested and transported. Society's dregs declaring that the USA's elites can send their own vile spawn to bleed and perhaps die on foreign soil.
So many tasks that need doing not done.
It takes a team for a society to function, especially a complex industrial/post-industrial society such as we live in.
I am not trying to make a point here... just conveying an attitude.
Perhaps a couple folks with much better minds than mine can assist in conveying my convoluted thoughts:
"While the poor and middle class fight for us in Afghanistan, and while most Americans struggle to make ends meet, we mega-rich continue to get our extraordinary tax breaks," Buffett wrote in a Sunday New York Times Op-ed.
"There has been class warfare going on," Buffett, 81, said in a Sept. 30 interview with Charlie Rose on PBS. It's just that my class is winning. And my class isn't just winning, I mean we're killing them."
"There's class warfare, all right, Mr. (Warren) Buffett said, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war, and we're winning"
"One reason companies are so profitable is that they're paying employees less than they ever have as a share of GDP. And that, in turn, is one reason the economy is so weak: Those "wages" are other companies' revenue.
In short, our current system and philosophy is creating a country of a few million overlords and 300+ million serfs." Blodget
I am now atop the Ozark Plateau surrounded by a huge horde of society's dregs. I lived in "P-town" back when its population was around perhaps 5,000at most and the roads were all 2-lane except maybe for I-580 but I remember seeing the building of the freeway across Altamont pass.
No BART back then and the "dime store" on the main drag had wooden floors and the soda/pop/refreshing carbonated beverages were in bottles immersed in chilled water. Five or so years before the Summer of Love? Groovy.
Anyway, all the best to you folks and try to look at the BIG picture where the proverbial "we need ditch diggers too" are too often being shoved face-down into an economic quagmire.
And pray that the apparent growing numbers of desperate po' folks never rebel.
Personally, for what it's worth, before I die from old age I would revel at a full-scale military coup to destroy what I consider to be an unfixable federal government and various bureaucracies and systems owned and controlled by a few powerful greedy class-based scum.
Scour the Web. I believe the numbers of folks such as I are growing.
Have a wonderful week.
Thank you for taking the time to read this diatribe.
Ex-Granada High from the "groovy" years. When the SDS spoke on campus and the "Blue Meanies" rushed in along with local cops and the Highway Patrol... defending the status quo!!!
Welcome to the age of entitlement in this country. All you have to do to deserve anything nowadays is to exist.
Please note I am not a youngster, and I don't live with an air of "entitlement", as I see many upper class people have.
I do more than "exist" as you put it. I work hard, have worked for the same company for over 30 years. I EARN my money in Pleasanton, wouldn't you like to see me spend my earnings in that town? and contribute to the economy of Pleasanton?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ceece
A wise man once said "you can't always get what you want".
I don't know what you mean by "deserve" to live some where. That's not even a factor. You either can or can't afford a place, it's how life works. The good news is there are lot's of places at lot's of price points so you can live a good life while having something better to shoot for. Wanting something you can't afford is usually what motivates people.
I believe it was Mick Jagger who said what you quoted.
Can you tell me where I can live on an income of 44k and not have to commute to work and continue to make that wage? And what exactly do you mean by "Live a good life"? Have you lived in these areas? I work hard and would like to live in a place where the schools are as good as Pleasanton, crime is low, great public transportation, people are educated, culture is close by and the town has a good walkable score.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ultrarunner
Per Capita is now around 49k for Pleasanton... numbers are straight from the 2010 Census...
Household Income is about double the per Capita number
In my "household" there is only 1 income(mine) so that is what I have to live on. Oh, by the way my income is below the "Per Capita". It is 2012, and that census is two years old, incomes have gone down in those two years. I also know quite a few Senior Citizen whom have incomes below mine and are forced to move away from the town which they have lived in for a long time. Many of the children of the people who live in Pleasanton now will NOT be able to live in this town due to no housing which they can afford. Yes, those of us can rent apartments and be subject to ever increasing rents, as over the last two years rents have increase 50% while incomes have not increased. Yes, I know, if you are a landlord you can charge what ever the market will bear, for landlords are in it to make LOTS of money. Please, don't tell me how much up keep there is to do on a house, I already know what it cost to own a piece of property.
In my "household" there is only 1 income(mine) so that is what I have to live on. Oh, by the way my income is below the "Per Capita". It is 2012, and that census is two years old, incomes have gone down in those two years. I also know quite a few Senior Citizen whom have incomes below mine and are forced to move away from the town which they have lived in for a long time. Many of the children of the people who live in Pleasanton now will NOT be able to live in this town due to no housing which they can afford. Yes, those of us can rent apartments and be subject to ever increasing rents, as over the last two years rents have increase 50% while incomes have not increased. Yes, I know, if you are a landlord you can charge what ever the market will bear, for landlords are in it to make LOTS of money. Please, don't tell me how much up keep there is to do on a house, I already know what it cost to own a piece of property.
DIVERSITY IS GOOD.
I live in one of the most diverse cities in America... Oakland. My rental property is also in Oakland and I have lived in each and every one except for two...
I don't know what else to say about Pleasanton... I have never lived there and have no desire to live there... I think it is great for those that do and homes there do not seem to be on the market very long... so people are finding a way to make it work in August 2012.
As for rent increases... as a rule, my rents only increase when a unit is vacant... other than that, rents stay the same for years at a time... You do realize Oakland has rent control and 50% increases just do not and cannot happen to most renters?
Why don't you look in my city? Oakland has many more rentals and a much more diverse population then you will ever find in Pleasanton...
One of the reasons I like my side of the East Bay is for the mild climate... most of the homes have/need A/C on the other side of the hill... no one that I know has A/C in Oakland... just think how much more electricity and water costs a typical home owner in Pleasanton.
As to Seniors... I have helped several get onto Section 8... two didn't even know it existed... I got the forms, help them with eligibility and shuttled them to Housing... Seniors have shorted waiting lists... especially if they have a disability and I don't have a problem with that.
I guess I could add that Piedmont has some spectacular homes that I could adjust to living there... it's just started homes there can be a million plus... depending on location... What I'm saying is life, at least for most of us is about compromises...
A single income is harder no matter where you live... if you're out of work... there is no income... with a dual income family as in the traditional first time home buyer... there are more options.
Yup, that's the way the Judicial System has set things up in this country.
Boca Raton, Florida, passed a voter-initiative to set a population cap decades ago. The Supreme Court shot it down; you can't do population caps, period.
As to the low-income housing, Student Urban Planners study what is known as the "The Mount Laurel Doctrine," which comes from a NJ Supreme Court Case. The Court decided that every locality had to provide its "Fair Share" of low-income housing. All the other states followed suit. To enforce this, the government may require that a certain portion of any big new developments be set aside for low-income residents, and can use tax dollars to compensate the developers.
Social Engineering by a government that thinks it has complete and ultimate power. Who are you to complain?
Yeah, that's a really simplistic, uninformed view of it.
The Mt. Laurel decision didn't even happen over a fight about public housing. It was about a market rate apartment complex. Mt. Laurel, like a lot of suburban towns in NJ had tried to zone out apartments and any other type of house that wasn't a McMansion. This wasn't about building the projects in Mt. Laurel, this was more like building townhouses that cops and teachers could afford to live in. It's called "exclusionary zoning". It's actually a little embarrassing that this took until 1975 to come to a head.
This has been in and out of the courts for going on 40 years. Mt. Laurel II happened in '83 because none of the towns were complying with the decision and the state legislature still failed to act.
Then it went back to the courts because when the county governments finally got it together the suburban towns started paying towns like Camden, Newark, Trenton, Asbury Park, etc. to take their affordable housing credits - which completely went against the spirit of the law but wasn't actually illegal.
These transfers are still allowed in NJ but to a much lesser extent than before subsequent rulings. Look at all the "Safest . . ." "Most Dangerous . . " lists and NJ is always well represented on both because everything is ghettoized. It's really no different in CA and if you're middle class it means hours of your life and thousands of your hard earned $ spent sitting in traffic.
Mind you, in most of these cases, "affordable housing" doesn't mean "the projects" or "HOPE VI" or whatever HUD is calling them these days. These are often market rate units built as part of a larger market rate project but certain units have their construction costs subsidized so they can be sold below market rate for those making less than $58,000 per year for a family of 4 (for example in Mt. Laurel although the rate varies from region to region).
In talking about entitlements it's good to remember that the mortgage interest tax deduction costs ~$80 billion per year while the entire Federal housing budget is around $44 billion.
Doing the deeds so many lackey politician figurehead scum spew that "Americans will not do."
Harvesting your food. loading semi-trailers with the goods you need then driving a multitude of miles then unloading the goods.
I would enjoy watching a cubicle creep unload 18 tons of onions in 55-pound bags.
Masses of despised "commoners" laboring away, often at low pay and NO benefits ensuring the "better classes" have life necessities available allowing you to perform your admittedly needed specialized tasks that pay so much more and allow you to live apart from us commoner scum.
When I was aboard a warship steaming up the Saigon River way back when I looked around at the crew manning the machine guns, M-14s and shotguns and I saw the dregs of USA society. The few folks I kept in contact with over the years were the norm... do the research if you want to verify what I write... the typical American does not rise above the socio-economic group they were raised within.
Oh yes, shout out your exceptions and your belief that the exception disproves numerous studies over the decades indicating that the norm IS remaining in the cohort one was reared within.
Anyway... the topic is extremely complex and I understand the desire to keep the riff-raff at arm's length or more.
Perhaps it is an attitude I detect in some of the comments aboard this thread.
Imagine, if you will, if the folks doing the "dirty work" who receive so little for their efforts decided to just quit working.
Food not harvested and transported. Society's dregs declaring that the USA's elites can send their own vile spawn to bleed and perhaps die on foreign soil.
So many tasks that need doing not done.
It takes a team for a society to function, especially a complex industrial/post-industrial society such as we live in.
I am not trying to make a point here... just conveying an attitude.
Perhaps a couple folks with much better minds than mine can assist in conveying my convoluted thoughts:
"While the poor and middle class fight for us in Afghanistan, and while most Americans struggle to make ends meet, we mega-rich continue to get our extraordinary tax breaks," Buffett wrote in a Sunday New York Times Op-ed.
"There has been class warfare going on," Buffett, 81, said in a Sept. 30 interview with Charlie Rose on PBS. It's just that my class is winning. And my class isn't just winning, I mean we're killing them."
"There's class warfare, all right, Mr. (Warren) Buffett said, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war, and we're winning"
"One reason companies are so profitable is that they're paying employees less than they ever have as a share of GDP. And that, in turn, is one reason the economy is so weak: Those "wages" are other companies' revenue.
In short, our current system and philosophy is creating a country of a few million overlords and 300+ million serfs." Blodget
I am now atop the Ozark Plateau surrounded by a huge horde of society's dregs. I lived in "P-town" back when its population was around perhaps 5,000at most and the roads were all 2-lane except maybe for I-580 but I remember seeing the building of the freeway across Altamont pass.
No BART back then and the "dime store" on the main drag had wooden floors and the soda/pop/refreshing carbonated beverages were in bottles immersed in chilled water. Five or so years before the Summer of Love? Groovy.
Anyway, all the best to you folks and try to look at the BIG picture where the proverbial "we need ditch diggers too" are too often being shoved face-down into an economic quagmire.
And pray that the apparent growing numbers of desperate po' folks never rebel.
Personally, for what it's worth, before I die from old age I would revel at a full-scale military coup to destroy what I consider to be an unfixable federal government and various bureaucracies and systems owned and controlled by a few powerful greedy class-based scum.
Scour the Web. I believe the numbers of folks such as I are growing.
Have a wonderful week.
Thank you for taking the time to read this diatribe.
Ex-Granada High from the "groovy" years. When the SDS spoke on campus and the "Blue Meanies" rushed in along with local cops and the Highway Patrol... defending the status quo!!!
Feel sorry for yourself much? A military coup??? Oh yeah, that would solve all problems. Pathetic in the extreme.
The worst thing about communities like Pleasanton is that are they are massive contributors to pollution and gridlock.
All the people who live in Pleasanton commute to Silcon Valley, FiDi, and all those places.
Then all the people who actually work in Pleasanton (Oracle, Stoneridge, etc) can't afford to live there, so they have to commute in.
If the voters of the city approved to not allow more housing in 1996 why should a judge be allowed to change that? I can understand if the voting people of the city decided to change it but I am sure they haven't.
The city is now forced to build 3,277 housing units. It also forces them to build 2524 low to very low income housing where section 8 vouchers are accepted! The low income housing will be by Hacienda / Bart area.
Why do people of low income and very low income deserve to live in Pleasanton? Most people who live there have worked very hard to leave places with problems associated to the poor. It's an exclusive and nice area for a reason. If you can't afford a place you can't afford a place. How is that not logical to people? I know I can't buy a house there so I don't live there. Now would I want to live there if I could, of course. Am I going to throw a fit and sue them for having a nice city that I can't afford, of course not.
This shows you the problem with our state, most people and our society. The fact there is a Urban Habitat who sues cities for not allowing enough low income residences. The fact we have a state law that mandates we always include the poor in developments.
How is it that Urban Habitat is allowed to run around and sue cities and then charge them for the laywers fees? Pleasanton is going to pay these nuts 1.9 million dollars for their lawyers. How is this possible? This is insanity!
Can't people have anything nice in California these days?
They should build them all in 5 high rises, that should solve all the problems.
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Pathetic in the extreme.
