Report: Bay Area jobs surge creating 'superstar' economy of haves, have nots

San Jose Mercury ^ | 04/02/2014 | George Avalos

[artichokegrower]

The economic surge in the Bay Area and other parts of California that's being led by the tech boom could create a "superstar" economy of haves and have nots, an economist said in connection with a new economic forecast that's being released Wednesday.

In their quarterly report, experts with the closely watched UCLA Anderson Forecast predict the current drought won't choke the economic upswing in California -- although the protracted dry spell could cause job growth to expand more slowly than initially anticipated.

While the issue of economic haves and have nots wasn't addressed in detail in the current report, Edward Leamer, an economist and director of the UCLA Anderson Forecast, warned in an interview with this newspaper the bifurcated economy.

[Fee]

There is too many glamorizing of hi tech industries as sources for new high paying jobs. Go to Silicon Valley and you see hi tech has four social layers. On the top are the owners and exec founders. They take the most percentage of profits for themselves as salaries, next is the small number of unique skill American grad that are not available from anywhere in the world, next is a token number of American hi tech workers usually young and have the hip image to enhance the hi tech company image. The bulk of the mundane work is not done by US college grads, but rather foreign H-1B workers from China and India at 1/3 of US tech worker salaries. In a nutshell for one software company does not even hire the amount of US workers like oil and gas industries do. In the end the small cadre of hi tech workers do not have the purchase power to stimulate a regional economy like the numerous good paying workers of gas and oil. Look at up state NY which attracts biotech and hi tech firms in their deteriating cities with the offer of 10 years no state tax deals. The ones that open hire a paltry number of workers compared to oil and gas in PA and OH. Worst these high tech companies opt to hire foreign H-1B tech workers over American college grads. Like Wall Street bankers, hi tech lie to the gov on their H-1B applications.

[RayChuang88]

You are completely correct. If fracking was legal in New York state, crumbling cities from Buffalo east to Utica and beyond would be booming right now as thousands upon thousands of workers in the natural gas fields would be snapping up and rebuilding a lot of "fixer upper" homes--and those thousands of natural gas field workers would add seven to eight more workers in other fields per gas field worker. The result would be a booming economy and a way lower unemployment rate, not to mention so much new tax revenue that New York state could do what what thought impossible: lower tax rates, which in turn attracts even more businesses to the state.

[A_Former_Democrat]

And like those hypocrites care? Gentrification has been going on for years now and if you saw inside their evil little minds, they’re damn glad to run the minorities off to Oakland and Richmond.

[wac3rd]

Lifer Commies with literal millionaire type retirements lecturing the public on fairness

[CorporateStepsister]

” they’re damn glad to run the minorities off to Oakland and Richmond. “

Along with the poor working class whites.

[kearnyirish2]

“This is not just a Bay Area thing, or a California thing,
the middle class is being eliminated across the entire nation.”

That’s right; our middle-class way of life has been off-shored to Asia. Much of our manufacturing will never come back because now the CUSTOMERS (formerly Americans) are in Asia now. Why sell to 300 million when you can sell to 3 billion?

[kearnyirish2]

“Gentrification has been going on for years now and if you saw inside their evil little minds, they’re damn glad to run the minorities off to Oakland and Richmond.”

Michael Bloomberg’s dream was to make NYC a playground for the wealthy, but he couldn’t attract many; too many had already fled the locusts, and wouldn’t come back. Here in northern NJ, Newark is destined to fail in its bid to re-introduce a white middle class because it won’t re-settle the locusts while other places (Jersey City, for example) are quite willing to do so. In the end, most Americans don’t want to live in any of these places; any emerging middle- or upper- class is mostly composed of imported “replacement Americans” anyway.