Source: https://transparentcalifornia.com/salaries/search/?q=fire&y=
I'd imagine the expected result is that prices increase to support higher wages for service workers... which they actually have. Just one example: a take-out salad for lunch now costs $15 in San Francisco. The place I'm thinking of has huge line at lunch, so business seems extremely good.
Regional economic prosperity being a _cause_ of homelessness makes no sense to me, unless that economic prosperity for the few took away every business opportunity for everyone around them (e.g.: robot manufacturer replaces all jobs in all industries). The people making money are going to have to spend money.
So I wonder if it has more to do with other societal/economic changes going on that have changed how money is spent:
* Could it have something to do with Amazon/Home Depot/big box stores impacting local retailers?
* Could it have something to do with local manufacturing jobs going overseas?
* Could it have something to do with the 1099 gig economy work making it infeasible for companies to employ people full time (in that type of gig work), and driving down income for those jobs?
* Could it have something to do with the massive increase in drug use[1]?
Or all of the above? Or more reasons?
Also, the fact that it's happening in a period of very low unemployment does not bode well.
ps - Firefighters get down-payment assistance in San Francisco. I personally know a couple who live near me, thanks to this. https://sfmohcd.org/resources-first-responders
[1] - https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Number-of-people-shoo...
SF has, and has had for awhile, some of the most restrictive construction and zoning laws in the country, and as a result demand has far outstripped supply. A decent number of people in SF become homeless for the most obvious reason that they just can't afford housing.
Does the demand outstrip the supply in large part because of the zoning laws.
What other cities had a similar population and vibe to SF 40 years ago, but followed the path of rampant housing growth?
BT
I am very glad to hear that there's down-payment assistance for first responders in San Francisco.
Another way big tech actually COSTS taxpayers money
We’ll pay them more.
Ditto for teachers, janitors, waiters and gas station attendants.
I expect this is where we’re headed. Several people I know who work on poverty wages in the arts industry here pay their room and board in elder- or child-care for a homeowner.
We often hear that terms like “feudalism” and “landed gentry” applied to Bay Area housing policy are over dramatic. I think they’re dead on.
I don't have much sympathy for anyone who chooses to work in the arts... One must see the risks taken, and that the rewards are unpredictable.
> elder- or child-care for a homeowner
Are you talking about the very wealthy here? The upper income? The middle or even low income earners that made good financial choices? Looking after children and elderly is honest work.
Are these art workers tied to the Bay Area by anything apart from their choices?
You have different goals in life than other people.
Please try to be aware that the path you've chosen is not the only right one. Some people have different goals.
Some people even have the cognitive ability to regard the goal of fulfillment in life and creativity as more important than the run-of-the-mill goal of survival that most people are seemingly satisfied with reaching towards.
This is a failure of city planning and should not be excused or ignored as if this fialure was inevitable.
Careers in the arts are generally regarded as belonging to the second category for all but a handful of lottery winners.
I am old enough to have family, friends and acquantances from plenty of different ages and wage brackets: minimum wage hospo, the retired poor, sickness beneficiaries, young and unemployed by choice, successful land-banked hippies, successful founders, successful artists etc. I support my friends and family, even when they are making lifestyle choices.
Your reply comes across to me as condescending.
This makes sense, but does it explain the issues?
You mentioned yourself that people working in software are a "relatively small number of people". Can they have such a big impact on everyone else?
this seems to be aggravated by zoning laws and NIMBYism in the US where localities will not tolerate high-density housing that is an eyesore but provides little homes to people who'd otherwise not have one (or have to pay higher prices than they otherwise would)
What a strange example for you to use. First, firefighters in most urban areas make muchos, muchos dollars. Second, firefighter jobs are extremely desirable, for that reason and many others ("heroism", firefighter groupies, extreme lengths of downtime, early pensions, etc) Third, in poorer areas, volunteers are all-too happy to be firefighters.
As I said, strange example. Maybe you could fret about garbage collectors instead...?
Firefighters
Median annual salary: $35,440
10th percentile salary: $20,520
90th percentile salary: $57,060
First-Line Supervisors of Fire Fighting and Prevention Workers
Median annual salary: $53,180
10th percentile salary: $28,270
90th percentile salary: $78,740
(Firefighters in Alabama make more than in California?!?!)
https://www.jobapscloud.com/SF/sup/bulpreview.asp?R1=CCT&R2=...
Entry Level (H-2) Firefighter
$78,676.00 - $121,420.00/year
Entry level and before any overtime. If you look at individual salaries you see things like one fire fighter making 220K in overtime alone(!). Other make less, but lots and lots are making 300-400K:
https://transparentcalifornia.com/salaries/search/?a=san-fra...
There’s a big difference in what happens in the housing units that are up for grabs vs. the city as a whole.
And it is the growing industries that drive the market rate for housing. Someone who bought in to the market via purchase or rent-regulated lease five or ten years ago has a significantly lower cost of living than someone entering the market today.
Exempli gratia: (in California) If you're living in a $2 million house that you bought for $400 thousand, you might not be able to afford to sell and buy something else at a similar price due to the tax code.
Exempli gratia: If you're living in a rent-regulated apartment that's now leased 40% under market value, if you lose your lease for any reason, you may not be able to afford the market rate. And your landlord has greater incentive to get you out of the unit.
Thus the well-tenured school teacher making $100 thousand per annum[0] can afford to live comfortably, but when this teacher retires, a qualified replacement offered a salary of $66 thousand[1] may choose to live and work elsewhere.
[0]http://www.sfusd.edu/en/assets/sfusd-staff/contract%20and%20...
[1]ibid
If this is to become the norm, it's a monumental shift in the fabric of American society. Meritocracy/justice/feudalism arguments notwithstanding, the implications are huge. Parenting strategy changes. Not even the very best wages are going to cover your child's cost of living near a decent job at market rate. Setting her up to be a valuable worker is a poor investment.
Instead of researching school districts, research cities and economic trends. Instead of saving for college, buy property in the cities you think will be employment centers in 18 years (and keep it empty to avoid a potential tenant-rights battle). Instead of living in the best school district, live in a rent-controlled apartment in another favored city, maybe the one where you can least afford ownership today. If your family can't afford this alone, go in with another family or two. Choose wisely. Your kids will be roommates for life.
If one of your bets is correct, then your kid gets a decent life. It doesn't matter that she's less educated; a worker's most important qualification is to be there. Whatever the growth industry is will be elated to find any young adult. And she'll have 100x better living arrangements, at 1% of the cost, compared to any sucker whose parents didn't set this up for them like you did.
But this happens in the US disproportionally more than, say, many countries in Europe.
I've heard of way too many US ok-ish jobs that don't provide adequate health-insurance (just to give an example). Maybe I'm a little paranoid but I'd have constant nightmares thinking that a couple of days of hospitalization for a benign medical intervention could set me tens of thousands of dollars in debt (or worse).
When I first moved to the SF Bay area, I was surprised by the amount of visible homelessness and by the number of service economy workers who drove nearly two hours to and from work.
I also had my first experiences with the "campuses" of major technology companies, where money was made hand-over-fist. I think the recent widening income gap is a natural consequence of the technology we have invented. A relatively small number of people are able to generate a relatively large amount of profit; this is the nature of the software industry.
But that relatively small number is still enough to dominate the economy of a major metropolitan area, and so it has, and the demand for labor routinely outstrips the supply of housing for those laborers (artificially constricted, but also geographically constrained), and so those who work in software and electrical engineering and cetera can afford to live in the area. Those who do not, can not.
I look at the cities where this is an issue and I see similar threads: industries where money from everywhere flows to a relative few. Technology skims off the top in San Francisco. Finance skims off the top in New York. Government skims off the top in Washington, DC.
So the rise in visible homelessness is perhaps the expected result. Cities are economic systems, and it is easy and myopic to cater only to the demands of the prime mover. But the prime mover has auxiliaries it needs to function, without which the system will collapse.
And my experience with collapses is that they are not gradual, but rather, they are sudden.
Last night, a fire raged through abandoned vehicles parked under Interstate 280. Black smoke poured out from under the freeway and choked Portrero Hill. I watched fire crews advance on the flames and extinguish them. What will happen when the people we rely on to extinguish our flames cannot afford to live in our cities?