
Treating the Bay Area as like working in the mines - imartin2k
https://pedestrianobservations.com/2018/09/24/the-mines/
======
nostrademons
I'd say it's more like conventional factory towns from a couple centuries ago.

I grew up in the Boston area, and on a recent trip back home, took my wife to
see Lowell National Historic Park, birthplace of the industrial revolution in
America. It struck me how similar the stories of the young women who went to
work in the mills were to the young people who now flock to the Bay Area. Like
today's workers, they were fleeing political instability & violence (for
immigrants) or economic stagnation and lack of opportunity (for domestic
migrants). Like in the Bay, they were thrust into a melting pot of cultures
that sometimes stirred conflict but usually ended up broadening their
horizons. Like in SF, they lived in small tenements or boardinghouses, often
2/room. Like at tech startups, they worked long hours in often alienating
conditions to make capital owners rich.

The interesting thing about it was that despite all the hardship, it was very
often the right choice financially for them. Many of the women who worked in
the mills would "retire" in their mid-late 20s or early 30s, having saved up
the majority of their wages. They were then free to do things like become a
pastor (the 1840s equivalent of living a life of spiritual enlightenment), or
get an education (nearly unheard of for women in those days), or marry above
their previous station and have a family, or return to their hometowns and buy
up large swaths of farmland that would've been out of their reach had they
stayed on the farm they grew up on.

The people who really got screwed by the industrial revolution were those who
_didn 't_ take the factory jobs in poor conditions - the small homesteading
farmers, the artisans and craftspeople, the local merchants. They were largely
wiped out as the new means of production spread throughout the world, bankrupt
dinosaurs who eventually had to sell what was left of their homesteads when
the dust bowl hit almost a century later. Most of them ended up catching the
_next_ wave, though, migrating to California or the Great Lakes and getting
jobs in the new aerospace, defense, and automotive industries.

~~~
vostok
> Many of the women who worked in the mills would "retire" in their mid-late
> 20s or early 30s, having saved up the majority of their wages.

Thanks for sharing. I was under the impression that this was a relatively new
phenomenon with the advent of sky high compensation in tech roles.

Do you happen to know how common it was for them to be making, say, $300k in
inflation adjusted terms by, say, age 26?

I'd love to read more about this if you have any links. All the stuff I
remember reading in school was about how horrible it was.

~~~
badpun
My guess was that standards of living were drastically lower back then, so the
accumulated factory wages could make a difference. Back then, people lived in
crappy little houses with no electricity, no water/sewage, obviously had no
cars etc. There was relatively little stuff in their lives, so, as long as the
land provided you with food, you didn't need much money. My grandma used to
live like this in rural Poland - they occasionally bought something with
money, like salt or matches, both mostly were self-sufficient.

~~~
jfindley
Isn't that likely to be the same as what people 90 years in the future will
say about us, though?

~~~
CamTin
In most of the developed world, literally all of our necessities (housing,
healthcare, even food) require interaction with the money economy, which is
the opposite of what is described here, so probably not. Even the Amish have
to interact enough with the "English" economy to buy things like nails, and to
pay their property taxes. Possibly we can operate this way again, with nano-
factories turning homegrown soybeans into jeans and iPads or something, and a
self-healing infrastructure, but that's far future sci-fi, not current
reality.

------
titzer
After 5 years there, my conclusion was that the Bay Area runs on human souls.
It might not be like the black lung, dirt-faced dangerous mines of old, but if
you end up working 10 or 12 hours a day, are caged, distracted, annoyed (but
fed!) at work, go home to a meager existence, have zero friends, zero romance,
and your mind is hijacked to the point where you literally cannot think about
anything else and _relax_ , then your soul is being pretty much sucked dry.

Get out if you can.

~~~
EZ-E
> It might not be like the black lung, dirt-faced dangerous mines of old, but
> if you end up working 10 or 12 hours a day, are caged, distracted, annoyed
> (but fed!) at work, go home to a meager existence, have zero friends, zero
> romance, and your mind is hijacked to the point where you literally cannot
> think about anything else and relax, then your soul is being pretty much
> sucked dry.

I would get my soul sucked dry for a few years for 100k$+ a year - for few
years

~~~
carlmr
100k$ won't create much savings in the Bay Area. At least aim for 200k$ there
if you want to sell your life for years.

~~~
nigifabio
100k in most of European big cities are not going to send you to pension at 40
either, 200k is the 6figures salary of the 90s

~~~
carlmr
True, in Europe high taxes take an additional toll, also the salary situation
is so that it's basically impossible to get 200k in Europe if you're an
employee.

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code4tee
Its a harsh but fair analogy. The region has lost its soul.

People moving there have little intention of setting down roots and staying
long term. People who have lived there long term are just waiting to cash out
on their house and move far away and just hoping the local tech ecosystem
doesn’t implode first. Employees think they’re playing the companies by taking
big pay then getting out and going elsewhere. Companies think they’re playing
employees by having a seemingly never ending supply of “miners” looking to
live and work under conditions most “normal” people would laugh at. Yes, it’s
a mess.

~~~
ummonk
I grew up here, and have always wanted to stay, but the affordability bar for
that has been constantly going up. I switched into software engineering in the
hope that I could afford to keep up with rising housing prices. I'm just
hoping all the people planning to get out do so soon in the next recession.
Because god knows the NIMBYs aren't going to allow enough housing for everyone
in the meantime.

------
throwaway5250
If you don't have kids, and don't plan to, the Bay Area could be a fun ride.
And if it turns out not to be, well, you can just lick your wounds and leave.

If you have kids, or think you might, you're doing them a grave disservice by
moving to the Bay Area, given the alternatives currently available in America.

------
claydavisss
There's really no way to intellectualize it - people coming to the Bay Area in
2018 are suckers, plain and simple.

You missed the boat - by years. Not only will you never afford a home here,
you will piss away so much money on rent and other aspects of the absurdly
inflated cost-of-living adjustment that you won't be able to leave and buy
anywhere else either. If you're coming up on forty and still renting your
primary residence, you are in real danger of financially screwing yourself for
life. Traditional models of retirement have people paying off their homes in
full by around fifty so they can start building their retirement funds.

Forget about catching a break when the "bubble bursts"...the "bubble bursting"
means most people reading Hacker News will be out of work or feeling very
nervous about their jobs.

~~~
megaman8
What the article is saying is, If you are young and have no family, you can
rent a room really cheaply say 1400$ for a 1 bedroom, or bunk up with a mate
for 700$ (2 people renting 1 room), and save most of your income for about 10
years - durring that time you can save about 500K. Then after that, get out
and go anywhere but CA. In the rest of the US, you can buy a house for 300K
and have a nice life.

The trick is, to not settle down. Don't get a wife or girlfriend or friends.
If you that, you'll be able to walk away from it all very easily.

~~~
pm90
> The trick is, to not settle down. Don't get a wife or girlfriend or friends.
> If you that, you'll be able to walk away from it all very easily.

10 years without friends and partners (to use a gender neutral term) would
literally be hell. Its not that hard to find a healthy mix and not bust your
bank in the process.

------
angarg12
I'm looking to relocate to the Bay next year, and I'm exploring renting a one
bedroom with my partner. Our plan is to rent as cheaply as we reasonable can,
even if we can afford more (that is what we are doing right now).

I think the analogy to the mines is spot on. At the same time it seems like
the most rational approach for most tech workers. Even if I wanted to stay in
California, as a foreigner in a L1 visa, my future will be too unpredictable
to commit myself. Even after getting a green card, another recession would
most likely force me to leave the area, if not the country altogether.

Having worked through 2008 I know the current situation won't last forever. In
the meanwhile, I rather work in the mines and extract as many resources as I
can from the ground. Once the mine dries up and we are forced to move I'll
have time to reevaluate my position in life and priorities.

~~~
pm90
Mine are similar and I just moved. Its as demanding as I was warned it would
be but oddly I feel great. I've never had as much responsibility and yet have
to work on tough engineering problems at the same time before. Maybe this is
the best way to learn for me; I feel like I've learned a lot from being around
very very effective and driven engineers. Its increased my confidence in my
craft. And I think those intangibles are worth a lot more down the line.

Of course, I'm able to work as hard because I kinda really like programming
and learning about how Computers/Algorithms work. If I didn't have that
inclination, then this would be hell.

------
null0pointer
At $5,500 per month is that to rent or buy?

I currently spend about 25% of my after-tax salary on rent and I consider it
too much for me.

$66,000 => $264,000 after-tax. Californian marginal income tax bracket for
$52k - $268k is 9.3% So $264,000 after-tax => $291,000 pre-tax (I know that's
not how tax brackets work but I'm just estimating)

And that must be base salary since you can't pay rent or buy food with stock
options.

On Glassdoor a SENIOR developer at Google in SF shows as only $170,000.

So can someone either tell me where can I get a $300k job as a MID LEVEL
developer or tell me how on earth the author considers $5,500 per month an
affordable housing cost?

Side note: My marginal income tax rate in Australia is 37%... I feel
absolutely robbed looking at these California tax rates

~~~
smivan
Here are real numbers.

Background: Average of 10 programmers who range ages 22-25 and are 2-3 years
out of college.

Base: 140k Bonus: 30k Equity: ~60k Total: $230k year pretax.

Taxes: \- 33% federal bracket \- 10% state bracket \- 7% FICA+Medicaid. (50%
total)

Brackets listed are marginal rates, actual rates are noted here:
[https://smartasset.com/taxes/california-tax-
calculator#p9c7Y...](https://smartasset.com/taxes/california-tax-
calculator#p9c7YRLmHn)

Let's run the math \- $230k comp - $83k taxes = $147k/year \- assuming no
other expenses, no retirement savings and no other income, that's 147/12 =
$12.2k/mo, post tax. At this point $5,500/rent is easy.

Realistically, the breakdown is more like this: $147k post tax income \- $20k
retirement \- $18k food/drinks ($1500/mo in SF is reasonable) \- $10k car
payments \- $10k insurance/misc = $89k/year

$89k / 12 = $7,400/mo post tax and expenses. A $5,500 rent is still doable,
but again extremely stupid because you aren't saving.

~~~
gbustomtv5
20% bonus is not what mid engineers get.

60k equity is probaly over 4 years not 1. 60k over 4 years is actually close
to average equity comp for 140k comp bracket.

You are off by 50k.

Signon bonuses can bring total comp to 200-210k.

Background: I write eng offers and know comp brackets.

~~~
smivan
I do not doubt your work experience, but I would like to respectfully point
out that the data I have for those ~10 engineers does indeed match to the
numbers I have presented.

Either way, with $200k salary the rent mentioned in the article is doable.

------
dnr
The author seems pretty confused about the geography of the bay area, and
comes to odd conclusions because of it. First of all:

> Google programmers living two to three to a bedroom in Bernal Heights, not
> even that close to BART.

Why would Google employees care about living close to BART? They take the
Google shuttle to work, and Bernal has great highway access, making it a
shorter commute than other parts of SF.

Besides that, the people I know who have tons of roommates in SF do it because
they want the experience of living in SF (culture, nightlife, food,
socializing). If they just wanted to make money and save as much as possible,
they'd live on the peninsula or in the east bay and have a more comfortable,
and also cheaper, housing situation.

Even for people working in SF (SOMA), commuting on BART from Oakland is often
faster than many parts of SF, and almost certainly cheaper. If you choose to
live in SF anyway, it's because you want to be there specifically.

------
jiveturkey
what’s wrong with working in the mines? everyone is afraid of working hard? my
parents spent every ounce of their being working hard so their children could
have a better life.

you think this is something difficult try on a true “work is life” existence
like the people that made your phone and laptop.

and, no one is being marched here. no one claims it is better than a slow and
steady and more well rounded life. i mean besides the incessant drone of pop
culture.

just a couple of counterpoints to the developing arguments.

i do like how the article itself isn’t judgemental about t. it’s a fair piece.

