Housing in the Bay Area - <AUTHOR> http://blog.samaltman.com/housing-in-the-bay-area <comment><USER2> People should actually call in! Over at the SFBARF, we have a thread of people reporting on how long it took to call their representatives: [https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/sfbarentersfed/7G4Kr...](https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/sfbarentersfed/7G4KrGBAB_8).

I managed to talk to someone at both of my representatives' offices within a minute, without any sort of delay. It's very easy, please do call in if you support this measure!

Also, when you do call in, post here afterwards with how long it took you. A lot of people don't bother because they think it'll be a hassle, but it's about a 100 times easier than calling to book a restaurant reservation.

<comment><USER3> Thank you for this post. I am now very encouraged to contact my state legislators. I might even muster up the courage to call my federal representatives!

<comment><USER4> [http://tryvoices.com/](http://tryvoices.com/) \- great app for calling representatives

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This is one of the top factors preventing me from moving back to the Bay Area. It's good to know there's at least SOME serious attempt at a solution (even if folks around here are mostly pessimistic.)

It still surprises me that an industry that's all about connecting the world through the internet and allowing anyone to work with anyone else on anything says "yeah but you need to work in this small area of the country to do it."

The armchair economist in me says that high housing prices in the Bay Area will cause a market "correction" of sorts with other cities exploding as tech sectors -- see NY, Boston, Chicago, Austin, Las Vegas -- as those cities can get away with much better housing for cheap, even if the opportunities aren't as plentiful (yet.)

<conspiracy theory> The cynic in me likes to think that VC's and other wealthy tech execs are trying to keep housing prices high by artificially creating this in-elasticity ("you can have my funding if you live in SF" or "we don't allow remote workers"), as they all probably own houses in the area; the incentives for them would be to have housing prices keep rising, NOT fall, as they would lose significant real-estate equity. </conspiracy theory>

<comment><USER6> Somehow the city with the highest average salary/cost of living usually goes unmentioned... Seattle has two huge tech companies, a lot of mid sized tech companies, and a growing startup scene... and it's not that far away from the bay.

<comment><USER7> On top of the weather, which is a big deal to a lot of people, the problem is exactly in what you said: there are two huge tech companies. And that's it.

Basically, if you move to Seattle, you are pretty much restricted to working for Microsoft or Amazon and that's it. Period. Nothing else.

It's a huge career limiting move, make sure you're okay with it.

<comment><USER8> Microsoft and Amazon only you say? Don't know where you'd get that data from.

Google has a big campus here in Fremont and Kirkland, and they're building a huge new complex in South Lake Union (Amazon's stomping grounds).

Facebook just opened their brand new office in SLU.

Samsung is here. Adobe is here. Atlassian is here. Uber is here. DocuSign is here.

Expand the metro area to Bellevue (since we included Microsoft above) add companies like Redfin, Zillow, Expedia, FICO, Disney.

Edit: Oh yeah, forgot Intel and EMC as well.

I'm sure there's many I missed but there's WAY more than just Microsoft and Amazon.

... Just don't tell anyone. Go to Portland instead. I hear they want you ;)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER3> There is so much pressure, career-wise, to move to either the Bay Area, the West Coast in general, or a major urban hub.

I honestly like living in a semi-rural part of the Midwest. I _like_ seeing fields and forests while driving to work. If I want to get out to some wilderness, I can do so in 15-30 minutes. I travel in a car that, I feel, offers me freedom. To boot, I have a nice, reserved spot in the garage below my apartment. I live _downtown_ and I still feel great freedom/"space". I cant imagine being able to do anything like this in a place like SF or even Chicago.

My cost of living is very cheap. My commute is 15 minutes. I live close to my family. Why should I want to leave?

<comment><USER9> With you all the way.

I have 11 acres, horses, a goat, cats, a dog, and I live 15 minutes from downtown and 17 minutes from work. This is in a mid-sized midwest city (Grand Rapids, MI). While I realize that I could achieve a substantial pay raise on one of the coasts, a similarly sized plot there would cost millions. I paid under 200k 5 years ago with a 1500sf house on it, and it's still probably only worth the mid 200k range after we improved it (cleared 6 acres of trees, planted and fenced a bunch of pasture, made significant improvements to the house). I could not achieve a similar lifestyle on an engineer's salary near a major urban center on a coast ... and I have no desire to move to one :).

Plus, I get to make avionics, which is on my short list of the best jobs ever.

<comment><USER10> I know I found a Rails shop there in a search years ago, but generally speaking is there a tech career scene in GR? If so, are there any trends as far as the tech that companies are using that you can tell? I've got 3 acres with dogs and chickens here in NJ, but we have no family for a 10 hour radius and my wife's family is in Livingston county (don't want to be _too_ close).

Thanks in advance.

<comment><USER11> > generally speaking is there a tech career scene in GR?

Not _really_.

There's plenty of tech work in GR, if your just looking for a job you probably won't have any problems. And there's plenty of social / networking events. GR definitely punches above it's weight for the region -- but not enough to compare to a real market.

Grand Rapids is closer to a small town than a major city, so despite our best efforts, there isn't really a scene that's comparable to anything like what I've seen in Minneapolis or Portland or Austin or even Milwaukee.

Of course, those places are larger and cost more. Low cost of living is great, (cheap housing even with good schools, lots of space, easy commutes, no crime, silly amounts of lawn and garden) but it has its own drawbacks (very low wages, worthless public transit, everything's suburban, greatly reduced career opportunities, etc)

I would personally prefer an urban lifestyle, and that's impossible to have in Michigan, which is frustrating to me. But if you want a suburban lifestyle in a ranch house with a huge yard, Grand Rapids is perfect for that. There's tons of those properties around for about $200k.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> This is a contentious issue and in case you are not from SF and wondering why Y Combinator is taking a stand on it, it has to do with the politics of the tech boom.

The plain truth is that the housing crisis is a combination of too much sudden demand fueled by the tech boom and too little supply. The tech community likes to deflect criticism of their sudden influx of relatively high-income workers and say "don't blame us, it's a supply problem."

This bill focuses mainly on juicing supply by removing restrictions on builders. But part of that is weakening the affordable housing restrictions on them.[1] The problem with that is, increasing market-rate housing alone may not make an _appreciable difference_ in prices where it matters most from a macroeconomic perspective: for low-to-mid income residents.

Cities need teachers, service industry workers, artists, etc. Already the restaurant industry is facing a major worker shortage.[2] Let's not even get into the cultural effects of long-term residents getting displaced en masse. So if market-rate supply alone can't solve this, then you need affordable housing regulations to set aside spots.

Sam has offered a rather simplistic statement on the law of supply and demand on this. But that masks the real question: whether weakening affordable housing demands as this bill does is a smart move. Will juicing mostly market- rate housing be _enough_?

[1] [http://48hills.org/2016/05/22/a-terrible-housing-bill- looms-...](http://48hills.org/2016/05/22/a-terrible-housing-bill-looms-in- sacramento/)

[2] [http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/print- edition/2016/0...](http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/print- edition/2016/02/12/restaurant-labor-shortage-sf-business-costs-bubble.html)

<comment><USER13> I don't live in SF, but having spent most of the past 15 years in Europe, which _is_ dense: it's almost completely a supply problem. SF is not really very dense at all for a place with such a high demand for housing.

Random place in SF: [https://firstname.lastname@example.com,-122.4388549,3a,75y,...](https://email@example.com,-122.4388549,3a,75y,143.66h,92.09t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s7PTH3Jshnfj4VZCDNw0Dog!2e0!7i13312!8i6656!6m1!1e1)

Near where I lived in Padova, which is way smaller than SF, and way, way less well off:

[https://email@example.com,11.8706466,3a,75y,18...](https://firstname.lastname@example.com,11.8706466,3a,75y,183.83h,93.14t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1st_alGR0roo8WaXCMoaK7gg!2e0!7i13312!8i6656!6m1!1e1)

They look fairly similar, despite a 3 bedroom, 2 bath house in that area of the suburbs in Padova going for under 200K euro.

Here's what Milan looks like, which does have a decent economy, for Italy: [https://email@example.com,9.2105922,3a,90y,219...](https://firstname.lastname@example.com,9.2105922,3a,90y,219.5h,87t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1snWGqaEBVqvtHw- Cr4Wv61g!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo1.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3DnWGqaEBVqvtHw- Cr4Wv61g%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D46.500008%26pitch%3D-3!7i13312!8i6656)

None of this 2/3 story crap, even if it's fairly far out from the city center. They've built _up_.

<comment><USER12> Apples to oranges. SF has always been more of a boomtown. Neither of the cities you mention have experienced the sudden, massive surge in demand that SF has in recent memory.

When you have sudden surges in demand you can't just pin it on supply. You have to think about macroeconomic objectives for the city (i.e. preserving low and mid income housing) as well as how to plan for the long term, like when the boom turns to bust and lots of those new residents leave.

<comment><USER14>
        > Neither of the cities you mention have experienced
        > the sudden, massive surge in demand that SF has
        > in recent memory.

They haven't? According to what? I just looked this up for Milan real quick:

SF had 350k people in 1900, and 800k in 2010[1], a growth of ~2.3x. Milan had 550k people in 1900 and 1.3 million in 2010[2], a growth of ~2.35x.

I don't understand how you think SF is the exception in this example. Both of these cities have had similar population growth, Milan slightly more actually. It seems the difference is that Milan decided to build up.

1\. [http://www.sfgenealogy.com/sf/history/hgpop.htm](http://www.sfgenealogy.com/sf/history/hgpop.htm)

2\. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_Milan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_Milan)

<comment><USER12> First, you are looking at the wrong time scale. Second, population growth is not the same as demand. In just a few years SF has experienced a massive surge in demand, i.e. the price new residents are willing to pay for housing.

<comment><USER14> Well of course population growth isn't the same as demand, that's the point!

What davidw was observing was that there's plenty of cities that do better at satisfying the demand for housing than San Francisco does.

You can have a growing population in the same area while demand goes down, if you're building enough new housing to offset the demand. The examples davidw and I have been citing here show cities that have faced similar population growth that have built up rather than succumbing to SF's housing problems.

I think your claim that it's apples to oranges is invalid. Yes SF has been a boomtown, but plenty of cities all over the world have been boomtowns without the same issues.

The issue is that SF has been a boomtown _AND_ hasn't gotten its act together when it comes to building up density. That's what makes it a special case, and that's why both the demand for housing housing prices are ridiculous there.

<comment><USER12> _> cities that have faced similar population growth_

You've simply ignored my point about the _rate_ of growth in demand. That introduces a new factor, which is the need to control displacement of lower- income people and maintain healthy economic diversity.

Also, the issue here is not that SF is opposed to density. SF has many high- density neighborhoods and virtually all new construction is higher density. The issue is how hard the city should negotiate with developers to set aside price-controlled units to maintain economic diversity.

<comment><USER13> > the issue here is not that SF is opposed to density.

Sure it is. Otherwise, given the prices you could get for building higher buildings, someone would have done it. It'd be like printing money.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> I highly doubt this bill would pass without severe modifications. The problem is that we have two groups in population: One who own houses and other who don't. First group don't want new houses and dilute value of their property. Politicans very well knows that making this group unhappy will end their careers. The second group is often in minority outside large cities. This is why its very hard to pass laws that would allow build new houses. It's great that SamA is taking interest in this. If enough valley billionaires can pay for lobbing then politicians can finally ignore their majority constituents and do the "right thing" :).

<comment><USER16> Around 65% of the population in SF are renters. If it were simply homeowners vs renters, renters would win in a landslide.

Who do you think was pushing for proposition I (an 18 month development moratorium in the mission) to pass? It wasn't homeowners, that's for sure. It was renters living in the Mission who were (not incorrectly) terrified that new development means they will get evicted and displaced.

Why did 60% of SF voters (keeping in mind only 30% are homeowners) vote for Proposition B, requiring a city wide up-or-down vote on all new waterfront development over 40-80 feet? A measure that was also endorsed by multiple major newspapers? Because people are afraid of everything changing too quickly and the nice beautiful waterfront turning into midtown Manhattan.

It's complicated. This isn't homeowners giving the middle finger to everybody else. The situation is more akin to existing residents fighting against future residents. Though whatever the situation is, pointing fingers at individual constituencies instead of trying to understand the problem holistically is not helping anything.

<comment><USER17> > It was renters living in the Mission who were (not incorrectly) terrified > that new development means they will get evicted and displaced.

This is such a bizarre idea.

How exactly do renters get displaced by _adding_ more housing?

<comment><USER18> Because the actual building they live in gets demolished to build another building. Or because the new building next door is filled with 'luxury' $5000/mo rents, which might drive the rent up in their building.

<comment><USER17> > because the new building next door is filled with 'luxury' $5000/mo rents, > which might drive the rent up in their building.

This is such a stupid myth. On par with "vaccinations cause autism" or Bigfoot.

Science has studied how price depends on supply and demand _very_ thoroughly. Increased supply _always_ leads to lower prices.

<comment><USER19> Here a scenario that can illuminate the unavoidable fact of supply and demand.

\- A building owner doubles his rents from $3000/month to $6000/month. What happens? Everyone moves out. The high price eliminated Demand for that building.

ANALYSIS: When the owner tried to jack up his rents too high, it created an excess supply of $6000/month units and not enough demand. What will happen to that owner? ANSWER: go out of business or increase Demand by lowering his asking rent. CRUX: owners only have 'pricing power' matching the strength of demand, they cannot just start 'greedily' raising rents.

Now assume Zynga opens up shop in the neighborhood. Does demand increase for apartments? YES. There are hundreds of new renters.

Building owners see they get 20 applications now for a vacancy instead of 5. They raise their asking rents to $3100 and people pay it due to lack of Supply of units.

The owners cannot raise the rent unless Demand increases. But in San Francisco, which has become much more of a Tech hub over the past 20 years, Demand for apartments has increased. Supply hasn't kept up.

INCREASE IN DEMAND = more applications for a vacant unit = HIGHER RENT because lack of supply means renters have few choices.

Okay, now assume Zynga goes out of business.

Does demand DEcrease for apartments in the neighborhood? YES. There are hundreds of fewer renters.

Building owners see they get 5 applications now for a vacancy instead of 20. If they keep the rents at $3100 there is now an excess supply of expensive units. They must lower their asking rents or wait longer to fill a vacancy and lose money on an unrented unit.

I own/operate rental properties. Supply and Demand is alive and well in the apartments realm on the Peninsula.

During the worst parts of the recsssion we had 20% vacancy (normally it's between 3% to 5%).

Demand for apartments dropped precipitously. Did we lower our rents? We had to. We entered a 'race to the bottom' competition with other rental property owners.

THERE WAS AN EXCESS SUPPLY OF APARTMENTS in the 2008-09 recession. Rents dropped.

Right now there is a lack of supply of units because Demand rose as the job market got healthy.

Rents are higher.

When Demand drops in the next few years in the next recession (due to layoffs, tech firms folding, etc.), will my firm have to lower our asking rents?

OH BABY. Yes indeed. It hurts too.

The argument 'Supply and Demand don't apply to housing' is patently false.

During a recession, there's lower Demand for units (fewer people working; living in parent's basement or leave the area). RENTS DROP.

During a healthy job market, there's higher demand for apartments (more people working -- move out of parent's basement; and new people get hired locally and move to the area). RENTS INCREASE.

The argument that 'everyone must have an apartment in San Francisco, regardless, if they want one' is BOGUS. If you cannot afford to live there, that's YOUR FAULT. Not the city's fault. Not Zynga's fault. YOUR FAULT.

<comment><USER20> Perhaps Zynga is not an optimal example here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> If you are passionate about the housing crisis in The Bay Area, you should check out The San Francisco Bay Area Rentors Federation.

They are one of the groups doing the most activism on this issue.

<comment><USER2> Yup! If you're interested in a low-effort way to influence the local market, please consider voting by June 7th: [http://www.sfyimby.org](http://www.sfyimby.org).

Fun fact: some of you may have seen us canvassing at tech bus stops in SF.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> This is one of the worst piece of advice, IMHO. Here's why.

1) You can't add housing without adding proper infrastructure (transportation, sewage, power, etc). Adding infrastructure is expensive and takes a very long time. There will be no budget for proper infrastructure increase if the population keeps rising - remember that hundreds of thousands of people work for companies that offshore their taxes.

2) Most people need financial advice on what real estate investment means. If there's another bubble burst, a lot of average income people will have their life ruined. They would have bought an apartment for, say, $1M, with 200k down, only to see its value decrease by 30-35%, essentially wiping out their savings and forcing them into unsustainable debt.

3) I wish there was an easy way to fix the housing problem in SF. There isn't. Let's be realistic about it.

Please don't downvote me just because you disagree with me. Instead, tell me why.

<comment><USER23> > Please don't downvote me just because you disagree with me. Instead, tell me > why.

I'll do both, because you are acting like an informed person but wrong about very basic things.

> 1) You can't add housing without adding proper infrastructure > (transportation, sewage, power, etc). Adding infrastructure is expensive and > takes a very long time. There will be no budget for proper infrastructure > increase if the population keeps rising - remember that hundreds of > thousands of people work for companies that offshore their taxes.

One, you don't "offshore taxes", you offshore profits. Two, corporations don't pay local taxes based on profits, so I'm not sure what you're on about. Tech workers? They pay quite a lot in local taxes.

> 2) Most people need financial advice on what real estate investment means. > If there's another bubble burst, a lot of average income people will have > their life ruined. They would have bought an apartment for, say, $1M, with > 200k down, only to see its value decrease by 30-35%, essentially wiping out > their savings and forcing them into unsustainable debt.

It is not the purpose of an economy to coddle wealthy people with artificial market restrictions, so I don't have any sympathy here. Also, mortgage debt isn't like college debt or credit card debt; it's secured by your house alone. Banks can't go after you for it. All they can do is give you a bad credit score for seven years. Which is bad, but I'm sure people who can afford million-dollar homes can afford to face the consequences of their actions.

> 3) I wish there was an easy way to fix the housing problem in SF. There > isn't. Let's be realistic about it.

This isn't saying anything.

</comment></comment><comment><USER24> Even if this bill passes and substantially more multi-family housing starts getting built, do not be surprised if house prices remain extremely high.

Vancouver doesn't have the same anti-development issues that SF has, and has been building multi-unit condos and apartments all over the region for decades. Multi-unit housing starts are about at its highest level ever. The average price of a detached house however is C$1.3 million (~US$998k thanks to the weak Canadian dollar) and rising. Low interest rates, "fear of missing out," incredible amounts of real estate speculation and a dash of foreign investment can go a long way.

It's likely that the strongest benefits to increased supply in SF will manifest itself in lower rents and/or lower rate of rent increases.

<comment><USER25> Vancouver is a bit of an anomaly, and much of the housing pricing there is being driven by foreign investment rather than occupation rates.

I moved out of the sea-to-sky about 6 years ago (I'm from Whistler) but I seem to recall huge amounts of apartment vacancy in Yaletown and even Coal Harbour areas. From what I've been reading in Canadian news, it seems that many of these properties remain empty and are not in the rental pool as the act as a shell game for foreigners to move money our of other contries (mostly China, but others too I'm sure).

SF is a very small city, even compared to Vancouver, and from what I understand, vacancies are almost nil.

<comment><USER26> The official vacancy rate is low but the unofficial vacancy rate is much higher. Many empty units are kept off the rental market due to how tilted the rights are in favor of tenants. 39 percent of the landlords surveyed in 2003 said they kept vacant apartments off the market because of regulations. [1]

[http://missionlocal.org/2015/06/a-closer-look-at-airbnbs- inn...](http://missionlocal.org/2015/06/a-closer-look-at-airbnbs-innocence-in- sfs-housing-shortage/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER27> I'm in favor of how "building in the Bay Area is approved by discretion", I call it having some power over what gets built. "Democracy" y'know?

I'm from SF. I grew up here. I'm also a computer nerd.

To me, the tech "industry" has been ruining the city I love since the Dot-Com boom. To me, they are an invading army culturally speaking. In a very real sense my home is being destroyed.

The saddest part is, this city kinda sucks. It's not even a good place to locate a business. The city gov is soft-corrupt. The weather NEVER gets better. We're on a damned peninsula. If I were starting a company I'd go to Davis CA! People aren't coming here because it makes sense. This is just where the game is being played. They are drawn here like aspiring actors are drawn to Hollywood, but the prospects are just as glamorous and illusory. A few will strike gold, the rest will toil and vanish.

This is a town for freaks and weirdos. If you don't believe me, visit Civic Center. ;-) It is said "The people who are too strange for the rest of the country move to California, and the people to weird for California move to San Francisco." (If you are still too weird you go to Berkeley.)

What concerns me the most is that the newcomers might lack the environmental commitment, and tip the scales from valuing conservation to valuing rampant development. San Francisco is the largist metropolitan area with the most wilderness/open space around it in the world. The last thing we need is more lux condos and freeways.

I'm going to be calling those numbers, you can bet, but it will be to urge "con" on this abrogation of the weirdo-freaks ability to stonewall development. This is a good thing.

Y'all "young gods" will just have to figure out some other place to hatch the singularity. Move away. Build a floating "Seastead". Just please stop trying to cram a million more people into the Bay Area. It's not actually a good idea!

Also, I hear Portland is nice.

<comment><USER28> > San Francisco is the largist metropolitan area with the most wilderness/open > space around it in the world.

It's high on the list, but it's not the one with the most:

      Vienna 51%
      Singapore 47%
      Sydney 46%
      Hong Kong 40% 70% is the total green space 40% is protected
      Rio De Janeiro 40%
      London 38.40% Almost 40%!
      Stockholm 30%
      Johannesburg-Gauteng 24%
      New York City 19.7 % or 14% Park Score/World Culture Report
      San Francisco 17.9%

[http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=1660203](http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=1660203)

<comment><USER29> Believable (17.9%) if you are measuring only within the S.F. city limits. San Mateo and Marin counties and the East Bay have huge tracts of open space for metropolitan areas.

<comment><USER30> Same can be said for the surrounding areas of some of the other cities on the list.

<comment><USER31> Not Singapore or Hong Kong of course, but those are special cases.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> Isn't housing just a painful side effect of an astronomical influx of people moving to one city? IMHO, the problem is the tech industry being too centralized.

</comment><comment><USER33> I suspect this might have an impact. The timeline though will be ten to twenty years, optimistically.

1\. Eligible property will have to change hands and land in the right hands to make the projects happen. That's the nature of redevelopment, someone has to be willing to knock down a profitable building in hopes of building something more profitable.

2\. The rate at which property will change hands will correlate to the legal certainty it can be redeveloped. Until new legislation successfully survives court challenges, the uncertainty will swirl around its "by right" provisions.

3\. The trades base will affect the cost of construction and hence the viability of projects. Imagine there is some number /n/ of plumbers in the Bay area. At some threshold amount of construction, these plumbers are all in demand, and so the price of plumbing rises. This happens across several trades and formerly viable _pro forma_ 's pencil out poorly with the new cost structure.

4\. People sitting on the land now are already in a wait and see mode. As land becomes more desirable to developers, prices go up. Rising prices attract speculators hoping to sell on. The rate at which developable land flows to competent developers remains moderate.

5\. Five years from identification of a feasible redevelopment site for multifamily housing to full occupancy would be pretty quick even in a relatively development friendly culture. Research, options, due diligence, financing, entitlement, design, bidding, construction and leasing...any one [or several] can run out over a year.

Throw in the normal rate economic and financial cycling and the sorts of effects experience indicates these have on the construction and housing sectors, and even in the next ten years, there will likely be a period where half of all projects in the pipeline die.

There's no silver bullet.

</comment><comment><USER34> I've wondered for a while weather housing exclusivity can improve economies in some respects. Do the high housing costs create a strong selection bias to bring in only the most determined to take part in the SV culture?

Obviously, lower housing costs would cause a higher absolute density of people. But maybe the presence of people with other unrelated interests would somehow dampen the tech economy, even if the absolute density of tech people remained the same.

Let me be clear that I support more residential construction on the peninsula, so I am not saying this as part of a weird socio-political agenda. It's purely out of curiosity.

<comment><USER35> Yeah, I've also wondered this. SF is easily the best place on earth for technology, but the price to access it is steep. My friends poke fun at me for wanting to move to an area where you pay $3,000 a month to live in a box. "Isn't Atlanta almost as good? You can get a whole house for that price!"

</comment></comment><comment><USER36> I tried to read the bill, but don't know how the old text read, and am far from a development lawyer.

Will this have the impacts Mr. Altman suggests they will? Specifically - significantly more development of multi unit dwellings?

</comment><comment><USER37> "His bill would make it so multi-family buildings are automatically approved by right as long as they comply with local zoning, and have 5-20% affordable units--the percentage depending on location and subsidy offered."

The problem here is that this leaving height limits in place and could create a rush to impose even more stringent zoning restrictions.

What would be necessary would be legislation that pre-empts both local zoning and other mechanism for a relatively small area to allow the construction of a few high rises without the destruction of existing housing stock.

The ideal of Nimbys seems to be no development and the ideal of developers seems to be building a limited number of ultra-high-priced units in the super desirable places like the Mission. The sane approach would be to allow a series of high rises in Potrero Hill and along the Bay.

This approach sounds like it would simply push-through development according to the developer ideal, which would serve the Nimbys right but also destroy whatever remains of the character of the mission.

</comment><comment><USER38> Companies that extract advertising and other revenue from around the world, like Google, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc, should create job centers outside of the Bay Area.

This is the only way that house prices will moderate, is if these globally significant companies spread their distribution of money around the country/world. There's too much concentration of money flowing into the Bay Area in terms of revenues, and that is creating this hyper-inflation that we see here.

My house value when up by 60% in 2 years. I can sell it for almost $2 million if I wanted to, which I don't. I keep thinking it's not sustainable, until I hear the offers that people get from these companies. Google offered one of my friend $160k + 400k in RSUs, and Facebook offered another one $180k and $500k in RSUs. That's well over $1M over 4 years for both. Of course salaries like this will cause hyper-inflation in this area.

<comment><USER39> If it made economic sense for them to create job centers outside of the Bay Area, they would. This gives one an idea of just how great the economic advantage of locating in the Bay Area is.

<comment><USER40> Or just an idea of how the herd mentality can so utterly overwhelm common sense.

<comment><USER39> Businesses using a "herd mentality" will be out-competed by those which are profit-maximizers

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER41> Can we scale the schools, transportation, etc. to support this legislature? If so, I'm all for it. But the way things stand currently, it's already pushed to the limits.

<comment><USER42> turns out its easier/cheaper to do all these things, if people actually live in a dense city rather than spread out suburbs

<comment><USER41> That's not the current environment.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> This is good, except that I oppose subsidies for "below market rate housing". If workers are needed in an area, businesses will eventually need to pay them more. Subsidizing their housing is a backdoor subsidy to the business owners who don't need to pay their workers enough to deal with living in the Bay Area.

<comment><USER12> That's not an unreasonable perspective but you didn't go far enough. If business owners were to pay workers enough to live at market rates in San Francisco, what would the effect on prices be? How much would a restaurant meal cost? Then, once prices resettle at $50/entree, how appealing a city would SF be?

Note: Paul Graham recently spoke on how important affordable restaurants are to creating startup hubs![1] That's macroeconomics for you.

[1] [http://paulgraham.com/pgh.html](http://paulgraham.com/pgh.html)

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> A benevolent dictator could bulldoze easily upwards of 50% of housing in areas like the sunset, entire peninsula, and Oakland, and replace it with high quality, high density condos that would increase quality of living by at least 10x, while reducing costs by 50%. But, alas, we got kleptocrats.

<comment><USER39> Yes, property rights are a pesky thing

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> The most likely "correction" of this is going to be the next big earthquake. :(

</comment><comment><USER46> I'd be happy to extend a beta license for a brand new grassroots lobbying platform to the folks at YC for them to be more efficient and effective while managing this effort.

Heck, if anyone on HN is part of any lobbying effort in California and would like a beta experience of a new platform email me lane (at) fastAdvocate (dot com)

Warning you in advance, the website up today is horrible and not representative of the beta product. The homepage is about to be replaced. We focused on the product first.

</comment><comment><USER47> When I look at this bill I have to wonder if it will really help. Outside of the city of San Francisco itself, almost nothing is being built, because the construction costs are too high. Not the permitting and planning costs, but the actual guys-with-hammers-and-saws costs. For example in Oakland there are number of properties that are fully entitled to build and have been sitting that way for years. So how does Brown's bill help?

<comment><USER48> If construction costs explain the high price of bay area housing, how is it possible that houses in the midwest are produced at less than 1/5 the price? Are the Kansas guys with hammers really making 1/5 the wages of the California hammer swingers?

<comment><USER47> Construction costs do not explain housing prices, but construction costs do explain which developments are undertaken and which are not. Consider that construction costs are basically the same in Oakland and San Francisco, but prices are higher in San Francisco, it makes little sense to develop in Oakland. The profits are simply not there.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER49> It's probably a marginal issue, but would decreased living costs reduce salaries? Presumably if living costs were lower companies could pay less while still offering a higher net-income than other areas. I guess what I'm asking is how connected are the high salaries in the bay area with the cost or living there?

</comment><comment><USER50> The long term solution was proposed more than a century ago ironically enough by an economist from San Francisco.

[http://qz.com/169767/the-century-old-solution-to-end-san- fra...](http://qz.com/169767/the-century-old-solution-to-end-san-franciscos- class-warfare/)

</comment><comment><USER19> Some landlords (such as our firm) are liquidating our rental assets due to the increasing risk of 1979-1995 properties being pulled into rent control regimes. Cities like San Jose, Richmond, San Mateo, just this year either debated increasing or actually increased control over rental properties. The population is rising; the supply of rental units is too low; cities want to stop landlords from raising prices; so they are just this year increasing rent control (San Jose just did this).

Anything built before 1995 (that's a California State statute) can be (will be) rent controlled (unless population drops dramatically in cities near the coast).

The State passed a law (the "Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act") that prevents California cities from pulling in any property built _after_ 1995 into a rent control regime. But Costa-Hawkins does _not_ protect rental properties built between 1979-1995.

Right now, properties built _before 1979_ are rent-controlled in California cities (San Francisco, San Jose, etc.)

But at the drop of a gavel, a municipality can pull in all properties built between 1979 and 1995 into rent control -- the Costa-Hawkins is the _only_ thing stopping municipalities at the year 1995 (they'd like to be able to rent control every property necessary to accommodate their increasing population over time).

The citizens of a municipality in Southern California -- Santa Monica I believe -- narrowly defeated a rent control change designed to extend rent control to apartments built up to 1995.

That does not help supply. Jerry Brown trying to 'fast track' development does not remove the risk that newer properties will be rent controlled in the future.

A new developer sees partial-confiscation of their asset being a possibility, because the California legislature could modify Costa-Hawkins and remove 1995 as the limit year for rent control.

Once a city/state has demonstrated a commitment to seizure of:

\- a restaurant's right to increase prices \- a dentist's right to increase prices \- a doctor's right to increase prices \- a private school's right to increase prices \- a rental property's right to increase prices

Those restrictions lead to: \- fewer restaurants \- fewer dentists \- fewer doctors \- fewer private schools \- fewer apartments

Businesses _must_ have freedom to operate or no one will start businesses (supply of businesses will drop).

Once a city/state has demonstrated a commitment to partial seizure of personal assets (restaurant, dental practice, apartment property, etc.) of a person, or a business, there is a very strong likelihood that 'seizure/state control' tendency will never stop.

So the governor of California can wave his hands all he wants with this kind of "fast track" proposal to building real estate assets in California.

Until the state makes it clear that they will stop the partial or "legislative seizure" of rental properties, very few developers are stupid enough to risk a change/nullification of Costa-Hawkins.

<comment><USER51> I get that, generally speaking, the owner of a house should have the right to set their rental prices. But what is the risk associated with a property you own suddenly coming under rent control? Sure, there is the opportunity cost if the market rent goes up. But do costs correlate with the market rental value? I would assume (and I could be wrong), that when you buy a property you look at the current market rental value to decide if the property could be profitable. Are there landlords who buy properties that will rent at loss because they are speculating that they'll be able to raise the rents by 20%/year (to pull a number out of the air)? Does the cost of maintaining a property rise faster than what the rent-control laws allow you to charge for rent?

And yes, I get that the possibility of rental control can scare of developers. But I'm wondering what the effect is on current owners. I've never been a landlord so there is probably something I'm missing.

</comment></comment><comment><USER52> How does this benefit/harm the folks who already recently bought a house at exorbitant price, burning all their savings, calculating their returns based on how bay area prices have behaved over the last couple decades? Will they be screwed?

<comment><USER20> When this bubble bursts, absolutely.

</comment></comment><comment><USER53> Does anyone see a problem w/: 'legislation that would allow a lot more housing to be built'?

I stopped reading after that, as I was satisfied as to what the problem and solution is.

</comment><comment><USER54> I made an app that uses your GPS location to show you who your elected representatives are, lets you call, tweet, email them.

TryVoices.com (iOS + Android)

</comment><comment><USER55> Great, I'm sure the 101 will just be a blast to drive now! Maybe they should solve the transportation grid lock first..

</comment><comment><USER56> Too little too late. Middle class is gone.

</comment><comment><USER57> Apparently not all economists agree that increasing housing supply would make rents cheaper.

<comment><USER58> Source?

<comment><USER59> I can't say for sure if this is what Foobarqux was referring to but this article [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11708873](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11708873) came up a couple weeks ago which states

> Tim Redmond of 48 Hills has argued that building more housing would make the > problem [high housing costs] worse because the people who would move into it > are likely to be wealthy newcomers whose demand for services will increase > low-income employment, putting further pressure on older, lower-cost > housing.

<comment><USER60> The affordable housing requirements to qualify for the streamlined process should mitigate this effect, to the extent that it's real in the first place.

<comment><USER61> this is a reduction of current affordable housing restrictions, and "affordable" / Below-Market Rate housing is currently awarded by a lottery which is harder to win than the actual lotto.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER62> 12,000 people moved to San Francisco in 2014. 4,000 homes were built. What's the problem?

[https://medium.com/@TomPJacobs/what-housing- crisis-3c0568a5d...](https://medium.com/@TomPJacobs/what-housing- crisis-3c0568a5dd44#.w021ouwnc)

</comment><comment><USER63> "The bill is currently being debated in California's Congress as part of the upcoming annual budget" \- it's called the Legislature.

I mean, yes, I knew what he meant, but it doesn't give me confidence that he understands how to influence the political system.

<comment><USER64> I think it was written to be accessible to a very broad audience.

<comment><USER65> It's specifically about California. This level of government is the "Legislature" in all states.

        "State Legislature":
          - "State Senate"
          - "State Assembly"

<comment><USER66> Nebraska has only chamber, but it's still called the Nebraska Legislature.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER67> I love this, but why does he list just those specific members?

</comment><comment><USER68> And now HN has started to push a political agenda...

<comment><USER69> It's about time. Tech companies, both startup incubators and the big software megacorps, should have been lobbying Bay Area gov'ts for more housing and transport infrastructure for the last five years. What's the point of all that wealth and power if they're not going to use it to enrich their local communities?

</comment></comment><comment><USER70> This being California- when can we expect housing on the ocean floor of the bay?

</comment><comment><USER71> Cannot believe I'm posting here but relevant:

I have a room in my house in the Sunset opening next month. $900. It's month- to-month rent. Looking to house a founder/hacker/designer/etc currently struggling with SF rent (or someone who wants to move to SF but didn't think they could afford to live in SF)

My email is in my bio.

<comment><USER72> That's cool and all, but sort of counter to the point being made. Subsidizing housing for those already on top doesn't really help with wealth inequality.

<comment><USER71> Couldn't be further from my intent. I'm not looking to give housing to people who are "already on top" \- those people would not want to live in an old house in the Sunset ;)

<comment><USER72> Designers and hackers are pretty much on top, relative to the majority of the bay area inhabitants.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER73> typo: "legislative aides," not "legislative aids"

</comment><comment><USER74> I'm currently renting out my upstairs walk-in closet. I live in Potrero, near 26th & Rhode Island. The closet is pretty big and can easily fit a double bed and dresser. $900 + utilities, but we might be able to work something out.

edit: this is a serious post

<comment><USER75> This boggles this mind.

And is unsustainable.

<comment><USER74> How is it unsustainable? I have a room for rent, that's more than a lot of people.

<comment><USER39> If you don't have a window, it's technically not a room. Fire codes usually require 2 directions of egress.

<comment><USER20> I think you mean _bedroom_. There is no legal definition of a generic "room". Such rooms are often part of the building plan and are called "bonus rooms".

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER76> Won't work. Imagine supply is met, housing is cheap. People then want to live there more. Eventually the point of equilibrium is restored which is that banks keep on creating fiat money until land prices reach a point where you can just about eat _and_ afford the interest repayments.

Land value tax is the answer for all those who don't simply want a quick in so they can get on the gravy train and actually want their kids to grow up in a society where wealth creation, not money creation, makes you richer.

<comment><USER77> Yeah, it's always going to be a function of income in the area. People value housing enough to pay up to 50% of their income towards it in desirable cities. If more inventory is available more people will elect to live in SF and rents will find equilibrium at around the 50% of incomes

<comment><USER76> In large part because many people own/mortgage multiple homes because it's a one-way bet under the current system where all productivity gains flow to land.</comment></comment></comment>


IV sues big three telco companies over patents - <AUTHOR> http://allthingsd.com/20120216/patent-collector-intellectual-ventures-sues-att-sprint-and-t-mobile-for-infringement/

<comment><USER2> Nathan Myhrvold has certainly made a brilliant business out of patents laws. They simply think of the "ideas" and patent them without having any need to actually implement any of the stuff (there are few things that they do prototype to show off to journalists and avoid getting flagged as clearly a troll). Then they go to all big businesses and ask them to become "subscriber" for their patent pool in order not to get sued in future. The beauty of the business model is not about filling patent law suits for billions of dollars like all other trolls but instead offer a subscription for few million dollars that generates a continuous revenue stream. In essence, they make companies pay annual dues just because they are sitting around and thinking about something!

</comment><comment><USER3> Patents have become like pixels. Collect enough of them and you can draw a picture of any technology imaginable.</comment>


Diveintohtml5 lives - <AUTHOR> http://diveintohtml5.info/

<comment><USER2> The moral of all this is that if you want to disappear silently, you should disappear silently. Silently on the internet does not mean deleting your content. It means leaving it there.

<comment><USER3> Amen to that. Specially if all your content was open source.

<comment><USER4> Indeed. If anything, I consider his move a little douchey. At least he should have put the tarballs for his open-source content somewhere and said "there guys, figure it out". Looks more like throwing a tantrum.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> This was not unexpected. Several years ago there was an enigmatic post in his blog, a comparison with David Salinger author of The Catcher in the Rye, after publishing that book Salinger disappeared from public presence and hide from any form of popularity. The best friend of Mark died from drug consumption not long ago, and he was really disappointed about that. One time Mark said that all his activity in the web was of no use for getting a good friend. He think that you can have only one friend that survive you, and that friend is not here ...

No wonder people imagine strange things happening when someone decide to disappear in the web.

</comment><comment><USER6> Did anyone manage to fork Dive Into HTML5's mercurial repository at hg.diveintohtml5.org recently? I had started translating the book to Spanish and now I'm left stranded!

<comment><USER6> Answering myself: <https://github.com/diveintomark/diveintohtml5>

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> I am sorry, but I was out of the loop. What exactly happened to the original site?

<comment><USER8> The author did a variant of the _Why: took down his online presence, deleted the online accounts he could and changed the configuration of his sites to return "410 Gone" on requests.

<comment><USER9> Why ?

<comment><USER10> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Why_the_lucky_stiff>

<comment><USER11> But why?

<comment><USER12> No ... _who_ is on second.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> google maps key error on <http://diveintohtml5.info/detect.html>

<comment><AUTHOR> Fixed. Thanks.

<comment><USER13> no problem :)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> There's this, too: <http://diveintohtml5.ep.io/>

</comment><comment><USER15> I'm not very educated in all this legal stuff, so i have few questions regarded license of this book. First: does license CC-BY-3.0 allow me to download this book for free, make any changes to format or content of the book, including downloading to my Kindle? Amazon sells O'reilly version for kindle for 15.49$, and i can't find 'mobi' version at any legal sources, so is it ok if i make one myself? And if i will, is it ok to share it with everyone?

Secondly, as i understand, there is no problems with translating the book to any language and then sharing it for free with everyone?

<comment><USER16> why not? The license permits you to do what you want with it, as long as you attribute the original author.

<comment><USER15> I was expecting that, but wasn't completely sure about it. Thanks.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER17> I just discovered that those resources were down. Is there any mirror of dive into python available? A good friend wants to learn python and that was a terrific resource.

I wish Mark all the best. I know what is to loose a good friend. Still what he created was beautiful and those resources are too good to vanish.

<comment><USER18> if you mean the one about python 2 I have it ( diveintopython-html-5.4.zip ), I'll gladly upload it somewhere. The python3 one is @ <https://github.com/diveintomark/diveintopython3>

</comment></comment><comment><USER19> feedparser.org is also down.

<comment><USER20> The Google code project is still there: <https://code.google.com/p/feedparser/>

And the software is still in PyPi: <http://pypi.python.org/pypi/feedparser/>

</comment></comment><comment><USER21> This was a project Mark worked on his employer's time. Thats why it is different.

<comment><USER22> Different from what? What do you mean?

I'm super confused. A couple hours ago the two top stories were about mark pilgrim having done what looked like an info suicide. I came back here to check on that and the stories are nowhere to be seen on the first two pages of HN. What happened?

<comment><USER23> Looks like someone at HN stopped an attention whore from attention whoring too much. Censorship, yes, but _nice_ censorship.

<comment><USER24> I'm sorry, but no censorship is nice in a site that is supposed to be about content getting up-voted/down-voted by a community.

<comment><USER25> There's no downvoting, though. Hence, moderators sometimes remove articles that are popular but don't belong here. Just because something is popular among HN readers doesn't mean it needs to be on HN, and the mods balance out the natural Way Of The Universe in that case.

I'm not sure I necessarily agree with this, but am just stating how things work here. There is no reason to expect that you aren't being censored; ultimately this site is for advertising YC, not for being an impartial news filter.

<comment><USER24> You right of course, I was mistakenly thinking of comments getting down-voted, but articles cannot.

> There is no reason to expect that you aren't being censored; ultimately this > site is for advertising YC, not for being an impartial news filter.

Yeah, it's important to keep sight of that, and frankly in that case it makes me wonder why I should continue to come back here?

<comment><USER22> _Yeah, it's important to keep sight of that, and frankly in that case it makes me wonder why I should continue to come back here?_

Same here. That's why I'm so interested in what happened backstage with these stories. I've contacted the mail link on the Guidelines section for some light but haven't received a reply yet.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> So Mark deletes this from the Internet, and a bunch of other people put it back up? For people that were concerned enough about him to send the police to his house a few hours ago, it seems weird that they are now saying "fuck the author's wishes" and putting it back online.

I guess if there isn't enough Internet Drama, we have to make our own? Can we go back to whining about node.js? At least I found that mildly funny...

<comment><USER26> Being concerned about the author's well-being doesn't imply that one ought to 'respect his wishes' with regard to a CC-licensed work that _many_ other people rely upon as a productive resource.

Mark has produced some exceptional reference works and released them under an open license. They certainly ought not be removed from existence on anyone's personal whim, original author or not, no matter how much we sympathize with his situation, whatever that might be.

<comment><USER27> Put another way, republishing an otherwise unavailable CC-licensed/open- source-licensed work is explicitly respecting the author's wishes, the author that published it under that license.

I doubt (but obviously don't know) Mark wanted to excise his work from human memory, he just didn't want the personal responsibility of maintaining those resources/participating in their development as a leader. That's the wish worth respecting.</comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: Why do Unix groups still require re-logging in to register changes? - <AUTHOR>

Why does a user have to log out and back in again before they appear in (or dissapear from) a Unix/POSIX group they've just been added to (or removed from)? How hard would it be to calculate the the list of groups the user is in on the fly, or have a command that refreshed the user's list of groups?<p>I can understand why it didn't work this way when Unix/POSIX groups were designed and first implemented back in The Ancient Times -- when CPU, memory and disk were at a premium. But times have changed.... Is there a technical/architectural/security reason why this hasn't changed? <comment><USER2> Because each process belongs to a set of groups (set via setgroups(2)), and that set of groups isn't necessarily the same as the set of groups to which the process' _user_ belongs.

</comment><comment><USER3> Because no one has hacked together a good solution for it, presumably.</comment>


Create unique long URL's out of A's - <AUTHOR> http://aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.com/ <comment><USER2> If the point is to lengthen, they could just encode the URL instead of saving it and returning a key. That way it'd be stateless. Something like:

      $ ruby -pe '$_.gsub!(/./) {|c| ("%08b" % c.ord).tr("01", "Aa") }' <<< http://google.com
      AaaAaAAAAaaaAaAAAaaaAaAAAaaaAAAAAAaaaAaAAAaAaaaaAAaAaaaaAaaAAaaaAaaAaaaaAaaAaaaaAaaAAaaaAaaAaaAAAaaAAaAaAAaAaaaAAaaAAAaaAaaAaaaaAaaAaaAa

Then to decode:

      $ ruby -pe '$_.gsub!(/.{8}/) {|s| s.tr("Aa", "01").to_i(2).chr }' <<< AaaAaAAAAaaaAaAAAaaaAaAAAaaaAAAAAAaaaAaAAAaAaaaaAAaAaaaaAaaAAaaaAaaAaaaaAaaAaaaaAaaAAaaaAaaAaaAAAaaAAaAaAAaAaaaAAaaAAAaaAaaAaaaaAaaAaaAa
      http://google.com

EDIT: Wow. I hadn't noticed that HN got rid of the horizontal scrolling behaviour for indented text. It's funny that I kind of miss it in this case.

</comment><comment><USER3> I love how whimsical this is, made me smile! It's refreshing to see a silly hack that isn't also performative self-promotion.

</comment><comment><USER4> sample: [http://aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa...](http://aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.com/AaAAAaaaAAaaAAAaAAaa)

          http://aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.com/AaAAAaaaAAaaAAAaAAaa

</comment><comment><USER5> The associated Github repository: [https://github.com/programming/aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa...](https://github.com/programming/aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa)

</comment><comment> codemonkey-zeta Nice hack kid! Very clevel and VERY simple, though maybe not very practical.

</comment><comment><USER6> :'( need to lengthen urls but can't bc on mobile :''(</comment>


Good News You Might Have Missed in 2013 - <AUTHOR> http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Personal/Year-in-Review-2013 <comment><USER2> As people in Tech industry we should be very proud of Bill Gates and what he has done with Microsoft and his charity work.

A lot of people totally miss the point when they say "hey anybody could do all that if they have enough money". That is simply not true. Charity is not just about throwing money at poor, it is a far more difficult job than say building a company. Working for profit is simpler where clear regulations, contracts are in place and a government which has an interest in making businesses work.

Charity is a different ball game, I remember I was in Pune-India when Bill Gates quietly flew there in his private jet sneaked into local red light area to meet the health workers and monitor the progress. No one knew about his visit, when media reached there his private security somehow managed to make him disappear. He had a review meeting with health workers and key government people, and then simply flew out. He does this in all the countries where no sane minded Billionaire would set a foot.

Throwing money and feeling good is simple. Achieving results is very difficult. Pune's red light area has benefited immensely by his efforts. There are at least 3 NGOs who have successfully managed to reduce AIDs and help the children of prostitutes rehabilitate in better professions. Over last 10 years, the sex workers in this area have reduced.

Bill Gates is actually very stingy when it comes to money. You cant simply setup a NGO in red light area and get funding from him. The whole process by which he chooses whom to help is the real USP of his work. That is something takes a lifetime to build and he has done it well.

<comment><USER3> > Over last 10 years, the sex workers in this area have reduced.

Hardly anyone wants to ask if that is an overall benefit to society?

The sex ratio for India is 108 men per 100 women [1]. For those under 15, the ratio is 113:100, so the problem is set to get much worse in the near future.

If India (pop. 1.2 billion) were to have maximal monogamous relationships and no sex workers, you'd have 577 million happy couples, and 46 million men left over who have no chance of any sexual intimacy.

EDIT: Condoms, contraception, and safe sex are obviously good things. My comment is whether eliminating sex work should be the goal. If that's the goal, then please answer the following question: Should men who don't have or can't find a normal relationship be forever denied occasional intimacy?

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_sex_ratio](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_sex_ratio)

<comment><USER4> The ratio is actually far worse! A lot of 'adjustments' go on during census times. The net ratio is close to (<850 women) per (1000 men). You are right in pointing out that its going to get a way more worse very soon.

The main reason for that is dowry and extremely bad treatment meted to women in India. Most people prefer to not have girls at all given these scenarios. Imagine having to spend money on your daughters education, tending to physical safety and then only to find the boy's family asking for big money gifts during marriage. And not just that, in most common cases the demand for gifts just keep coming infinitely even after marriage. The demands are insane of course- Asking for large quantities of gold, real estate, or just plain hard cash, cars combined with a demand for lavishly marriage party are a common place here in India.

Some people have absolutely no shame and sense of self esteem and resolve themselves to this kind of begging to get money. This includes people from all over India, regardless of caste, religion, color, regional, linguistic belongings.

This whole thing promotes a culture for a madness to have male children.

I am assuming marriage among people of same gender especially men is going to be a common place in India only a couple of decades from now.

>> Should men who don't have or can't find a normal relationship

Such men should actively work towards a society that doesn't kill girls before birth and after wards. If they can't may be they should suffer and live in the society they built.

<comment><USER5> > The net ratio is close to (<850 women) per (1000 men)...Most people prefer > to not have girls at all given these scenarios. Imagine having to spend > money on your daughters education, tending to physical safety and then only > to find the boy's family asking for big money gifts during marriage.

With a shortage of women, shouldn't the groom's parents be paying instead?

<comment><USER4> Having the ability to kill somebody before they were born is a recent medical advancement. Before that you had to simply accept what ever was born to you.

Dowry system has been going on India since ancient times. The system works like this. By and large Indian society still works in a system where your parents choose your spouse. So when a boy is of marriageable age, their parents go a matchmaker- and put forward their clauses. There are some typical things they look in a girl, The girl must be fair, beautiful, not taller than the boy, shy, and obedient. She must not be too intelligent, or bold or sometimes not working or well educated.

Apart from these behavior and cosmetic demands. They also put down financial clauses- Generally the demand is in gold, or real estate. Or a car, Or just hard cash. The demands for gifts never really ceases. Women are harassed, many women set themselves on fire unable to bear the torture and harassment. Dowry deaths are common and you will often hear of them in the news papers. In many cases women commit suicide, or worse there are cases where the mother in law burns the girl alive. As much as shocking to you all this may seem, it happens all the time here.

This has been happening since a long time. There are trends of these demands. If the boy is a doctor/Civil Servant the money demanded is highest, engineers/rich business men come next and so on... And this is so common, if you have to marry off your daughter you have to often pay up!

So you need to undo that much of cultural thing. I don't think it will go away anytime soon.

<comment><USER5> I guess the laws of supply and demand do not apply when ancient traditions are involved.

<comment><USER6> They do apply, just because there's fewer women than men doesn't mean they're on the supply side.

In traditional Indian culture daughters are seen as a deprecating asset that their parents want to get rid of.

Presumably the bribes dished out to get rid of them are less than their upkeep would cost if they weren't married off, with some added cost to account for the social stigma of having an unmarried single daughter.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER7> I don't really get the canonisation.

I'm very happy the the Gates' foundation is doing good work. You'd be a fool to say that it wasn't. However, I don't believe that the tech industry should be proud as a result, nor do I think that there is a particular difference between the foundation and some other charities, nor do I understand the obvious astroturfing.

I especially don't think that the act of charity somehow excuses the dodgy business practices or Microsoft or the long-term damage done to the tech industry.

So we should be grateful that the Gates' money is being used to positive ends. But that certainly doesn't make Bill a saint, and I suspect that this hyperbole and short-term memory-ism can fuel the backlash.

<comment><USER8> >I especially don't think that the act of charity somehow excuses the dodgy business practices or Microsoft or the long-term damage done to the tech industry.

How much damage do you think that is? You don't think all the lives saved have "made up" for that? You don't think the world is better off than it would otherwise be without Bill Gates?

<comment><USER7> No, because I don't think that positive or good acts can somehow "cancel out" (or as you say, "make up for") bad or negative ones. Karma is not a concrete concept, and the question "is the world better off" is objectively unanswerable.

<comment><USER9> Hate the man's business practices. Love the man for his philanthropical work. They don't need to cancel out, and you don't need to forgive one to appreciate the other.

Michael Vick was put in prison for dog fighting. I absolutely hate him for that. At the same time, I appreciate his talent on the field as a football player.

Orson Scott Card is a rampant homophobe. I absolutely hate him for that. Doesn't affect my opinion of his novels though, not in the least.

There's no logic in idolizing or demonizing anyone. Life's a lot better when you get out of casting a pall over everything a person does by some other things that they've done. People like making villains and heroes of people, whether or not they deserve it.

We see someone we don't like from afar, and it's easy to assume that they're bad at everything, that they're horrible people, that they're bad parents, that they're likely running around kicking puppies all day long. That's very rarely the truth.

With people we're nearer too, it's easier to accept that they have strengths and weaknesses, and I don't know why it's hard to imagine the same thing of famous people, but it is. There's very little to love about Bill Gates, CEO of Microsoft. Similarly, there's very little to hate about Bill Gates of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Roll with it.

<comment><USER10> > Hate the man's business practices. Love the man for his philanthropical work

At the core of this is trust. Bill lost mine at Microsoft's helm - he has shown a borderline sociopath that will stop at nothing and will destroy anyone on his path.

To give this much credit to someone with such dark history is appallingly naive.

<comment><USER11> 'Dark history'? Aggressive business practices for sure, but it's not like he was dumping toxic chemicals in the water supply or something. How many people were killed as a result of Gates 'sociopathy'? I'm afraid that slowing the popularity of Linux and the open web doesn't strike me as particularly impressive in the Evil Genius stakes.

<comment><USER12> Jimmy Saville, well-known British celebrity with lots of charity work for kids, now known to be a sick child abuser.

Lance Armstrong, well-known cyclist with lots of charity work fighting cancer, now known to be a drug cheat.

Can Bill Gates wash away his sins? Has he really turned over a new leaf?

 _" The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation's investments in Monsanto and Cargill have come under heavy criticism. Is it time for the foundation to come clean on its visions for agriculture in developing countries?_"

[http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty- matter...](http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/poverty- matters/2010/sep/29/gates-foundation-gm-monsanto)

<comment><USER11> /facepalm at how many logical fallacies you have squeezed into one short comment.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> In slightly related news,nobody is talking about the UN Millenium Goals [1][2]anymore, which are due next year. And it doesn't need a prophet to predict that we will miss most, if not even all eight, of them[0].

[0][http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/pdf/report-2013/2013_progr...](http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/pdf/report-2013/2013_progress_english.pdf) [1] [http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/](http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/) [2] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Development_Goals](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium_Development_Goals)

</comment><comment><USER14> I am proud that the technology industry, of which I am a part, has created Bill Gates, a living saint.

<comment><USER15> I don't think he's a saint. I think a lot of people on HN, given the same resources Gates has, would do substantially similar things with their lives. It seems like incredibly rewarding and important work.

I'm just really glad he chose to do it.

<comment><USER16> Yeah right. Most of the people on HN will never quit the game, and will keep trying to make more money until they have one foot in the grave. (And no, I don't think there is anything particularly wrong with this.)

Gates got to a point where he knew his time as a competitive capitalist was over, and that his time as a generous philanthropist had begun. This isn't about net worth, this is about making that choice at a point where you still are physically, mentally, and financially able to have an impact.

Anyone who has a good exit has sufficient resources to no longer work and could make a similar choice, even if they won't have the same net impact as Gates. But most of them don't. Most of the people at Gates' level don't either. It's commendable.

<comment><USER17> >Most of the people on HN will never quit the game, and will keep trying to make more money until they have one foot in the grave.

That's because, as was already stated, most of them won't have billions of dollars. If they did, they would probably at some point start thinking about something besides personal wealth.

>Anyone who has a good exit has sufficient resources to no longer work and could make a similar choice, even if they won't have the same net impact as Gates.

Getting a good exit is only slightly more likely than winning the lottery. You make it sound like most of us here at HN will be millionaires. That's just ridiculous.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> BillG is one of the very few people about whom I have completely changed my opinion.

Post his Microsoft days, he is the highest profile "rich tech person" who has promoted so many projects and efforts to help the poor. While Microsoft was famous for "embrace, extend—and extinguish" where it crushed any product that felt like a threat (saw this first hand with Netscape).

Now BillG is using his enormous wealth in the best possible way! Kudos and Thanks

<comment><USER19> I have different view on that.

The charity Bill Gates is doing now is good, but what Bill Gates did as Microsoft founder was much better and way more important.

Lots of people are still using Microsoft products.

<comment><USER20> >Lots of people are still using Microsoft products.

Huuuuuh? What? What does that have to do with ANYTHING?

Lots of people still use Bayer aspirin but that doesn't make their actions during WWII ok. They used slave labor and manufactured gas used in Nazi gas chambers and their executive Fritz ter Meer, sentenced to seven years in prison for his actions.

They also invented heroin as a "non-addictive morphine substitute."

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> It's a little unfortunate that rather than discussing the contents of the piece we are focusing on the individual

But I would like to comment on the substance because that is the link that was shared; and avoid all the on and on conflicts about the author of the piece.

I hate to be that guy, but while I appreciate the optimistic note (no pun intended), I think we really should introspect on how 2013 was actually a year of setbacks in fight against poverty and other related social problems including the ones listed by BillG, which I want to point out. I am writing on the basis of my knowledge (which I can assure you is credible) and will append references later.

1.Polio: While there are some obvious achievements, the question of Pakistan is one country that has taken long backward steps since being close to eradicating it just before 9/11, and most of that has to do with geopolitical reasons. Post 9/11 the insurgent groups started targeting polio workers and banning immunization programs alleging that they were American spies. Because none of these were allegations were substantiated, the village elders fought against their voices, and the immunization program continued with the insurgents not being able to do much. However that changed with the Laden killing which in a way vindicated the insurgents as the chief informant was a doctor affiliated with the polio program. Since then the elders lost their ability to object, and the insurgents gained their authority which has resulted in completely dismantling of the polio program with periodic killings of polio workers, the last one less than a week back.

The number of polio cases in Pakistan has grown about 40-50% since then. And one would argue there's a lot that the west can do to regain confidence for the local workers without jeopardizing the so-called continuing war on terror. This is a contentious issue, but ones that needs to be highlighted and not as simple as the Pak PM giving assurance to Gates.

2\. Child mortality: Sure child mortality has gone down but it is far from the target set in the Millennium Development Goals (UN MDGs). More importantly its not just the poorer countries that are doing badly. Amongst the worst performing countries has been India which goes on to my next point that economic growth or the rate of poverty going down means nothing more than in numbers to the state of social welfare. The overall child mortality has gone down because of two separate factors: 1. Countries in latin america and south east Asia have improved drastically through better "socialistic" maternal and child welfare programs while the rest amongst the poorer countries languish. 2. The civil wars that plagued sub saharan countries before the 2000s have gone down both in their occurrences and their casualties, of which women and children formed a huge number. Sure you hear about the current violence in the likes of South Sudan, Mali, Syria and CAR but these are nothing compared to the violence of the past and the civilian casualties are much lower in number.

3\. Poverty rate: From the point above while in absolute terms poverty has gone down, social inequality has grow. More importantly the measure of poverty line is highly debated as growth in income in low and middle income counties has also seen concurrent high real inflation on the ground which is highly under measured.

4\. Rich counties re-committed to saving lives: This is actually perhaps the most concerning. Just read this piece by Jeffrey Sachs, one of the world's most well known development economist who was is a key advocate of the Global Fund that Gates mentions that [http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeffrey- sachs/world-to-poor-dr...](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeffrey-sachs/world- to-poor-drop-dead_b_4385420.html)

Sorry if this sounds like a long rant. But I really strongly believe that we need to be realistic of what has been achieved. I appreciate what Gates is trying to do, but we need to introspect on how little we are doing to address these grave issues. And discussing the man and not the article itself is one of those key symptoms of our indifference and lethargy.

<comment><USER22> Points 2 and 3 both sound like steps forward to me.

Also:

> middle income counties has also seen concurrent high real inflation on the > ground which is highly under measured.

What does that actually mean? "Real" is an economic term that doesn't make sense in that context. And if inflation's not being measured properly, how do you know in which direction it's off? Or more generally - you seem to think inflation is higher than is being reported; why do you think that?

<comment><USER23> When people say that inflation is not being properly measured, what they're likely referring to is the fact that some policy makers use the CPI Less Food and Energy which means that some of the biggest expenses for the majority of people, food and energy, are sometimes ignored when discussing the effects inflation.

<comment><USER22> That's not a measurement problem, though; that's a what-should-our-policy- response-be problem. Food and energy prices are actually easier to measure and compare year-over-year. There are good arguments for (and some against) excluding them from your monetary policy targets, but I've never heard of anyone doing it when discussing human wellbeing. But either way, it's still being _measured_.

The World Bank has inflation for middle income countries as 4.1% [1]. If you download their data sheet, you'll see that number is a GDP deflator, so no food/energy exclusion. That's not an ideal number, but it's not high either, and it's much lower than most previous years. They also have a CPI number, which is actually higher: 4.6%, but again not terrible. So my question still stands: does the GP think that number is wrong, and if so, why?

[1] [http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/mic](http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/mic)

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> Things you might have missed in 2013:

The Gates Foundation's Hypocritical Investments

[http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/12/gates- foundat...](http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2013/12/gates- foundations-24-most-egregious-investments)

<comment><USER25> Seems like the Gates Foundation is mostly a front for a profit-seeking venture.

<comment><USER26> It is the other way around. If you are doing effective altruism, you want to make sure you have money coming in that you can be altruistic with.

The bit about Walmart was especially badly done. If the author of this article thinks Walmart employees are poor on the same scale as the poor that the foundation targets, he really has no clue about world poverty. If the minimum standard of living throughout the world were equal to that of a typical Walmart employee, the world would be tremendously better off.

<comment><USER10> So, your argument is that it's right to make Walmart employees poor in order to maximize profits because they are not nearly as poor as the poorest people in the world?

If there is something poor here, it's the excuse.

<comment><USER27> How does buying a lot of Walmart shares make Walmart employees poor? I am frankly baffled here. Walmart buyers should probably get more blame here.

Have you ever spared a thought about who made the electronics you own and under what conditions?

<comment><USER10> When you buy shares you send the signal the company is doing the right thing. It says you support the company and its business practices and, ultimately, enables the company to continue them. If everybody refuses to buy their shares, their stock will plummet and prompt changes.

As for my electronics (and consumables), yes, I try to avoid manufacturers and brands that are associated with poor working practices. Nice try attacking me to try to disprove my argument against the Gates foundation.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> A lot of people here hate on BG for his past and at the same time idolize Steve Jobs. If you would just have swapped MS and Apple in terms of market growth i am not so sure if Jobs wouldn't have made as many questionable decisions as Gates. Apple of today is making lives harder for a lot of companies, arguably more than MS of today. Also MS seems to share a lot more (Open Source, Public research) while Apple seems to be 100% self-centered. That of course makes sense for any competitive company, just saying that when one reaches the top, they always look kind of evil while the underdogs seem more sympathetic.

</comment><comment><USER29> Health activists in India, observers the states push for pentavalent vaccines with suspicion. They are more expensive and does not really provide the cost- to-benefit.Also, experts are divided on the fact that there are 18 deaths reported on which state has confirmed 3 being caused by the vaccine.

EDIT: Context - gates pushes pentavalent vaccine being the exciting thing for next year. [1] [http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/centre-confirms- three-...](http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/centre-confirms-three- pentavalent-vaccine-deaths) [2] [http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Thiruvananthapuram/penta...](http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Thiruvananthapuram/pentavalent- vaccine-caught-in-fresh-row/article5455511.ece) [3] [http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/policy-draft-backs- new...](http://www.downtoearth.org.in/content/policy-draft-backs-new- expensive-vaccines)

<comment><USER30> Ugh, it's seriously hard to read those articles. The writing is just off enough a bit to make it super jarring to read.

In summary: 2 million doses delivered, 3 doses per child, 18 reported deaths (of which two apparently were in child who didn't take the vaccine at all). Depending on the sources, the actual number of deaths caused by the vaccine is 3 or up to 16. This is ontop of a base infant mortality rate of 12 deaths per 1000 infants per year. Also controversy over the actual need to vaccine Hep B and Hib (the two additional vaccines added to the original 3-combo vaccine), over spending their resources on other vaccines.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> I would be more interested in they can work for self sufficiency. They seem to be more interested in bringing big business to every corner of the world then making corners of the world self sufficient. Instead they want to push GMOs along with the purchase of those seeds.

</comment><comment><USER32> He links to a pretty decent site too -- 'oooh shiny visualizations' [http://www.healthmetricsandevaluation.org/gbd/visualizations...](http://www.healthmetricsandevaluation.org/gbd/visualizations/country)

</comment><comment><USER33> If others in the tech industry are keen to contribute to having as big an impact on the world as Bill has, I encourage you to check out the Effective Altruism movement in your area. Effective Altruism overlaps with lean approaches and evidence based action, and many of the proponents are big names in the Valley: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effective_altruism](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effective_altruism)

</comment><comment><USER34> How to Become As Rich As Bill Gates: [http://philip.greenspun.com/bg/](http://philip.greenspun.com/bg/)

</comment><comment><USER35> I wish he were to post something similar regarding climate change and energy developments.

<comment><USER15> I wish someone was working as hard on climate change as Gates is on preventable disease in the developing works. But I do not wish that Gates worked any less diligently on the problems he's chosen. Global poverty and disease in the developing world are, particularly in the way they stifle the potential of a huge fraction of the world's people, root causes of most of our other big problems.

<comment><USER36> "Global poverty and disease in the developing world are, particularly in the way they stifle the potential of a huge fraction of the world's people, root causes of most of our other big problems."

No, they're definitely not the root causes. There's plenty of interest from the richer countries to keep poor countries in such condition, that is the root cause.

<comment><USER15> Waiting for the drone strikes to take out Bill Gates then.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER37> I love you, Bill. I will do everything in my ability to get all help to your foundation, financially or otherwise. Thanks for your enormous contribution to the world. Here's hoping you get a Nobel peace prize.

</comment><comment><USER10> Saint William of Redmond?</comment>


Don't start group discussions by sharing initial preferences - <AUTHOR> http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/2010/04/dont-start-group-discussions-by-sharing.html

<comment><USER2> I've generally attributed this result to simple laziness. Someone else has an opinion, and if you respect their opinion, you are less likely and less motivated to apply original thought to the outcome. i.e. someone else has already solved the problem, why do we have to discuss it?</comment>


Samy is my hero (old - first MySpace worm) - <AUTHOR> http://namb.la/popular/

<comment><AUTHOR> When this happened Samy was the roommate of a coworker of mine. Some time after the described events my coworker was in the shower when he heard hammering on the door saying, "OPEN UP! THIS IS THE POLICE!" He called back, "Just a minute, I'm in the shower." "THIS THE THE POLICE! COME OUT NOW!"

He thought it someone playing a joke so he decided to play along. He wrapped a towel around himself, opened the door, and found at least a half-dozen guns pointed at him from officers in several different forces, FBI, local police, etc. Let's just say that dripping wet and naked under a towel that is slipping off is not how you want to be for the next half-hour in front of a group like that. Particularly when they are not all men.

It turns out that they had a warrant to remove all computer equipment from the premises. Whether or not it belonged to Samy. This included my coworker's laptop. He was fast on his feet though, he pointed out his laptop and said, "That is eBay property, you'll have to talk with eBay legal before taking it." (We worked for Rent.com which had been purchased by eBay. The laptop was his personal laptop, but did contain some proprietary eBay stuff, mostly VPN stuff so he could work from home.) He managed to convince them not to take his laptop.

Samy's stuff, however, was gone for an extended time. His case got settled out of court. I don't remember the exact details, but I think he wasn't supposed to use the Internet outside of a work context for a period of time.</comment>


Ask HN: Review my app Tweetc.com, splits long tweets into multiple. - <AUTHOR> http://tweetc.com

<comment><USER2> I suggest hooking up with an author in an exclusive joint promotion, where the author distributes/serializes his/her book using Tweetc.com. Both parties get some attention, and you're showing a practical use for your service.

I wish you success!</comment>