So if anything, Amazon will make the market worse for all other companies by sucking up a lot of the talent and causing a rise in wages. It might be good short term for software devs, but like Seattle and The Valley, it hurts absolutely every other industry. The person in your IGA or Starbucks often has to commute via bus or train or (god forbid) car over an hour out just so they can afford to barely make it, while tech people can pay the $2k ~ $4k a month for a 1 bedroom within 15 minutes of work.
Highly-paid professionals need service people, so bringing more of them into your city creates more demand for other careers to support them.
If there isn't enough affordable housing for those lower-paid people, that's a failure by the local politicians. Don't blame the highly-paid professionals; they're not the ones controlling zoning and development.
I think most people on this thread are in agreement. It's not the tech people who are "to blame", it's the companies and politicians for not developing a sustainable growth strategy that includes housing for all the jobs that support those tech workers.
Suddenly bringing in 25k high paid workers without a concrete plan on how to support that growth (including not giving gigantic tax breaks which would impact the necessary schools/police/transportation/etc of the area) is the root cause of the housing and traffic issues in Silicon Valley. I think local politicians are becoming a bit wiser to that kind of thing after seeing how gentrification is causing issues in other cities. NYC local politicians are probably the most aware, given NYC's history.
There's nothing "sudden", however. These housing problems in major metro areas have been going on for a long time, and there hasn't been any action at all to rectify it. No one's building good, affordable housing at a proper density anywhere, as far as I can tell.
