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Comment by anon291 | Hacker News Reader

If the SF local government were to substantially change, particular political party officials would be out of a job, because the city is run by one party, and is in fact the breeding ground of a lot of major national politicians from that party.

People should think about this when they go to vote, because several SF politicians are attempting to potentially run for president and other national positions. One of them is already in the executive branch.

The 'both sides' nonsense I see in this thread needs to stop. It is a lie. There is only one side in San Francisco; we all know what side that is; and for someone reason, we're actually totally okay with those very same politicians becoming top dog nationally. Despite all the hand-wringing here by people saying they can't vote for SF politicians because they don't live in SF, everyone sure seems really happy to do it when it comes to the national elections.

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> is in fact the breeding ground of a lot of major national politicians from that party.

Really? If Newsom runs for president, despite being somewhat moderate, he's going to have problems because Republican attack ads will frame him as the former mayor of the most liberal city in the country while showing pics of the TL in the background.

He’s obviously angling for a national platform, picking silly sound-bite fights with people like DeSantis. My guess is that he runs for president, fails somewhat spectacularly due to just this issue, and then steps back into the position of senator for as long as he likes. Quite possibly for life, just like Boxer and Feinstein. It’s what I would do in his shoes. It would also give him the platform to launch another presidential campaign whenever it feels right. How many times did Biden run for president?

> senator

Feinstein is 89, so...

NIMBY-ism and the accumulation of power through real estate and capture of local power structures isn't an inherent to SF or any specific political party.

It happens in Texas, NYC and Idaho.

Texas and Idaho have much more housing and build much more, for better or worse. And are much cheaper.

Most Texas and Idaho cities also have a lot more physical space to work with than SF does.

(Hell, most cities, period, do.)

Absolutely... There's no denying that SF is going to be more expensive based on natural barriers. However, this same sort of dynamic plays out in many more cities than SF

That's such a load of baloney, man. Yeah, you're right, SF is hemmed in by a bunch of natural barriers

BUT there's more than enough space and money to build some utopian high-density stuff if it weren't for the NIMBYism. You can work part time as a janitor in downtown Tokyo and afford live in a comfortable apartment within 20 minutes of your job (Comfortable by local standards, but Japanese people don't usually use couches or beds. You could afford a place comfortable by American standards with a 45 minute commute)

Man, this area makes me so angry every day. Every time I go to a store or restaurant the people working there are lazy rude slobs because they're stressed out, overworked, and underpaid. I can't even blame them for being a-holes, because a lot of them have been pushed out of their homes and have to endure hours of commute every day just to BARELY scrape by.

I'm getting blasted by political spam now, and it's all about "protecting home values". If I could somehow cause an earthquake to level this region without physically hurting anyone, I'd do it right now. I'm counting down the days until I can leave at this point.

Tokyo is huge. It's actually less dense than San Francisco. There's a lot of room to build out, and the train system makes that possible.

It's unlikely a janitor would be able to afford a comfortable apartment 20 minutes from work. The norm in Japan is for the husband to be the sole breadwinner, and a janitor's salary would almost certainly push them further away from the center. You certainly can live in the center parts of the city, with low prices, but the place you rent is not going to be comfortable. This is a better situation than SF or NYC, obviously.

Tokyo is actually quite expensive. You can't compare the specific prices against American cities, because the wages are considerably lower. Folks work insane hours to get overtime pay to afford their lifestyles. Similarly, the reason the prices don't increase is partially because they keep up with building enough units (and that's partially due to zoning), but also because there's effectively no inflation, and there hasn't been inflation for a long time. Prices don't change, but neither do wages. Home prices are also deflationary, unlike the US.

Tokyo is a great city to use as a good example of building a dense, immensely enjoyable city, but it's best not to exaggerate.

(I currently live in Tokyo and am in the process of buying a home)

Unlike California Republicans, Texas Republicans haven't gone off the deep end and passed a Proposition 13.

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