[closeparen]

Young adults necessarily occupy space in a way that hasn’t yet been legitimized by the passage of much time. Populations that need to work for a living must go where there is work. Many of the consequences of this set of facts are dire and inhumane, and responsible public policy manages their impacts as best it can. A world with no new households is one that has stopped reproducing. A world where people are confined to their economically depressed birth cities is another kind of dystopian hellhole.

Half of this wouldn’t even matter if we let housing become a positive-sum game.

[biocomputation]

You could always refuse to participate in the social and economic destruction of communities by simply not working at places that have a disproportionate impact on the surrounding community.

Yes, it's that easy!

<< A world where people are forced to leave their community of origin because rich tech workers can outbid them for housing is another kind of dystopian hellhole.

Fixed that for you.

[closeparen]

The size of your employer has nothing to do with your contribution to housing demand. A million employees of two-person startups have the same effect as a million Googlers, assuming similar budgets.

[biocomputation]

Interesting argument strategy. You pose something that will never happen in Seattle (a million employees of two-person startups) with something that actually has happened (Amazon).

If you're a transplant who works for Amazon, then it's because of a choice. You came from somewhere where you lived in a community with people you knew and who knew you. You don't need to be in Seattle.

People who are from Seattle need to live in Seattle. A lot of us don't want to leave our families or watch while our communities (or surrounding) communities are destroyed by waves of outsiders who know nothing about the area and who are only here for career/money.

Is that so hard to understand? How much should we have to accommodate? How many people? Should we sit idly by while people drive us out of our own neighborhoods?

Sorry, that's not going to happen.

[closeparen]

>You came from somewhere where you lived in a community with people you knew and who knew you

Sure. College, which ends. After that, returning to your hometown is only possible if you're privileged enough to be born somewhere with a decent local economy, and even then, chances are you'll be moving from family-oriented suburbs to an "up-and-coming" urban neighborhood with other young adults... same set of issues. Or you got priced out of the Bay Area, or your hometown's economy finally shrank to below the level where it can sustain you, etc.

> A lot of us don't want to leave our families or watch while our communities (or surrounding) communities are destroyed by waves of outsiders who know nothing about the area and who are only here for career/money.

There is nothing an American city can do to privilege its natives relative to other Americans. Privileges and Immunities Clause. What you can do is rent control + plan and zone for growth so that it's an increase in population, instead of a displacement.