Silicon Valley and the rest of the Greater Frisco Bay Area has always been one of the highest-cost of living areas in the world, but it’s enjoyed a productivity advantage over the rest of the US of 94%. When you factor high Silicon Valley costs into productivity, however, the area slips behind some fairly humble competitors, according to a shocking new study:
But with the cost of living factored in, the region’s advantage over the nation shrank to 31 percent in 2002. Only two years before, the Bay Area’s cost-adjusted productivity edge had been 43 percent. Moreover, the region had slipped into third place in the productivity race, behind Boise, Idaho, and Austin, Texas, after taking the cost of living into account.
It’s pretty sad when you can’t keep up with Texas, given the intellectual pretensions you find among Bay Area residents, but Frisco assemblyman Mark Leno is on the case, with the kind of forward-looking and visionary plan you only get from the nation’s best and brightest: raising the car tax in Frisco.
“Look, we paid the fee — which is 2 percent of the value of the car — from 1948 to 1998 without a word of debate or contention,” said Leno, D-San Francisco. He pointed out that the rollback was meant to last only as long as the state enjoyed good times.
Those poor Texans won’t even see this coming.