I agree with part of your post, but not all of it. Subsidies and zoning laws? Definitely. Suburban land was cheap, automobiles and fuel were cheap, hence Suburbia. The post-war US economy was booming, so you had families with higher-than-now purchasing power.

Are people moving to cities because fuel and automobiles are more expensive compared to stagnant incomes? In some cases. It probably also helps that people value their time more (commute time/distance to services and social venues) and that there are more opportunities for work in cities than suburban and rural areas.

I am curious to see what happens with remote work; I see a big push happening right now, at least in the tech sector. Not everything can be done remotely, but if the advantages are truly great enough, companies will compete against each other to hire quality remote workers (who can live anywhere its convenient for them).

I look forward to this industry realizing everything doesn't have to happen in SF.

Network effects are powerful. Silicon Valley largely runs (today) on monetizing network effects, and network effects are also why Silicon Valley is all concentrated in the Bay Area.

The primary factor is concentration of capital: it is exponentially easier to raise money in the Bay. The second is concentration of talent and peers -- early customers, beta testers, development partners.

The Internet was supposed to make place less relevant, but as far as I can tell it's had a paradoxically opposite effect. When I was younger, I didn't have such a strong sense that you must be in one of maybe ten urban areas (but preferably SF) to do anything. Today it feels a bit like things happen in one of maybe ten cities, and everywhere else doesn't exist. Americans have always joked about the "flyover country," but I've distinctly noticed a massive increase in this effect since circa 2000.

Really? I've seen the opposite. The downtowns of places like Indianpolis, Cleveland, Columbus, Pittsburgh, Charlotte, Atlanta, Nashville, etc. were underinvested wastelands not too long ago. Now a lot of young people want to live in these places. Not to mention the hipster paradises of Portland, Austin, etc.

SF, Seattle, NYC, DC, Boston, etc., are still the major magnets, but "hip" urban living isn't as confined to the coasts as it used to be IMO.

Those cities are becoming great places to live, but if you work in tech the opportunities in the bay area still dwarf everything else.

Some industries are very centralized in one city - tech in the bay area, finance in NYC, entertainment in LA, etc.

I've noticed the same thing, but interpreted it as an effect of political alienation during the Bush years. The post-9/11 freakout and series of military misadventures left me feeling like there is really no such thing as America; the America I live in consists of its high-density coastal cities and nothing more, all the rest being driven by a foreign culture I don't like or belong to.

This

It's frankly pathetic that the so-called "biggest innovators" and people who "get the internet" feel the need to be constrained in an already crowded city.

Face to face communication is important, but there are tools to help with day to day communication

The Linux world knows much better how to deal with this then your average "Web 2.0" company

I think api's post is pretty accurate. This book has a lot more detail:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0078XGJXO/ref=as_li_tl?ie=...

I wish Hacker News would strip out affiliate codes.

We're capitalists here, mostly, so people don't mind. People who are just here to spam get turfed out pretty quickly. I don't recommend stuff that I don't think is pertinent to a conversation.

> We're capitalists here, mostly, so people don't mind.

I have never thought [citation required] was more necessary than with this comment.

We're technology professionals or enthusiasts primarily here.

Y Combinator embodies the very definition of capitalism, and they host this site. While the community seems more diverse than that, its fair to say there is a capitalist bent.

> Y Combinator embodies the very definition of capitalism

Y Combinator also donates to efficient non-profits in the tech space, no strings attached. That's not traditionally capitalistic.

Philanthropy is a lot harder without capitalism. "I should be the one who decides where the money I worked so hard to make gets donated." Besides, it's good advertising.

I didn't mean capitalists in terms of a job - I'm a tech guy too - but in terms of being ok with capitalism and making money.

> but in terms of being ok with capitalism and making money.

That's exactly what I mean as well. I'm a socialist looking to replace jobs with cheap renewable energy, software, and robotics automation. Definitely not a capitalist. To each their own.

If you prefer, you can think of the referral link as a way to redistribute some wealth from billionaire Jeff Bezos to not at all bad off, but certainly not even millionaire davidw.

This concurs with the arguments a very liberal city planner once convinced me with. His preference for a solution, of course, was different government pressure on where people live and work, rather than my preference of less pressure, but he was convincing on the nature of the problem.

Also as a way to racially and economically segregate the population. Office park connect to residential suburbs where little Johnny and Lisa can get good schools and other white upper middle-class friends to play with.