
Anti-NIMBY movement is winning with a simple message - inostia
http://www.eastbaytimes.com/2017/11/12/homes-for-human-beings-millennial-driven-anti-nimby-movement-is-winning-with-a-simple-message/
======
raldi
In San Francisco, I think the real story is what YIMBYs are looking to do on
the 2018 ballot: An initiative
([https://yimbyaction.org/prop/](https://yimbyaction.org/prop/)) to allow
affordable housing and teacher housing to be built "by right" \-- which is
wonky terminology for "The architect will be told the rules (zoning, etc) in
advance, and as long as they design something that complies with all of them,
a permit will be issued easy peasy".

Under current law, even if you abide by all the rules that were stated in
advance, you still have to wait years and might be denied in the end anyway.

The reason I think this is such a key move is that until now, the landlords
and homeowners who reap all the benefits from the status quo have somehow been
able to dupe the housing have-nots who suffer from it (low-income renters,
etc) into thinking that blocking housing construction will somehow keep their
rents low or stem evictions. But anyone who stands against this measure won't
be able to pretend they're doing so in the interest of the less-fortunate.
They'll have to admit that they're really just looking to protect their view /
parking space / skyrocketing property values.

~~~
stanmancan

        They'll have to admit that they're really just looking to protect their view
    

I dunno, if I bought the most expensive thing I'll ever buy in my life and
part of what I paid for was a good view, I'd be pretty choked if someone put a
big building up and took that away.

~~~
RHSeeger
I guess part of the counter argument is that you did not, in fact, pay for a
good view. You may have thought you paid for a good view, and the person who
sold to you may have told you you were getting a good view... but, since you
didn't buy the land between you and what you were viewing, you weren't buying
that view. You were just lucky to get it.

~~~
sliverstorm
Similarly, you might have thought you were getting clean air...

You may not have legal authority over everything that happens, but there's
more to the land you purchase, than the dirt within the lines.

Otherwise, why does anyone pay extra for a house near a school, or in a
happening city? They didn't buy the school or the city, after all.

~~~
twblalock
> They didn't buy the school or the city, after all.

No, but they didn't buy the right to control the school or the city either.
And if they thought they did, they were wrong and had an unrealistic sense of
entitlement.

~~~
majormajor
"Sense of entitlement" comments like this show that what this debate really
boils down to is control, with neither the "we have had control and don't want
to give it up just because you want change" side nor the "we want to take some
of the control" side coming off looking all that great. I happily wash my
hands of all of it.

~~~
cloakandswagger
In all fairness, the comment he was responding to literally equated a nice
view to breathable air.

------
buss
If you live in the Mission district of San Francisco and want to get involved,
come to the Mission YIMBY general meeting at the end of November. I'm one of
the organizers and we're looking to grow our membership base!
[https://www.facebook.com/events/771212863081381](https://www.facebook.com/events/771212863081381)

~~~
rsync
"If you live in the Mission district of San Francisco and want to get
involved, come to the Mission YIMBY general meeting at the end of November."

I am genuinely interested in what it means to be a Mission district YIMBY.

The recent history of housing politics in the Mission have pitted left-liberal
progressives against housing development on the assumption that: new
development will be market rate, this will bring "tech workers" and
gentrification, ergo: new housing will (paradoxically) force more existing
mission residents out of housing.

So it has been left-liberal, progressive, tenants-rights NIMBYs vs.
gentrifying developers (and sometimes, very explicitly, "tech-bus-
riders")[1][2][3].

BUT, the YIMBY movement _in general_ seems to present _itself_ as a left-
liberal, progressive response to incumbent property owners.

Given that context, what kind of reception does "Mission YIMBY" receive and
where does it fall in the politics of what is the Mission district in 2017 ?

[1] [https://48hills.org/2015/02/11/teachers-protested-google-
bus...](https://48hills.org/2015/02/11/teachers-protested-google-buses/)

[2] [https://48hills.org/2016/01/25/problem-google-bus-
program/](https://48hills.org/2016/01/25/problem-google-bus-program/)

[3] [https://48hills.org/2015/04/24/thebattle-over-sf-bus-
stops/](https://48hills.org/2015/04/24/thebattle-over-sf-bus-stops/)

~~~
santaclaus
Most of the opposition to housing I've seen in the Mission has been to infill.
Look at the controversy over development at the 16th street mission BART
station. This would be dense housing in an urban core literally on top of
public transit. It would displace a... Burger King. I find it hard to swallow
that Burger King is a core component of a sustainable, progressive urban
landscape, while high density housing with easy access to public transit is
not.

~~~
solatic
Anti-gentrification isn't the same thing as xenophobia. It's not a fear of new
(or even rich) people entering the neighborhood, it's the fear of even higher
property values raising property taxes and rents for existing owners and
renters, respectively.

The problem is that it's a virtual impossibility to build enough housing
throughout the Bay Area in a short enough amount of time as to have a
meaningful decrease in property values in _every_ neighborhood, thus
preventing gentrification. So in the real world, with limited yearly
construction, developers' aims will be to build upmarket housing.

You can't really work around this without dictating to developers what they
can and cannot build. SF tried to do that with community approvals being a way
for the community to de facto dictate to developers what they can and cannot
build, but it's clearly not working.

~~~
dcosson
> So in the real world, with limited yearly construction, developers' aims
> will be to build upmarket housing.

I don't understand the line of thinking where this itself is a problem. Who
cares what the new housing is, what matters is the total supply of housing. If
we build new affordable housing, then lower-middle-class people will move
there and upper-middle-class people will move to the older buildings. If we
build new upmarket housing, then upper middle class people move there and
lower middle class people stay in existing housing.

The problem with building only affordable housing, is that 1. it doesn't seem
like you could ever build enough because as soon as you do you create pressure
for more people who qualify to move to the city, and 2. there will always be a
step function where someone just barely doesn't qualify for affordable housing
but can't afford market-rate housing because you've been restricting the
supply. Building a lot of both is the only reasonable way forward.

~~~
eric-hu
> If we build new upmarket housing, then upper middle class people move there
> and lower middle class people stay in existing housing.

If the Mission were a closed population, I would agree with you. However,
there's a pool -- or rather an ocean -- of people on the housing market:
people in different parts of the SF, people looking to move to the bay, etc.
If the upper middle class in the Mission got new housing, I don't see the
landlords dropping rent prices so the lower middle class can afford it, when
someone from one town over is willing to pay the same or even +10% over their
competition.

> Building a lot of both is the only reasonable way forward.

I agree with you here. I think new housing supply should meet demand across
the market. My guess is that _new_ housing supply could be 10x what it is now
in the bay.

There's something about the housing market in general that's different from
typical goods markets. People buying a car don't care as much about
depreciation, whereas people buying a house expect it to appreciate as much as
possible over time. It's some kind of positive feedback mechanism that
counters the typical negative-feedback that lowers price as supply meets
demand. There's probably a name for this kind of market but I'm unfamiliar
with it.

~~~
closeparen
The outsiders are coming in anyway, renting existing Mission apartments when
their leases are up. New buildings are not required to stimulate new residents
- that’s already happening.

(New buildings _can_ make a previously-ignored place newly attractive, but
usually we’re taking about neighborhoods that are already popular and/or have
good immutable features like proximity and transit access).

------
khuey
If you live in San Francisco you should consider supporting Sonja's campaign
for the Board of Supervisors (City Council)

[http://www.sonja2018.org/](http://www.sonja2018.org/)

~~~
ag56
“I’m committed to ... preserving the Tenderloin as SF's most economically
diverse neighborhood.”

Re Tenderloin: I understand it’s part of District 6 and her campaign website
needs to say something, but that sounds like an anti-gentrification line,
which in SF is usually used as an argument _against_ new homes. Is Sonja anti-
development in the Tenderloin?

The area is rife with homeless and drug use. It feels to me like an area that
would greatly benefit from some gentrification. (I.e. add some rich techies
demanding cleaner streets and more policing, and the existing low income
residents gain.) Yet I’ve heard more than once that to change the planning
rules there is politically “untouchable”. Can anyone explain why?

~~~
bkcreate
The city "pushes" a large part of the homeless population into the Tenderloin.
They seem to be quite happy with this set up and don't want to have the
homeless spread out throughout the city. It may be altruistic in that it is
easier to help them out when you know where they live or a cynical approach to
a problem but there isn't much interest in changing the status quo

------
pcmaffey
They’re not winning in Boulder. 4 of 5 seats on the city council were just won
by Nimby supporters. And no wonder... the largest contingent here is wealthy
boomers who moved to Boulder because its Boulder. Why would they want that to
change?

I’m not one of them by the way. But I do think that increasing supply in crazy
high demand markets is a linear solution to a logarithmic problem.

~~~
tmh79
1) O(linear) > O(logarithmic), I'm going to assume you mean polynomial instead
of logarithmic. Soooo I'm going to address that. Increasing density in markets
with large amounts of single family zoning is not a linear solution. Yimby is
about turning 2-dimensional single family neighborhoods into 3 dimensional
multi family zoned neighborhoods by adding a heigh dimension to the equation.
It is by definition a polynomial solution.

------
jpatokal
Is there any actual evidence of "winning" outside the headline? The best the
article can muster is a single pending lawsuit that, if successful, would
allow the construction of one (1) home in Sausalito.

~~~
santaclaus
> Is there any actual evidence of "winning" outside the headline?

The legislation that Scott Wiener was able to recently get through the state
government, for one.

------
junkscience2017
As a Bay area home owner, I will stop being NIMBY when I see housing advocates
accept that schools, parks, roads and retail must see consistent investment
also.

So far I see a lot of advocacy for housing density but no concerns for quality
of life.

More units will just mean more new residents...developers have no obligation
to build to serve existing residents.

If we build 100k new units now, that is just another 100k new residents who
will suffer abysmal traffic.

~~~
santaclaus
> So far I see a lot of advocacy for housing density but no concerns for
> quality of life.

I see density as correlated with quality of life. I want to be able to live
near work (so no car needed), with easy access to restaurants, bars, music
venues, easy access to cultural opportunities, farmers markets, grocery
stores, etc. Neighborhoods with these things are an absolute joy to live in.

~~~
junkscience2017
What you want are frankly the typical goals of those derided as NIMBYs. They
tend to want amenities balanced with housing.

~~~
santaclaus
Without density you can't have these in a walkable neighborhood. It takes X
number of customers to support a grocery store (or a bodega, or a restaurant,
etc). If you want one nearby, you need more people in a smaller geographic
area.

Besides, it is not one or the other. Ground level retail, upper level
residential, and you get both.

------
natecavanaugh
I'm very much a pro YIMBY kind of guy, but I feel like there's a hard pro-
urbanization, anti-expansion aspect to this. And the reason that gets to me
now is that, while I totally get the pros and cons of both urban and suburban
settings, but this debate always seems to be binary, when in reality, it's
like every other socioeconomic factor, and is just a matter of tradeoffs. I'm
saying this as a guy who has done the 2+ hour commute each direction, but who
also is fortunate enough to live in a suburb and my commute is a whopping 4
minutes, so I obviously am prejudiced here.

But I really think that expanding development into further areas brings with
it economic advantages for those outlying communities (and yes, gentrification
as well), and we have far more space right now by going out rather than up.
Why not use it?

~~~
TulliusCicero
That's a complicated question to answer. Suburban sprawl certainly _can_ work
to get low or lower housing prices, but it has its own set of downsides.

Suburban sprawl tends to cement car-dominant infrastructure in an area, and
eventually leads to a situation where more people are commuting by car into
the principal city than the roads can handle, but mass transit is not a
feasible solution because most of the area has too low density to support the
stations (and the people who live out there are now set in a car-only way and
won't support his change). This also helps make people fat as hell.

Suburban sprawl is less environmentally friendly: takes more energy as a
lifestyle, and necessarily means cutting more into nature to build homes.

Suburban sprawl tends to be financially unsustainable. The Strong Towns blog
goes into this more if you're interested, but the gist of it is that sprawly
development means more miles of road, power lines, water lines, etc. per
person, without a commensurate increase in tax revenue. It works okay at
first, but then thirty, forty, fifty years down the line when things need to
be replaced, there's not enough money to do so.

~~~
natecavanaugh
I don't disagree about many of those trade-offs, because they do happen.
However, car dominant southern California is also a very big chunk of economic
activity and also has much of that infrastructure that is actually updated
(though, yeah, not very often, but there is a separate debate about whether
it's an inept state legislature that manages an extremely large land mass or
whether it's sprawl itself).

I feel like much of that could be improved by businesses at that point though.
Why not set up shop in one of those suburbs (which I've seen many a company do
over the years) and use that as a way to not only build up that area, but also
bring with it people who are skilled in different fields and reduce general
congestion?

I grant that that's a little pie in the sky, but I have seen it done, and even
from startup levels.

Maybe this is something academia could lead in, as I've seen a lot of colleges
that are setup in non-urban settings, and they could be the initial hub of
activity and a talent pool for businesses to draw from.

I'm not saying you won't have the downsides of not having a large concentrated
talent pool, and it for sure makes recruiting more time consuming, but if
you're looking to build a company that is sustainable long term, employee
satisfaction and happiness can be greatly improved by a dramatically shortened
commute and affordable housing, at least in California. The recruiting
constraint also gives you a chance to explore alternative paths of hiring,
such as hiring people with non-traditional backgrounds but who are uniquely
gifted for what you're needing. I know we have found some of our best
developers in people who graduated with a wide array of degrees that wouldn't
make sense on paper.

~~~
TulliusCicero
> However, car dominant southern California is also a very big chunk of
> economic activity

Oh, you mean the LA that's turning away from cars to solve its problems and is
moving to walking, biking, and especially transit? That LA?
[http://www.latimes.com/opinion/livable-city/la-ol-metro-
elki...](http://www.latimes.com/opinion/livable-city/la-ol-metro-elkind-
measure-m-transit-waste-20170317-story.html)

> Why not set up shop in one of those suburbs

That's a question you need to be answering. The suburbs are already cheaper
and less crowded, so why don't businesses set up shop there? Do they hate
money and love traffic?

> if you're looking to build a company that is sustainable long term, employee
> satisfaction and happiness can be greatly improved by a dramatically
> shortened commute and affordable housing, at least in California.

Employee satisfaction can also be improved by having a successful company,
which I think is probably a higher priority for most businesses, hence why
you've seen more companies recently moving _from_ suburbs to major cities
(e.g. GE).

> The recruiting constraint also gives you a chance to explore alternative
> paths of hiring, such as hiring people with non-traditional backgrounds but
> who are uniquely gifted for what you're needing.

Whoa there bucko, maybe take off your hippie hat? "When you think about it,
handicapping your recruiting is actually a _good_ thing!" No. No it's not.

~~~
natecavanaugh
> Oh, you mean the LA that's turning away from cars to solve its problems and
> is moving to walking, biking, and especially transit? That LA?

That very one. Even with it's car issues, it has gotten to be successful.
Those "solutions" don't work all that well in so cal because of the sprawl.
I'm not arguing it's a 100% pro. There are cons, but I think you're missing my
main point, which is that there are tradeoffs, and definite benefits and cons
to sprawl, but it's the same with urbanization.

> > Why not set up shop in one of those suburbs That's a question you need to
> be answering. The suburbs are already cheaper and less crowded, so why don't
> businesses set up shop there? Do they hate money and love traffic?

They choose different tradeoffs, and I believe there may be an inherent
preference of many people who start certain companies for certain areas for
multiple reasons. The founder of my company had his life in the suburb we work
out of, so it started there and remains there.

Some suburban spots are inconvenient to reach from only specific other
suburbs, so there's an infrastructure issue involved as well.

Lastly, my point isn't that it's the right move for every company or even
every industry. But I have seen and worked for companies that didn't even
consider moving outside of certain urban areas because of image reasons. I'm
just saying that there are other benefits worth considering.

> Employee satisfaction can also be improved by having a successful company,
> which I think is probably a higher priority for most businesses, hence why
> you've seen more companies recently moving from suburbs to major cities
> (e.g. GE).

My point is that success and location aren't mutually exclusive. It's easy to
fail in both types of areas, and a different kind of hard to get it
successful. And the company doing well doesn't always lead to employee
satisfaction. Not every company passes on those benefits, or the company
culture is toxic.

> Whoa there bucko, maybe take off your hippie hat? "When you think about it,
> handicapping your recruiting is actually a good thing!" No. No it's not.

Accepting a trade-off isn't handicapping anything, it's accepting reality and
working within constraints. And constraints _are_ very often a good thing, and
they're still there with urban cities.

At the end of the day, each company should pick whatever delivers the best
economic outcome for them, and the smart ones make sure to account for the
long term, which includes retaining smart and good people. If your company
turn over rate is high, yeah, you'll need to focus on recruiting, but IMHO,
that's not a good way to work in this world, hippie hat or not. Maybe it all
comes down to how and where we prefer to work, but I think the benefits are
often not even considered.

------
matt_wulfeck
I am wish even people who owned houses could improve on them. I own a home in
the Bay Area. If I could extend it out near the sidewalk I could probably
double my living space and get rid of a dead yard, but he setback rules make
reasonable expansion impossible.

------
neilwilson
Eventually they'll work out that land cannot ever be a functional market -
because they don't make it any more.

A far more useful regulation would be to require those business owners funding
these lobbying operations to release their own massive pads, demolish them and
build high rise, high density accommodation for millennials. Then they get to
feel the cost of over centralisation personally.

If you want to make a fortune out of this, buy land in the bubble areas and
just sit on it. It's a one way bet.

~~~
raldi
There are already lots of people who _voluntarily_ want to demolish the house
they own to build apartments; why not allow them to do so first, before we
start talking about making people do it against their will?

~~~
neilwilson
Well it's about allocating the cost. Surely the cost of intensification should
be paid by those needlessly intensifying.

Certainly amongst technology firms there is little need to be in a particular
place. That requirement is largely down to a power play and lack of management
and organisational skill

~~~
raldi
I think adding more people to a city is a benefit, not a cost.

Most people moving to urban areas do so because they like all the good things
that come with high population density.

It's only a problem when you artificially restrict the supply of new housing
and create a shortage.

------
sjg007
San Diego seems to be keeping up with new housing demand. It's still
California and on the beach.. Probably the best place to get in now.. Tech
companies will develop there.

~~~
goodoldboys
I recently looked at San Diego's housing market and was surprised to see how
much more affordable it was than LA. Seeing that they're building enough units
to meet demand is probably one of the reasons why it's still affordable.
Because it's certainly a desirable location to live.

------
anovikov
That is all good, but what will they do with transportation? When the supply
of the housing is increased, it will attract a ton of people who now simply
can't afford (as many not-so-top, but still good coders - i know a ton of
people who would move in, but can't afford the Valley rent). Can you imaging
the traffic then?

~~~
closeparen
The simple answer is to concentrate development around transit stations and to
increase frequency and length of trains on existing service. For example, by-
right authority to build towers, but only within half a mile of a BART
station.

~~~
raldi
We don't even need towers; six-story apartment buildings would do. See
[http://tinyurl.com/6storySF](http://tinyurl.com/6storySF)

~~~
closeparen
The land near BART that’s available for development in the near and medium
term is the parking. Six story apartments on all BART parking is what, a
couple thousand units? That’s a drop in the bucket. To replace enough SFHs to
make a difference with buildings of that height, we would need eminent domain
seizures of entire tracts. Not gonna happen.

It’s true that an entire city built out of six story apartments could work,
but realistically development needs to squeeze in the gaps (infill). A mere
six stories is a huge waste of a gap.

Path dependence is weird like that.

~~~
raldi
We absolutely would not need eminent domain. The city is full of tenantless
low-density buildings close to transit hubs where the owners would voluntarily
build six-story apartment buildings if we allowed them to.

(If they wouldn't, then why did it need to be forbidden?)

~~~
closeparen
Of course they would build six story buildings if we allowed them to. But why
would we stop them at six stories?

~~~
raldi
I'm saying, whatever height you want, there's no need for eminent domain.
Plenty of landowners _want_ to build.

~~~
closeparen
Appeals to Paris and vast tracts of six-story apartments as an alternative to
high-rise construction are dangerous because they create the illusion that a
six-story height limit is okay. If we could build the whole city over again
tomorrow, it might be. Today, recognizing the reality that most existing low-
rise structures are in it for the long haul, when there is an opportunity to
build, every floor counts.

------
chiaro
If your political opinions are little more complex than "does this involve
government intervention", it'd be wise to avail yourself over whether the
proposed alternative actually entails more state intervention or less.

------
acconrad
As much as I support what YIMBY is trying to do for San Francisco, I think
this is trying to solve the symptom of a greater problem: that our economy has
shifted to not needing (yet still somehow requiring) our workers to work in a
physical office.

I recently became a remote worker and I cannot imagine going back. If this
became the norm in the US I think this would do a lot for fixing the housing
problems.

 _We have enough space to house everyone, the problem is we believe we need to
house them close to where the "jobs are."_

But if employers allowed their workers to work from anywhere, then not
everyone would need to live in NY, SF, LA, Boston, et al. The cities that
experienced the worst emigration (e.g. Detroit, Cleveland, Milwaukee) could
stabilize. Housing prices would normalize as a result of everyone not being
forced to live within a 2-hr commute of the country's biggest employers. And
those same employers _could pay less for talent_ because they wouldn't have to
give them a salary to afford places where the average starter home is over
$1mm.

And yet, we see articles in the NYT how big companies like IBM are already
rescinding their offers for giving people more flexibility. We're not moving
in the right direction.

~~~
twblalock
Companies would love to encourage remote work if it would work out well for
them. They would save tons of money by reducing their office space, and they
could lower their salaries because they wouldn't need to support the big-city
cost of living.

So, why don't more companies encourage remote work, and why are some companies
rolling back remote-work policies? Because they learned from experience that
it doesn't work out well. Maybe some of them are just being stupid, but others
are well-established companies that have been very good at running their
businesses.

I've worked at a company that had very flexible working hours and a generous
work-from-home policy, and now I work somewhere that doesn't. I much prefer
the situation I'm in now -- my coworkers are much more responsive when there
is a problem, it's easier to schedule and conduct meetings, there are far
fewer slackers, etc.

Ever worked at a company that has office locations across the country (or the
world), and tried to conduct important meetings with people in those other
offices over Skype or the phone, or even expensive telepresence equipment? It
kinda sucks. Imagine that every meeting, and every interaction with your
coworkers, and every "whiteboarding" session was like that. That's not a world
in which business is easy to conduct -- in fact, it's so difficult that
companies are willing to forgo the massive cost savings they could realize by
encouraging remote work.

~~~
Tehchops
> it's easier to schedule and conduct meetings, there are far fewer slackers,
> etc.

That's a lot less a problem with telecommuting work and a lot more a problem
with your company not being able to hire effectively.

If employees are incapable of being responsive, or even productive, without
someone over their shoulder, I'm really not seeing where that is _any_ issue
but one of personal responsibility/capability, and if that's a question mark
in enough employees to render a telecommute policy ineffective, I have to
wonder how these people make it through the door.

~~~
jandrese
Even if your company was able to hire only people who work well from home, all
of those other people have to work somewhere.

Plus, how is a recruiter supposed to measure someone's productivity at home?

~~~
Tehchops
> Even if your company was able to hire only people who work well from home,
> all of those other people have to work somewhere.

Well sure. I don't think going completely decentralized is something most
larger orgs can embrace yet. But there's no reason that some engineering staff
could not perform their work remotely. If on-site staff complain it hampers
their productivity, then I ask why productivity is predicated on the "drive-
by" model of engagement, which is universally disruptive to programming flow.

Most companies are paying for a combination of Slack/HipChat and
WebEx/Zoom/Bluejeans, and you should make use of them liberally.

> Plus, how is a recruiter supposed to measure someone's productivity at home?

They're not. Their job is to ingress a pool of potentially suitable candidates
into the hiring process based on experience, acumen, and career interests. The
job of determining productivity, and ultimately fit into the environment, is
up to the hiring manager/s and the interview process.

If you're already conceding that you can't determine whether an employee will
be a productive contributor in their potential employment environment, remote
or otherwise, that's a problem with your hiring process.

------
tabtab
Does California really want or need more people? If it's so hard to get
housing, then move out. The rust belt has really good deals on housing. It
just needs something to jump-start its economy. Something is out of whack.

~~~
kerbalspacepro
If companies are hiring there... yes? Like, it is an objective "yes,
California needs more people."

------
Clanan
Can someone "explain like I'm 5": why does this need government intervention?
My gut reaction is that if these people can't afford to live in/near San Fran,
a massive, amenities-filled city, they should find jobs elsewhere? If enough
people take that approach, maybe the jobs will move elsewhere too? My family
wanted to move to a big city but we saw the cost and decided not to. I don't
want to assume it's an entitlement thing, but it sure reads like it.

~~~
voltagex_
Okay, but who will clean / teach / deliver to / cook for / care for (for
example) your city of the rich?

~~~
conanbatt
This is non-economical thinking. If a city becomes too expensive for service
workers, service workers will leave the city, lowering supply and increasing
wages. Its a non-problem from an economic standpoint.

~~~
voltagex_
Has this ever happened in reality?

~~~
conanbatt
Do you think service workers in San francisco have the same wages than in
Flynt Michigan?

Of course its reality. Wages can't go lower than subsistence for long, either
people move out or wages go up.

~~~
EADGBE
Flint, MI.

------
starik36
The big elephant in the room that no one wants to touch is the massive
immigration to San Francisco Bay Area from all over the world. The population
stands at 7.68 million. Just in 2010 it was 7.1 mil. And in 2000, it was 6.7
million. So you essentially have an extra million people living in what was
already pretty densely populated area.

I doubt NIMBY or anti-NIMBY is going to solve any problems.

~~~
raldi
The San Francisco Bay Area is absolutely not by any stretch of the imagination
densely-populated. At 332 people per square km (859/sq mi), it's a third as
dense as Peoria. It could grow by 50% and still be on par with New Jersey,
which isn't exactly Hong Kong.

Even if you're just looking at the city of San Francisco itself -- or even
just the neighborhoods of the city that surround underground train stations --
the population density is a joke:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/sanfrancisco/comments/3qu9uv/i_made...](https://www.reddit.com/r/sanfrancisco/comments/3qu9uv/i_made_maps_of_all_the_fourstory_zoning/)

~~~
conanbatt
This is obvious to the naked eye. The mission is all 3 story buildings, for
example. For the rental revenue you would expect everything to be torn down
and built into complexes.

------
umanwizard
I'm not sure the evidence suggests that building a lot of high-density housing
will reduce rents.

Compare New York (very high density, very expensive) to Tucson (low density,
very cheap).

Building more housing may just induce demand: more people will decide to move
to SF but rents will remain the same.

~~~
raldi
NYC’s demand for housing is more than an order of magnitude greater than
Tucson. If you want to argue that increasing supply doesn’t matter, you need
to compare two examples with similar demand.

~~~
umanwizard
That is exactly my point. I don't see why we should expect San Francisco to
turn out differently from New York. Building more housing will allow more
people to move there, which will drive growth, which will in turn attract even
more people...

~~~
raldi
We could debate how this works, but since neither of us is an economist, that
would be as silly as a couple of non-scientists arguing about climate change
-- when the overwhelming majority of scientists are all saying the same thing,
just listen to the scientists.

In this case, an overwhelming majority of economists are saying that
increasing the supply of housing in our cities would bring prices down.

SF's Chief Economist: [http://www.sfhac.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Ted-
Egan-Pre...](http://www.sfhac.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Ted-Egan-
Presentation.pdf)

California's legislative analyst's office:
[http://www.lao.ca.gov/reports/2015/finance/housing-
costs/hou...](http://www.lao.ca.gov/reports/2015/finance/housing-
costs/housing-costs.pdf)

The Obama White House:
[https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/whitehouse.gov/files/images...](https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/whitehouse.gov/files/images/Housing_Development_Toolkit%20f.2.pdf)

Even if they're all wrong, and we increase the supply of housing by 100,000
units and prices stay the same, that's 100,000 fewer families that get
displaced.

~~~
fapjacks
Don't put science up on a pedestal. That's the magic: There is no priesthood.
Anybody can do (and talk about, argue about) science.

~~~
fapjacks
Bizarre.

------
dingo_bat
Classic case of over-regulation. "Let's solve it with more regulation!" I'm a
millennial, and I apologize for my generation's stupidity.

~~~
mtpn
> Classic case of over-regulation. "Let's solve it with more regulation!"

I find this to be a fairly feeble argument. Regulation, to me, is a necessary
evil. Most especially when it comes to protecting the common good, or
interests of those who do not have other forms of power to get a seat at the
table. I’m also a millennial and I’d be just thrilled if you’d hold off on
apologizing on my behalf. Regulation is not some bogeyman. It can be effective
or ineffective in relation to particular goals.

~~~
dingo_bat
I know regulation is necessary and I know it's not a bogeyman. That's why I
addressed this specific problem and this specific proposed solution.

Less housing available in SF because of too much regulation. That's why the
market is not able to satisfy demand. The correct solution is not "more rules"
and "government-built housing". This is a typical case of trying to solve an
issue caused by over-regulation with more regulation.

So will you address my point or just pick up some other strawman again?

~~~
mtpn
My point is that “too much regulation” is an insufficient criticism. It means
nothing, except that it suggests you think regulation itself is the problem.
If you do indeed believe regulation is necessary, then we both accept that. It
then becomes about what kind of regulation best addresses the complicated
problem of housing in high-demand cities. I’d address your point but I don’t
know what it is, beyond what I’ve already said.

------
nodesocket
Here is the problem, the bay area is filled with hypocrites. After all, they
are having formal galas for affordable housing. Let me explain. Most of the
same people who are pro-affordable housing and homeless rights are making 200K
a year plus and living comfortably in their $4,000 a month rent apartments. I
fully expect this won't be a popular opinion, but I don't have a horse in this
race anymore. I'm moving to Nashville Tennessee next month, but I believe in
free markets. If you want to live in the bay area, then you're going to pay
bay area prices. It really comes down to basic economics.

~~~
azernik
Why exactly is being rich and pro-affordable-housing hypocrisy? Generally the
ballot measures they vote for involve spending their own tax dollars on the
policies they advocate for.

~~~
nodesocket
> Why exactly is being rich and pro-affordable-housing hypocrisy?

Because some would claim they are the reason there is an affordable housing
problem... I'm not one of these people though. Again, I believe markets set
prices.

~~~
azernik
"I'm not one of those people" \- yet you still call hypocrisy?

The organizations in the article, backed by wealthy supporters of affordable
housing, do believe that the market sets rents; the policies that they
advocate are a) allow low-income people to get housing outside of the market,
and b) to change market rules to encourage higher supply and lower market
prices.

------
notliketherest
I've met these "YIMBY" members personally, and only about 20% of them are
actual home owners. The rest are renters. So first of all, it's not their
backyard to say yes to. Secondly, these people are promoting the Hong Kong-
ification of small cities such as Palo Alto and Mountain View. Yes to 20 story
apartment complexes along the 101? Vote with YIMBY!

~~~
jaibot
"Renters should have no say in what people are allowed to build - only the
landed gentry have that right!"

~~~
dingo_bat
The slogan is "Yes in my backyard." But the people saying it don't have a
backyard. They should not be coercing people with backyards and imposing their
will.

~~~
Mindless2112
That might have something to do with not being able to afford a backyard.

~~~
dingo_bat
How is that anybody else's problem?

