[krstck]

Denver has so many wonderful things, but this undercurrent of "I hate all the new people" is so gross. I've encountered it in situations where I'm literally handing money over to someone who is bitching about people moving here.

[wahsd]

Let me guess; you are one of those new people and are resentful that people you are freeloading and mooching off of are resentful that you are destroying the community and society they built over time.

Its the same thing in Austin, even though Austin has really be fully deconstructed at this point and it is nothing like the nice place it once was. It's become ever more exclusive, ever more restricted, ever more douchy and pretentious, ever more expensive, ever more packed with people that are trampling everything.

What's actually disgusting is people like you who are incapable of understanding why people would rightfully be resentful about freeloaders and moochers trampling and disrespecting things they created and have a bond to. It's easy being a freeloader and moocher, but it really does undercut any incentive to create anything.

I suspect that in the future we will see examples of restrictive legislation or policies that will rightfully penalize newcomers and mooching types that started swarming to the next version of Austin due to the internet brigading effect.

[seibelj]

I can't follow any of this. I'm not sure how moving some place, getting an apartment, getting a job, paying taxes, etc. (aka "living") constitutes "mooching and freeloading". I think you need to take Rhetoric 101 again.

[wahsd]

Let me explain what you don't understand and can't follow. The massive influx of people into Austin has degraded what Austin was because it has exceeded any capacity to fully absorb them without a degradation. When you arrive at something that others built and paid for and yet still have full access to as if you had paid for it, that's when you are mooching and freeloading specifically. That's the whole definition of freeloading, not paying for something that you are using or taking advantage of.

Now that you are provided with the information to understand what you could previously not, let me further help by illustrating the only way in which it could not be freeloading and mooching. If new comers had to pay exponentially higher tax rates, essentially as a kind of compensation and even a rate of return, which in turn then lowered the taxes of locals that would be the only way to not be freeloading and mooching, especially in a system like Austin that is in no way capable of sustaining the influx of people without significant impact and degradation of the very thing that attracted the freeloading and mooching types.

You seem to be under the impression that somehow paying the cost of operation is sufficient to compensate for prior investments, let alone rates of return. It's quite ironic that such an erroneous mindset would exist in this forum. Then again, it is a tech startup forum, so it really isn't all that surprising.

Think of it this way. If you take n amount of money and invest it in starting a company by buying facilities, equipment, various other capital goods, and hire people; how long to you think you would last by selling your product or goods at the cost of variable inputs alone? ... not even to mention the return on capital or investment. And that still doesn't even get close to capturing the human factor of community and society and culture that is lost through such a destructive locust like swarming of places.

I get that most people in here can't think past their own selfish wants and desires, but what do you think makes a place, any place, so attractive so that you want to go there, it's not your contribution that you made to that place. You are a textbook freeloader at that point, especially in smaller places like Austin used to be where all the things that attracted people to Austin like community and culture existed before they smothered it.

We are going to see ever more of these kinds of things happen as the internet causes human swarming behaviors. Maybe one day people will start realizing it and its absolutely detrimental impact on society and humanity. It is in effect a great leveling and averaging of humanity, a regression to mediocre mean that destroys uniqueness, actual diversity, and civilization, and incentive for community and creation. What are we when there is nothing unique anymore because the second something becomes great and a community comes together, an influx of freeloaders that want to mooch off of it start pulling it down? We are facing a future of the commoditization of humanity, accelerated by the internet and the exponential pace at which anything good or unique is discovered and immediately smothered and trampled.

[seibelj]

Did you build Austin? What constitutes a "local"? No one anywhere in America (or anywhere on Earth that I'm aware of) is required to pay a "foreigner tax" for moving into another city within the same country, which they are already a citizen of. Everything is supply and demand, everything is a push and pull. If Austin is bursting at the seams, it will take a few years for investment and policies to relax it. If Austin starts to empty out, slowly the city will shrink. The ebbs and flows of change are always happening, nothing is constant, everything is in motion. Austin is better served by attracting people than it is by pushing people away.

[natrius]

I was born in Austin, and I've lived here for about eight years. This city and it's people have taught me so much, and I really don't know who I'd be if I never came here. I want to share this place with as many people who want it. If you like what you've heard, come join us. We have a bit of a housing shortage that's driving up the cost of housing, but that's okay. We'll just build more homes.

[mywittyname]

Freeloaders & moochers are making everything more exclusive, expensive and pretentious?

How does that work? More importantly, if they have it so nice, why don't get what you're due and start freeloading?

[wahsd]

Freeloaders are driving up costs, due to the oversupply of people and unmet demand for housing and finite goods and services. The pretentiousness it simply a cultural function of the types of people that are being attracted to Austin; a mixture of internet douchbags that have ever increasingly proliferated adn infested SXSW, which are largely made up of the west coast and big city self-righteously self-absorbed.

If you don't know what I'm talking about, one of two things is true, either you're naive about this matter, or you are precisely the type I just referred to and, as expected, fully lack self-awareness. I realize that hearing something like that will not necessarily be well received here, but it's really a pestilent type of cultural phenomenon which is a pernicious type of cancer that is constantly eating away at any progress that can be made.

[mywittyname]

I guess you and I don't agree on the definition of freeloading. If these people are coming in and driving up the price of housing with their six-figure incomes, then I can understand your argument (and do a degree empathize with your sentiment). But to call those same people freeloaders is either mendacious on your part or ignorance on mine.

Freeloading is taking advantage of goodwill without returning the favor. I don't see how driving up the market price of housing is freeloading.

[jessaustin]

Wait, you're a Texan, using the phrase "ever more douchy" [sic]?