If I wasn't on rbtl status (I think that's the status they give when they take away mod powers) I'd give a +1 Insightful for you.

Thanks for sticking up for me Jeremy.

I didn't exactly get bailed out. My principle is the same. Only our interest rate was adjusted (and fixed) So we're still paying the same for our house. Basically, we spent 10 years paying interest on our loan. So the ones that REALLY made out here was the bank.

I gotta disagree with not pointing the finger at wall street though.

I got really giddy the other day when congress told the banks, "NO MORE USING OUR BAILOUT MONEY FOR BONUSES" Remember all the outrageous bonus's those guys got? Bernie Madoff anyone?

I'm not upset for myself, I'm upset for others. I'm pretty happy where I am in life now.

If you're doing good, great, but the majority of folks I know have had to get back to the end of the line. I know some of the guys that used to run the ISP arm of Earthlink here in the bay area. They're worth every penny. (I'm not half bad myself as a network admin that knows my way around routers,bgrp, some light coding) Even these guys though got the axe in 2001. I met a few of them when I did a stint of phone support last year (now I remember why I hated it)

Nobody has outdated skills either. Most of my references died out as 90% of the companies I worked for imploded. Notable examples of places I worked at, Metricom (Ricochet Wireless Modem) and Commerce one. Most of us don't look at the tech as something to make money with either (at least I don't) I learn on my own because it interests the hell out of me. I love building things.

So you got to keep your house that you obviously can't afford

We could afford it at the time. We bought an "as is" house with numerous problems because it was the cheapest one on the market in an area we wanted to be in. We figured we'd just keep working, and fixing the problems as we saved our money along.

We didn't buy a house with 0 down either. My wife and I both cashed in stock options (that we had earned and vested at .coms) and had a $50k downpayment on a $500k house. So how dare you discredit the hard work we did getting to that point.

Why did you refinance repeatedly?

After 2001-9/11 it wasn't just the banks screwing people over. The counties lost a ton of funding (again, went to Iraq) Everyone's property taxes got raised sky high (we're at about $7k@year)

Let's face it man, with every city in the bay area suffering a deficit, from San Jose to Vallejo (who went bankrupt) everyone, everywhere lost funding. Inflation really hit hard. Gas prices skyrocketed.

Guys like countrywide home loans really set up a lot of hardworking folks to fail. We were with countrywide in the beginning.

How can you look yourself in the mirror now that you've taken such obvious charity from the rest of us?

  I'm not the only one in this boat. I am the 99%.

I'm not pimping any skills anymore. I'm perfectly happy where I am, not climbing the corporate ladder. I've gotten enough roots planted now where my future looks pretty solid.

You quote my "fucked" like it's inaccurate. If you had any concept of the world outside of your cubicle, you'd see it's still fucked. Local Silicon Valley cities are tanking. Here's some good reads since it doesn't seem like you see the world outside anymore.

San Jose City Budget Deficit.
http://www.sanjoseca.gov/mayor/goals/budget/BudgetDeficit.asp#impact

In the North bay Vallejo had to declare bankruptcy protection.

http://www.ci.vallejo.ca.us/GovSite/default.asp?serviceID1=712&Frame=L1

City of Santa Clara in Deficit.
http://santaclaraca.gov/index.aspx?page=50&recordid=560

  I live in San Jose, CA.

Our economy tanked because of this stupid war we've been fighting for the last 10 years. Where we were during the .com would have sustained if we had actually stayed the course, just stuck to going after Osama, and not blown trillions of dollars "liberating Iraq"

Another reason our economy is tanking is because of the buzzwords uttered left and right by the 1% as our salvation to creating the ultimate world utopia. "Globalization" IT Salaries are increasing, but are the jobs actually increasing? No, they aren't. China has proven to stand on their own when it comes to engineering. I look at my Android HTC phones in awe. My LG microwave runs circles around any GE (which oddly enough, was made in china, and rebranded as GE)

The investing 1% doesn't give a rats ass about you. At the end of the day, if it's a choice between hiring you or someone overseas to do the same quality of work for cheaper. Guess what? You're nothing more than a sum() function on a spreadsheet to them.

This is what the OWS people have been fighting for. Sure, you might be making good money, but your "cloud" skills are just going to be used until your product is stable enough to get shipped overseas. Cloud means it doesn't have to be here.. Think about that... Corporations shouldn't be allowed to setup shop overseas unless they're willing to provide the same levels of safety, and workers rights that they would get in the states.

So enjoy your time in the clouds anon.

2 weeks after my wife and I bought our house in 2001, I was laid off. After 3 months of searching 9/11 happened, and the shit really hit the fan. Silicon Valley for a time looked like a ghost town. Moving trucks were moving east (getting the fuck out of dodge so to speak)

A year later I wound up getting a crappy job at a bar. 10 years later I'm still here, working on my own software that runs certain aspects of the bar (very profitably I might add) When we bought our house in 2001 interest rates were sky high, and the wife and I thought our futures in tech were pretty secured. I think we were at 10% interest. We refinanced twice over the 10 years trying to keep payments down so we could stay in our house.

In the last 2 years the ARM on our loan got so high we were paying over $1600@mo for the new interest charges alone. We were virtually on the brink of losing our house. Then the "Obama Affordable home" plan was passed. Bank of America didn't make it easy. My wife had to call them every single day for a year. (like calling your AT&T subcontractor when your T1 goes down) At one point they denied us because "We couldn't verify your identity" (one of the loan modders wrote my social security number down wrong)

Despite what you might think of Obama.. He's just doing the best he can. He's no Bill Clinton, but having to clean up after GWB can't be easy. He stopped the banks from bending over hardworking people. Osama was killed during his term. Troops are withdrawing from Iraq.

You call this going up?

I made $85k in 2001, before 9/11 and before my layoff (after 10 years in IT) Ever hear the saying, "If you're out 6 months, you're back at square one?" It's true.

The economy is fucked as ever. The kids they're paying $78k to have vastly more talent than I ever did, and had they been getting paid 2001 wages, would be making closer to 130k if not more.

How can we be expected to teach children to learn how to read if they can't even fit inside the building!

Been meaning to point this out since /. has been using the green cross category picture. Here in California if you see a green cross, it means there's a marijuana club nearby.

I'm all for uncensored sites to a point BTW, it's just that I know yelp is a bunch of sleazebags and is using DMCA (they actually quoted it to me over the phone) as leverage to extort money from people.

I guess you're OK with extortion.