> most of the structures aren't nice historic houses. This is exactly what they've done.

So they prioritized nice houses over solving the housing problem. Not to re-assuring if you aren’t rich enough to own one of these houses or compete for the few high rise units there are.

> Many of the schools are great. Sorry if your school district is bad.

Lol, the embodiment of what’s wrong with California politics. That’s almost literally NIMBY.

> My coworkers for a decade took public transit more often than not. You live in the suburbs if you think 5% of the population takes BART or Muni to work. Plus many people walk or bike.

Yes, I live where the majority of the Bay Area lives - outside of San Francisco proper because SF has such hostile housing policies. Nobody would give a shit about the bay bridge if public transportation was decent but instead it’s a parking lot every day (non-covid).

> Perhaps the fact that you don't even know about the BART expansion should be the warning sign that you don't really follow Bay Area transit very closely.

If you’re talking about the track extension to San Jose, that’s pathetic. That’s something that should have been done about 20 years ago and it still doesn’t solve shit for most of the peninsula. It also doesn’t do anything for most of San Jose itself. If people cared about transit there would be multiple lines up and down the peninsula, cross lines, and a way to get to Mountain View from SFO that runs 24/7 and doesn’t require waiting at a bart/Caltrain interchange for up to an hour when it is running. As it’s run now, BART and Caltrain are red-headed step children used as lip service by politicians afraid to do anything serious to address public transportation in a meaningful way.

> I've met more people in junior roles get rich in the Bay Area from equity than would ever be possible by trying to live in the cheapest possible place with minimal opportunities such that your expenses are a slightly lower percentage of your take-home pay as a new graduate. If you did an entry level job at Twilio you're probably a millionaire now.

What a sad distraction from the point about the incompetent government. I already said the business environment is great and operates in spite of the incompetent government. Also, keep in mind that only a couple percent of the population work for tech companies and only maybe 1 percent of that group get to ride a successful exit. For every millionaire junior engineer you met, there are 10,000 people being failed by the current Bay Area government.

> So sure make your money and leave. Don't try to improve things you don't like, just complain about them.

What makes you think I haven’t worked on improving things? You might learn that the ability to identify problems is the only way to actually meaningfully fix anything.

It sounds like you’re just happy with your rich circle of friends in the city, that’s great for you. IMO that “I’ve got mine” attitude is what makes the bay so miserable for the rest of the 99%.

> Learn what a truly unwalkable place is like.

I’ve spent months in Tokyo and over a year in NYC. The Bay Area is a joke when it comes to walkability. Small segments of SF can be suffered through and then everyone else is just fucked without a car or ride sharing.

I suggest the opposite to you. Go spend some time in walkable cities to open your eyes to how mismanaged the governance of the bay is. Try Melbourne, Sydney, Hong Kong, Osaka, etc.

Your point of comparison might be some suburb rust belt US city so it might look golden to you, but it’s shockingly bad compared to governments that are truly motivated to support car free lifestyles.