I am an engineer at another large company here in San Diego – 4000 employees
Stock options at this company used to be pretty much automatic – each time an employee bought stock through the company’s program he would receive 2 or 3 options
Now there are NO options awarded automatically with stock purchases
Also, stock options used to be given out as performance awards and that no longer happens (that I am aware of)
My point – engineers here in San Diego, in my experience, aren’t pulling down the kind of bucks that some people seem to think they are
And even with a six-figure income, these engineers aren’t going to prop up San Diego’s real estate market – perhaps I am the only one who has noticed, but a six-figure income in San Diego is just a comfortable living wage – it isn’t like $100K/year means you have money falling out of all your pockets and that you can afford an $800K POS tract home in North County
And we haven’t even talked about engineers, in general, being intelligent, parsimonious people who are less likely to be sucked into the tail end of this massive real estate bubble
Anyone who thinks tech is going to save San Diego’s real estate market is fooling themselves
