A plea to the tech industry: Please leave our fair city alone (San Francisco: health insurance, buy)

[Wolfpacker]

Originally Posted by Tulemutt

Your happiness and life pleasures and satisfactions revolve around politics? You wallow thus in a hell of your own assumptions [about how the world must work for you to find your own personal best way through it].

Uh...our entire lives revolves around politics. What you can and can't do, how much your Dinged, where your jobs and entrepreneurs go, ect. is politics.

[Annie1004]

Originally Posted by 18Montclair

And I never said SF is perfect, only that it's more perfect than most places, most certainly more perfect than Phoenix by a mile or two. I mean, really that goes without saying.

You should throw in Zurich... beautiful city, as are Zermatt, Grindelwald, Gstaad, etc. ... Switzerland is lovely.

[Sovetsky Medved]

Im still confused at how a city can be more "Perfect" than other cities?
Wouldn't that just be the opinion of that citizen living in that city?
The only negative thing I can find in Phoenix is our outrageously HOT Summers.
and not being near the ocean.
if Phoenix was a coastal city and had the same climate as San Francisco, and both had the same Cost of living, I would easily choose Phoenix.
Seriously, it's all in a manner of taste.
I like some things about San Francisco, But I still feel Phoenix is a better fit for me.
What is it about San Francisco That makes you love it more than anywhere else?
what do you get out of it and why do you feel it's worth the high cost of living to stay there?

[Sovetsky Medved]

Annie1004: Let me get this cleared up, Im not Comparing Phoenix to San Francisco, there two completely different cities.
What Im saying is neither city is worse.
There both Great cities, both can have there negatives and positives.
and it all comes down to what you like and your tastes.
Nobody is going to tell me, that San Francisco is a better city than Phoenix or any other city in this nation.
Because like I said, it's all about your choices, Not everybody likes the same thing.
I like to travel to San Francisco Bask in it's climate and read about it's history. But I wouldn't really want to live there 24/7.
even if it was cheap and affordable.

[Tulemutt]

Originally Posted by Wolfpacker

Uh...our entire lives revolves around politics. What you can and can't do, how much your Dinged, where your jobs and entrepreneurs go, ect. is politics.

'Scuse my laughter. Few more trips around the sun and I'll be at 70 years of mostly going where I please, when I please, to do pretty much any of the things I care to do - all "under" a considerable variety of local, state, and national politics. And none of 'em "dinged" me more than a fair share of what they give me back in roads, public safety, parks, municipal services, resources management, retirement, medical coverage, on and on and on.

Waste of life to go around with your panties all up in a knot about it. To say nothing of how it would pain my nuts.

[Sovetsky Medved]

Tulemutt: Yes the climate of San Francisco is really inviting.
But what else is it about the city, that makes you say there is "No other reasonable alternative"
what about Portland or Seattle?
and the other numerous ports on the eastern seaboard?
I see from your post you have lived there for quite some time "1966"
I bet you could tell some interesting stories.
I lived in Cleveland from my birth 1964 till 2004. So Im alway's going to have this Love affair with my Hometown. Could that be what you find attractive about San Francisco, living there for so long?
What are some of the other things that you feel makes your city Great for you?

[Tulemutt]

Originally Posted by Sovetsky Medved

Tulemutt: Yes the climate of San Francisco is really inviting.
But what else is it about the city, that makes you say there is "No other reasonable alternative"
what about Portland or Seattle?
and the other numerous ports on the eastern seaboard?
I see from your post you have lived there for quite some time "1966"
I bet you could tell some interesting stories.
I lived in Cleveland from my birth 1964 till 2004. So Im alway's going to have this Love affair with my Hometown. Could that be what you find attractive about San Francisco, living there for so long?
What are some of the other things that you feel makes your city Great for you?

I grew up in St. Paul (Minnesota). I haven't called it my "home town" since I landed in California in '66 courtesy Uncle Sam. I haven't actually lived in SF since '66 because I was first stationed in San Diego for less than a year but close. Then it was two tours in Vietnam with Alameda in between and after. So I was in SF for the 'Summer of Love' Haight Ashbury scene briefly in '67. Then back end of '68 when the hippie invasion was falling apart.

I stayed in a friend's sister's apartment into the Haight back then. Loved it. Greatful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Janice Joplin, free concerts in Golden Gate park, hanging out smoking weed with the hippies on the street and Buena Vista park, etc all that. Mind blowing dichotomy of universes: short haired helicopter door gunner / dope smoking free love alter ego. In and out of those two worlds, dropping acid, shooting up a foreign country. I dunno. San Francisco was home base to the most intense couple years of my life I guess. I remember coming back from 1st tour and wandering around N. Beach and Chinatown with a couple pals and gal pals. Thinking "this is freakin' Disneyland. The whole USA!"

When I got discharged a few years later, I shared a house full of old hippies and convicts, up behind the Haight on Downey Street but the hippie scene had turned to a lot of crime and rough trade on the streets so I went briefly to Berkeley then Sausalito. Ended up buying a junker little boat and anchoring with a bunch of other ne'er-do-wells in Richardson Bay, living free on the hook (anchoring out) and paddling back and forth to the docks. Lifestyle stuck with me obviously. Been living on one boat and another all over the Bay and Delta since.

I had a good trade from early teens before the service. I was a printer. I loved being a printer so that's what I did most of the years since. Had my own shops for a long time. Worked a variety of others big and small. Construction and mechanical repair work at times too. Good with my hands. Like 'em dirty and scuffed up

My best buddy is another Nam vet up north of Seattle. He used to live in SF then moved north to Seattle and now up in those islands north near Canada. I go there almost every year. He's a boater like me but built houses to live in and rent out. Another mutual friend lived in Portland. So I been around those towns a lot. They are great too. But I can't do that weather year round. Sucks the big one half the year just about. Both towns.

Yeah, I've had plenty fun and adventures in the Bay. Relationships. Couple kids - raised on my boats. Killed a LOT of fish! Me and the boys love killing fish (and eating 'em).

I was to Cleveland a few times when I was a kid. From what I saw, I think less of the place than even St. Paul. But I didn't live there to learn it through. Still wouldn't have liked it, I'm sure. Been to Phoenix once, too. Can't do any place without big salt water, so that's a non-starter.

When I stepped off the plane in California I said "this is IT!"

[Sovetsky Medved]

Tulemutt: Cool snapshot of your life, sounds like a really interesting life.
And you raised your kids on the boat, What an interesting place to call home.
it does sound like your truely in the place you love.
Ive been all over the USA and I really have not found a place that I hate.
I know I poke fun at "Detroit" at times, but I used to go up there on day trips when I lived in cleveland.
For now, Im enjoying my life in Phoenix, will I alway's live here?
I don't really know. I didn't think I would end up here back in 2002, but life and it's opportunities led me out here.
If I lived in S.F. I wouldn't hate it, because I find Beauty in almost anyplace as well as interesting things to do.
I like to read, So I enjoyed the numerous bookstores in San Francisco.
and here in my new Town of Phoenix we just had this new cool bookstore open.
It's a Restaurant/Bar/Bookstore How cool is that
Check out there web site. Changing Hands Bookstore | New Books, Used Books, eBooks, Author Events, Toys, Gifts, More | The Phoenix Area's Oldest and Largest Independent Bookstore
That place is also in walkable distance to where I live. I love Urban living.
it seems wherever your travels take you, there's alway's something new to experience.
Thanks for sharing your viewpoint and giving us all a look into your life there.

[LexusNexus]

High-tech is cyclical, and so is the trend that is hipster culture. One day Apple and Google will be replaced by something else. Apple lost its visionary in Jobs, so the industry is waiting to see how long they last on the ideas that Jobs left behind. New technologies by other companies based elsewhere, even from other countries, could turn Apple and Google into followers, very quickly. The tech bubble could burst for a variety of reasons, at any time, sending techies running to places more reasonably priced.

Being a hipster will one day be a thing of the past, possibly replaced by a culture that even the hipsters are offended by. San Francisco may lose its appeal for a variety of reasons. Who knows?

Life's too short to worry about this stuff. It's better to try to thrive in whatever state things are, rather than wasting energy complaining.

[sonarrat]

Originally Posted by ketch89

Call your congressperson and tell them to introduce a bill requiring California residency for purchasing property. The tech industry is certainly a big part of the ballooning CoL, but cash buyers from China and elsewhere are the ones pushing it to madness.

That's not the problem. The problem is that wealthy foreigners can outright buy U.S. citizenship by investing enough money in the real estate market, causing a double whammy of real estate bubble + increasing wealth disparity in the U.S.