RE: Down with the government
The old people don't equate to the old culture. There's a fairly large intersection of the two, but neither is a subset (proper or improper) of the other. Old people, or more to the point, their lobbies (think AARP) wield a fair amount of political power right now. That's where the Social Security/Medicare untouchability comes from. The old culture is losing cultural ground and trying to make up for it by seizing whatever political ground it can. Julia -Original Message- From: brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com] On Behalf Of John Williams Sent: Monday, October 18, 2010 11:42 PM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: Down with the government I'm curious, if the old culture is in such decline, why are Social Security and Medicare still untouchable? There is no way, with the current system, that today's young and middle-aged are going to get as much out of the system as they put in. It is a giant Ponzi scheme. So if the old are so powerless, why doesn't the system get reformed to be more age-equitable? ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 6:35 AM, Julia ju...@zurg.net wrote: The old people don't equate to the old culture. There's a fairly large intersection of the two, but neither is a subset (proper or improper) of the other. I understand that, but as you say, there's a fairly large intersection of the two. I agree, which is why I posed my question. I don't think the fact that there is not a perfect correspondence of old culture with old people answers my question. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
There's also people like me who figure I'll not see much, if anything out of them but don't grouse too much about paying for those already in their golden years. - jmh Sent from my iPhone On Oct 19, 2010, at 8:53 AM, John Williams jwilliams4...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 6:35 AM, Julia ju...@zurg.net wrote: The old people don't equate to the old culture. There's a fairly large intersection of the two, but neither is a subset (proper or improper) of the other. I understand that, but as you say, there's a fairly large intersection of the two. I agree, which is why I posed my question. I don't think the fact that there is not a perfect correspondence of old culture with old people answers my question. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
RE: Down with the government
Besides which, we greedy geezers will pass our ill-gotten wealth down to you hard-pressed Xers and your children in due time via the normal process of inheritance, if the medical bills needed to keep us functioning don't eat every last bit of it up. http://idiotgrrl.livejournal.com/ From: ju...@zurg.net To: brin-l@mccmedia.com Subject: RE: Down with the government Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2010 08:35:21 -0500 The old people don't equate to the old culture. There's a fairly large intersection of the two, but neither is a subset (proper or improper) of the other. Old people, or more to the point, their lobbies (think AARP) wield a fair amount of political power right now. That's where the Social Security/Medicare untouchability comes from. The old culture is losing cultural ground and trying to make up for it by seizing whatever political ground it can. Julia -Original Message- From: brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com] On Behalf Of John Williams Sent: Monday, October 18, 2010 11:42 PM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: Down with the government I'm curious, if the old culture is in such decline, why are Social Security and Medicare still untouchable? There is no way, with the current system, that today's young and middle-aged are going to get as much out of the system as they put in. It is a giant Ponzi scheme. So if the old are so powerless, why doesn't the system get reformed to be more age-equitable? ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 8:41 AM, Pat Mathews mathew...@msn.com wrote: Besides which, we greedy geezers will pass our ill-gotten wealth down to you hard-pressed Xers and your children in due time via the normal process of inheritance, if the medical bills needed to keep us functioning don't eat every last bit of it up. Not greedy, in most cases, just poor financial planners / lack of understanding of future costs vs. savings. As demonstrated by the above comment. As a group, Americans nearing the age they expect to retire have saved far too little to support themselves and their care until they die (which is a lot longer now than it was 50 years ago). In the aggregate, there is not going to be wealth, ill-gotten or otherwise, to pass on. The reverse, actually. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
Better engineers, and more of them? Lots of Stanford and Berkeley engineering graduates to hire? When I talked about this last year with the Google people, they said that they still believed that you got more dollars for your money hiring engineers in Mountain View than in Durham or Austin. They could be wrong, but I wouldn't lay long odds on it... Yours, Brad DeLong On Fri, Oct 15, 2010 at 1:23 PM, Dan Minette danmine...@att.net wrote: BTW, I think that California has just seen the tip of the iceberg with regards to its problems. For example, why should someone build a new high tech enterprise in pricy San Jose instead of cheap Raleigh-Durham or Austin? California has put itself in a box and I'd expect housing prices to drop another factor of before it can start to rebound. Now, there's a topic we can debate. :-) Dan M. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
RE: Down with the government
From: brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-boun...@mccmedia.com] On Behalf Of Brad DeLong Sent: Tuesday, October 19, 2010 11:21 AM To: Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion Subject: Re: Down with the government Better engineers, and more of them? Lots of Stanford and Berkeley engineering graduates to hire? When I talked about this last year with the Google people, they said that they still believed that you got more dollars for your money hiring engineers in Mountain View than in Durham or Austin. They could be wrong, but I wouldn't lay long odds on it... I'm curious. Do they pay starting engineers $250k/year, and still think that Berkley and Stanford are so much better than every other engineering school in the nation that it's worth it? If they don't pay that kind of money, how can a engineer have a house and family? Dan M. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
RE: Down with the government
There is NO WAY an ordinary wage-earner could have saved enough to cover the sort of insurance-inflated medical bills common today. Call around and ask what various procedures and prescription medications cost. I have insurance because I worked for a University. A lot of people were unable to get work with people who offer insurance at that level. Call around and ask what these procedures and meds cost for someone without insurance. Then make a budget that allows for rent, food, transportation, etc AND savings at that level. http://idiotgrrl.livejournal.com/ Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2010 09:14:56 -0700 Subject: Re: Down with the government From: jwilliams4...@gmail.com To: brin-l@mccmedia.com On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 8:41 AM, Pat Mathews mathew...@msn.com wrote: Besides which, we greedy geezers will pass our ill-gotten wealth down to you hard-pressed Xers and your children in due time via the normal process of inheritance, if the medical bills needed to keep us functioning don't eat every last bit of it up. Not greedy, in most cases, just poor financial planners / lack of understanding of future costs vs. savings. As demonstrated by the above comment. As a group, Americans nearing the age they expect to retire have saved far too little to support themselves and their care until they die (which is a lot longer now than it was 50 years ago). In the aggregate, there is not going to be wealth, ill-gotten or otherwise, to pass on. The reverse, actually. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
Bruce Bostwick wrote: In other words, we have a continuing culture ware against a backdrop of change that is rapidly making the old culture obsolete. Well put. I might add that the old culture is becoming at least vaguely aware of their increasing marginality, irrelevance, and obsolescence, and doesn't like it at all .. I think this has been said before. Was it Cicero? No, probably some ancient summerian said it earlier. Alberto Monteiro ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 10:06 AM, Pat Mathews mathew...@msn.com wrote: There is NO WAY an ordinary wage-earner could have saved enough to cover the sort of insurance-inflated medical bills common today. If true, then by what magic of aggregation can a group of such people afford something that most individuals cannot afford? There are only two possibilities I can think of: (1) A fraction of the group members have saved a great deal, enough to support the rest of the group (2) A different group will pay to support the group that did not save enough The problem with (1) is that I think even if you confiscated all of the excess savings of those who have saved enough for themselves, you still would not have enough to take care of all those who did not save enough. The problem with (2) is how does the other group save enough to support themselves as well as support the first group? It is either a giant Ponzi scheme that will eventually collapse, or you are relying on some innovations that reduce care costs in the future, something which has not happened so far despite many advances -- people always want more and better life, and they have tended to choose that over freezing the status quo and reducing the costs. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
RE: Down with the government
There is NO WAY an ordinary wage-earner could have saved enough to cover the sort of insurance-inflated medical bills common today. If true, then by what magic of aggregation can a group of such people afford something that most individuals cannot afford? There are only two possibilities I can think of: (1) A fraction of the group members have saved a great deal, enough to support the rest of the group (2) A different group will pay to support the group that did not save enough I have tended not to answer you John because I have not been able to solve the problem of dialog with you. Whenever I use facts or correlations to support an argument you point to the causal density of economics (not your term but a neat term I found explaining why social sciences aren't science) to state that there is no way to use data to point to conclusionseven if the data is so simple as people getting negative interest from T-Bills shows an extreme flight to safety. But, in this case, we have an obvious solution. Medical costs are skyrocketinguniquely so in the United States. People in the medical field are making enormous amounts of money, compared to their contemporaries in other developed countries. While folks have heard horror stories about medical care in the UK and Canada, etc. surveys of satisfaction with care get greater percentages of people who are satisfied in those countries than in the USso they can't be all that worse. So, a single payer system, with the right of rich people to spend whatever extra that they want which pays the going rate for medical care in every other developed country would cost a lot less money. It's the threat of doctors to go to Blue Cross, which presently pays much more (my sister who bills for her husband who's a physician says he gets about $120 from Blue Cross, $80 from Medicare, and $40 from Medicade for the exact same service) that keeps the government dolling out the money at high rates (well the high voting percentages of the elderly who are scared of this actually does it). If we paid primary care physicians $100k/year, specialists $130k/year, and about as much as every other developed country for all the other parts of medical care, as well as required malfeasance for malpractice, we'd be able to reverse the inflation in Medicareand have costs in line with what is affordable. As for Social Security, if we capped the highest SS payment to inflation instead of the increase in the average income, and got back on the GDP/capita growth rate of 1960-2005 (number picked out of my head, not cherry picked. Pick any other two dates between 1940 and 2007 which are at least 30 years apart, and I'll be happy to use that.) SS taxes would actually be able to go down in 30 years with ZPG. We had a big discussion on this here around 2005 and the numbers are pretty easy to crank out. So, that's the other option. The real problem, as I see it, is that the GDP growth from 2000-2008 was mostly tied to the housing bubble and bank profits. If you look at jobs growth from 1939-2010, and take a mean percentage growth per year as the baseline, you will see the US starting to fall off the baseline in 2001. The last 3 years have been very bad, but real growth stopped when the internet bubble burst. Dan M. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 11:01 AM, Dan Minette danmine...@att.net wrote: I have tended not to answer you John because I have not been able to solve the problem of dialog with you. Whenever I use facts or correlations to support an argument you point to the causal density of economics (not your term but a neat term I found explaining why social sciences aren't science) to state that there is no way to use data to point to conclusionseven if the data is so simple as people getting negative interest from T-Bills shows an extreme flight to safety. Your difficulty is caused by your belief that a few simple data points can accurately predict how a complex system will behave in the future. You refuse to accept that it cannot be so. If it were so, then there would be people who consistently predict things like the unemployment rate or the chances of Fannie Mae blowing up. But what we actually see are the experts rarely getting their predictions correct, such as this: http://michaelscomments.wordpress.com/2010/07/02/june-2010-unemployment-numbers-theyre-real-and-theyre-spectacular/ But, in this case, we have an obvious solution. It may be an obvious thing to do, but it is not obviously a solution to the problem of how to pay for the best medical care for Americans. While folks have heard horror stories about medical care in the UK and Canada, etc. surveys of satisfaction with care get greater percentages of people who are satisfied in those countries than in the USso they can't be all that worse. Satisfaction surveys (for all areas) are notorious for being unreliable. The results depend on how you ask the question. And it is never clear what you are actually measuring. One well-known phenomenon is that people tend to respond to these things relatively -- if they are better off than their neighbor, then they are happy. But that makes the results of happiness surveys difficult to interpret, since each person may be measuring relative to a different benchmark. I prefer to consider more objective measurements for judging health care quality. For example, 5-year-survival-rates for a given serious disease. If we paid primary care physicians $100k/year, specialists $130k/year, and about as much as every other developed country for all the other parts of medical care, as well as required malfeasance for malpractice, we'd be able to reverse the inflation in Medicareand have costs in line with what is affordable. Are you suggesting that we prohibit by law anyone from paying doctors more than your proposed amounts? If so, I would strongly oppose such a law. I find the idea of putting someone in jail because they paid a doctor too much to be reprehensible. If you mean that we should create a two-tiered health care system, one where the doctors agree to treat the national health-care plan people and to have a salary cap, and a premium tier for those doctors who do not want a salary cap and for those who can afford to pay their rates, well. I do not find that as repellant as the first option, but I do not think it will work. The people in the lower tier will be always clamoring for the higher quality, higher cost care of the higher tier, and so the costs will keep rising quickly, just as they are now. As for Social Security, if we capped the highest SS payment to inflation instead of the increase in the average income, I agree it is a good idea, but it is not a new idea. The fact that the Carter administration changed it despite objections about the unsustainability, and that it has not been fixed yet, makes me wonder what the chances are that it will be done now. and got back on the GDP/capita growth rate of 1960-2005 (number picked out of my head, not cherry picked. Pick any other two dates between 1940 and 2007 which are at least 30 years apart, and I'll be happy to use that.) I hope that GDP growth can return to that rate, but it seems we have a long way to go to get there from here. The real problem, as I see it, is that the GDP growth from 2000-2008 was mostly tied to the housing bubble and bank profits. If you look at jobs growth from 1939-2010, and take a mean percentage growth per year as the baseline, you will see the US starting to fall off the baseline in 2001. The last 3 years have been very bad, but real growth stopped when the internet bubble burst. Yup. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
RE: Down with the government
Okay. Have it your way. We/they didn't save enough and consume health care with reckless abandon. May you never be in the workplace where the clerk, knowing that one must never, ever, consume health care one cannot afford, comes to work with the flu. http://idiotgrrl.livejournal.com/ Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2010 10:24:36 -0700 Subject: Re: Down with the government From: jwilliams4...@gmail.com To: brin-l@mccmedia.com On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 10:06 AM, Pat Mathews mathew...@msn.com wrote: There is NO WAY an ordinary wage-earner could have saved enough to cover the sort of insurance-inflated medical bills common today. If true, then by what magic of aggregation can a group of such people afford something that most individuals cannot afford? There are only two possibilities I can think of: (1) A fraction of the group members have saved a great deal, enough to support the rest of the group (2) A different group will pay to support the group that did not save enough The problem with (1) is that I think even if you confiscated all of the excess savings of those who have saved enough for themselves, you still would not have enough to take care of all those who did not save enough. The problem with (2) is how does the other group save enough to support themselves as well as support the first group? It is either a giant Ponzi scheme that will eventually collapse, or you are relying on some innovations that reduce care costs in the future, something which has not happened so far despite many advances -- people always want more and better life, and they have tended to choose that over freezing the status quo and reducing the costs. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Culture wars (was Down with the government)
I'm not saying that everything coming out of Garrett's interview with Bernanke is not worth considering only because of his party affiliation. I am saying that from my perspective his agenda sucks, so I am judging him by his group, as far as that goes. These are people who know how to twist facts, take what people say out of context, and interrupt them before they can verbalize a rational reply (Bill O'Reilly could teach Garrett a thing or two!~) To see what I mean, just watch Fox Noise, the most popular news program in the world. They REALLY know how to use emotional, ad hominem attacks and straw man arguments!~) As for wasteful spending by the government, BOTH political parties engage in wasteful spending, BUT they have different priorities. One party wastes money on administrating entitlements and the other on the defense industry bureaucracy. On the other hand, much of corporate spending (of stockholder profits) is targeted for rewarding the executives, which they don't consider wasteful. After all, it is their job to increase profits, no matter how it affects, the environment, job creation, etc. One of the jobs of the corporate elite is to protect their destructive priorities to waste the environment. Therefore, in order to recruit mainstream, gawd fearing, true blue Americans to their Tea Party cause, they question whether Obama is really American (those thinly veiled racist, viral e-mails) label health care as a further descent into socialism (but not defense spending) and taking our government back, from those lazy, welfare parasites (some truth to that!~). Change is always scary for traditional fundamentalist conservatives. They fight it by promulgating good old fashioned family values. They nationalize patriotism, preach that (in the bible) marriage is only for opposite sexes, etc. They advocate a gun in every holster, fear and hatred of The Other (non whites) and good old greed for the NEW American dream (not for that house, anymore, but to be good little units of consumption!~) These industrialist capitalists capitalized on Marxist divisions how to make the transition from an agrarian to an industrial society and made sure the monopolists controlled the means of production. They blamed undocumented workers for taking away American jobs while hiring them to clean their homes, etc. Turns out Marx was right about a lot of things; too bad his standard bearers are only human and susceptible to demagoguery and corruption, like everyone else. Some of the progress for human rights is being reversed, but pendulum swings are part of the process of change. Two steps forward, one step back. I expect the Republicans will stage a temporary comeback, and the Tea Party will elect some nut jobs, but they will be ridiculed and laughed at by 2012. That may be Obama's plan. I don't agree that Social Security and Medicare are untouchable; reform is needed in billing for sure so insurance fraud is stringently prosecuted, pharmaceutical companies are held to reasonable profit margins, and preventive care is practiced, etc. By the time today's young reach retirement age they will inherit a reformed system that is cost effective and age-equitable. Right now AARP is one of those systems that is feeding off the status quo; they are also a business. I paid more pre-inflation dollars into Social Security than I will be getting out of it, but I'm OK with that; I lived in a time when wages were decent and was able to set some aside because I knew what was coming. It didn't take that much foresight to figure out world population would quadruple in my lifetime, so I lived like a monk, worked two jobs, bought 40 acres of land and own my home outright. Good thing I have Social Security because my annuities, 401Ks, mutual funds, and pension plans are in the tank. I will continue to live like a monk and hold off retirement til I'm 70, so my Social Security will double, hopefully enough to meet inflation. Unfortunately I won't be leaving anything to my sons as I plan to liquidate everything and set up a trust for Alcor. I just hope it isn't just another scam and there isn't a complete collapse of civilization so the electricity isn't turned off!~) Jon M ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
On Oct 19, 2010, at 7:18 AM, anar...@gmail.com wrote: There's also people like me who figure I'll not see much, if anything out of them but don't grouse too much about paying for those already in their golden years. For many years, this is how I have understood Social Security: It's money I'm giving to the self-proclaimed Greatest Generation. Dave ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 1:07 PM, Pat Mathews mathew...@msn.com wrote: Okay. Have it your way. We/they didn't save enough and consume health care with reckless abandon. May you never be in the workplace where the clerk, knowing that one must never, ever, consume health care one cannot afford, comes to work with the flu. That is a poor example of reducing health care costs. Flu shots cost almost nothing compared to expensive diagnostics (MRI, CT scans, etc.) or major surgeries. Also, paying for health care for the working is not a big problem, but paying for decades of premium health care for the retired is a big problem. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
On Oct 19, 2010, at 8:53 AM, John Williams jwilliams4...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 6:35 AM, Julia ju...@zurg.net wrote: The old people don't equate to the old culture. There's a fairly large intersection of the two, but neither is a subset (proper or improper) of the other. I understand that, but as you say, there's a fairly large intersection of the two. I agree, which is why I posed my question. I don't think the fact that there is not a perfect correspondence of old culture with old people answers my question. It's not an absolute correlation. I fit many people's profile of old people. Maybe only by a few years, but I'm definitely at least partially stuck in that cubbyhole. But I'm pretty far out on the bleeding edge of new culture, at least in the sense of this current cultural conflict, and plan to stay there as long as possible. And I know people far more into the age range of what's culturally considered old people who are at least as many sigmas out from the mean in my direction as I am, if not more. Granted, my corner of the Venn diagram is a lonely one, but it's not completely uninhabited .. Almost nothing that trickles down is fit to consume. -- Davidson Loehr ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Down with the government
On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 3:03 PM, Bruce Bostwick lihan161...@sbcglobal.net wrote: On Oct 19, 2010, at 8:53 AM, John Williams jwilliams4...@gmail.com wrote: On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 6:35 AM, Julia ju...@zurg.net wrote: The old people don't equate to the old culture. There's a fairly large intersection of the two, but neither is a subset (proper or improper) of the other. I understand that, but as you say, there's a fairly large intersection of the two. I agree, which is why I posed my question. I don't think the fact that there is not a perfect correspondence of old culture with old people answers my question. It's not an absolute correlation. Didn't I just agree with that in the text quoted above? I don't understand your point. My point, to borrow Julia's phrasing, is that since there is a fairly large intersection of the two (but not a perfect correlation), that the old people and the old culture should have approximately equal political power. Then I picked a political issue (SS, MC) that old people are generally in favor of, but which young and middle-aged people should favor much less, and asked why, if the old culture has so little power, they appear to have control of the issue. I don't believe any of the replies so far have directly addressed my question. The closest thing I saw was the implication that young people don't really care about the costs (and I'm not sure I believe that, anecdotal evidence notwithstanding). ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Starting Engineer's Salaries
Well, I decided to answer my own question. At www1.salary.com they give the average starting salary for an EE in the US as 59,646, but in the SF area it is about 74,700. So, that is about a 25% premium. At simplyhired.com they state that the average EE salary in the SF area is $87k/year. That's not bad money, but you can't buy a million dollar house with it. Housing prices are about 6x higher in the Bay area than in the Austin area. Salaries for engineers are 25% higher. Dan M. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Starting Engineer's Salaries
On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 3:29 PM, Dan Minette danmine...@att.net wrote: they give the average starting salary for an EE in the US as 59,646, but in the SF area it is about 74,700. So, that is about a 25% premium. At simplyhired.com they state that the average EE salary in the SF area is $87k/year. That's not bad money, but you can't buy a million dollar house with it. Housing prices are about 6x higher in the Bay area than in the Austin area. Salaries for engineers are 25% higher. It sounds like the SF Bay area is more likely to appeal to single engineers willing to live in a small apartment and spend all their time at work. As compared to Austin, which sounds like it may appeal more to a young married couple just starting a family. I wonder if the SF tech firms are counting on that. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
Re: Starting Engineer's Salaries
Don't get me wrong. I like Austin a lot. But if--after her last summer's trip to Austin and dinner at the Salt Lick--I were to propose to my wife that we move from Berkeley to Austin so that we could double the size of our house and live fifteen minutes closer to the center... well, I don't want to do that... Yours, Brad DeLong On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 6:36 PM, John Williams jwilliams4...@gmail.comwrote: On Tue, Oct 19, 2010 at 3:29 PM, Dan Minette danmine...@att.net wrote: they give the average starting salary for an EE in the US as 59,646, but in the SF area it is about 74,700. So, that is about a 25% premium. At simplyhired.com they state that the average EE salary in the SF area is $87k/year. That's not bad money, but you can't buy a million dollar house with it. Housing prices are about 6x higher in the Bay area than in the Austin area. Salaries for engineers are 25% higher. It sounds like the SF Bay area is more likely to appeal to single engineers willing to live in a small apartment and spend all their time at work. As compared to Austin, which sounds like it may appeal more to a young married couple just starting a family. I wonder if the SF tech firms are counting on that. ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com ___ http://box535.bluehost.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l_mccmedia.com
