M&A lawyer. Travel & lifestyle photographer. Recovering New Yorker. Strong opinions, loosely held.
San Francisco, CA
Joined July 2008
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Peter Wu retweeted
this is insane
In 2005 San Francisco firefighter unions successfully pushed a proposition making it illegal to close or consolidate existing firehouses. It even prevents any apparatus from being changed. Despite some firehouses receiving < 3 calls a day. (not a typo)
Since then working fires have fallen 36% (309 to 197) as medical calls increased by far more.
More than a third fewer working fires. But each engine and tiller is a protected species (plus crew & exact role) and cannot ever be replaced with say, 3 ambulances and crews at ~same cost.
Meanwhile you still need an ambulance for transport. Which is going to be a while because as noted in an audit they cannot “add additional ambulance shifts by re-assigning existing resources from fire”.
But at least 5 guys in turnout gear can babysit with the $2.5M truck their medical kits are in.
Peter Wu retweeted
TX: you want to build some "clean energy," son? sounds like gay communism. anway, here's your permit
CA: oh my Gooood yaaass kween clean energy!! but your 3,000 page report on harms to nonbinary snail communities wasn't sufficient for the HOA so see you in court for 30 years
It's very very hot in Texas.
But the grid is fine.
Electricity prices are manageable.
What happened?
🔋🔋🔋🔋BATTERIES!!! 🔋🔋🔋
heatmap.news/energy/texas-gr…
Peter Wu retweeted
Jane Kim is a failed career politician. She ran for and lost State Senator and SF Mayor.
She’s trying to run for Insurance Commissioner, a technical actuarial role, with zero qualifications.
It is important that you do NOT vote for her. Tell your friends.
Peter Wu retweeted
this California wealth tax thing is just incredible.
so in October 2025, a California healthcare union proposed a "one time" 5% tax on any billionaire's wealth. the ballot measure will be voted on next month. In early December 2025, California announced that it would be a retroactive tax if passed, applying to anyone with CA residency as of Jan 1, 2026. The objective is to pay for Medi-Cal, California's incredibly dysfunctional healthcare system. (which also functions as a glorified welfare apparatus, but that's a discussion for another time).
polls reveal that the CA electorate is split around 50/50 on the tax, but prediction markets only give Prop 40 a ~23% chance of passing (there are competing measures on the ballet that would nullify it).
there are 200 billionaires in CA, worth collectively somewhere between $2.3 and $2.6 trillion. 5% of that is around $100b, accounting for a small amount of attrition. proponents of the tax forecasted a significant windfall, assuming only a 10% departure rate.
supporters thought they were being clever with the retroactive concept. no billionares would leave CA in the few short months between the tax being proposed and the residency cutoff date, without the tax even having passed yet, right?
well as it turns out, they did.
a new paper [1] from two academics at Stanford called "The Net Present Value of the California Billionaire Tax Act", argues that not only did more billionaires leave due to the proposed tax than its proponents expected, but that the value of the tax, if it does pass, is actually negative.
proponents of the tax only assumed 10% avoidance, that is, only 10% of the taxable base of targeted billionaires would leave CA within the very short Oct-Dec 2025 window. Jaros and Rauh, the Stanford academics, find that a lower bound of 28.6% of the taxable base managed to leave.
just based on known departures, those departures total $577b in net worth, or $28.8b in potential tax lost. this of course does not capture everyone (many left without announcing their departure), so the authors normalize to departure rates estimated from other wealth tax events, and apply other discounts for litigation, arriving arrive at a figure of only $28-$36b in forecasted tax revenues.
but this isn't all! all of the income taxes paid by the departed billionaires are also forsaken. the authors estimate that CA billionaires pay $3.3- 5.8b in annual income taxes. they assume a midpoint of $2b lost in annual collections from departed billionaires. the net present value of that lost income stream is -$68.9 billion.
so when you add it all up you get:
+ $30b one-time tax windfall (estimated)
- $69b in present value of lost future income taxes
= - 38.9b overall net present value of the tax
of course, this analysis is highly estimate driven. the authors simulate the parameters 100k times and find a negative NPV of the implemented tax 85 percent of the time.
and if the tax doesn't pass, which it's not looking like it will, California still ended up losing at least $577b in departed net worth, and they have permanently poisoned the well with entrepreneurs who will now worry about future wealth taxes.
[1]: nber.org/system/files/workin…
Peter Wu retweeted
SF spends double any other major city on its fire department, which is just a bunch of emergency response in a giant expensive truck-sized trench coat.
We should reform firefighter hiring and pay, reduce the number of fighter fighters, give them smaller vehicles, close down 8 fire stations (of 48!) which see fewer than 3 calls per day, and most importantly, stop blindly Respecting whatever they say about single-stair reforms, lane widths, outdoor dining, etc.
My friend reacted to hearing my anti-fire-department screed by asserting that SF firefighters are hot -- I would also support assigning 5% of our firefighters to do PR work at Beaux. They're good with poles.
Peter Wu retweeted
@GrowSF says yes on Prop 43 and I think it makes a ton of sense.
California shouldn't have a ballot proposition system *at all*. I voted yes on Prop 43. Policy should be written by legislators.
Peter Wu retweeted
We endorse Darshini Patel for District 8 Supervisor. She’s outcome-driven, reads the research, and thoughtfully engages on complex issues. She’s strongly pro-housing and will fight for more shelter and drug treatment facilities that the city needs.
growsf.org/voter-guide/#supe…
Peter Wu retweeted
Everything bad in American society, culture, and politics is partly a Russian op
I built 2,970 homes in San Francisco, 2015 to 2031. Grade B, "Builder of Some Things". Survived all eight investor reviews. 9 hearings, 1 appeals, 2 lawsuits. The city needed 82,069.
Peter Wu retweeted
NEW: Seattle’s mayor ran as a democratic socialist. Then she ran into reality.
Katie Wilson has been hobbled by a $175 million deficit, staff upheaval and a steep learning curve on public safety, the city's most intractable issue.
While New York under Mamdani makes for an easy comparison, it’s San Francisco that has become the envy of Seattle officials. A top adviser went there last month to study Daniel Lurie's tactics on crime.
Peter Wu retweeted
Pure joy. Every day of the week at Sunset Dunes in San Francisco.
(This is a Tuesday at 5pm)
Don’t rip out this playground to bring cars back to a road that lost its greatest utility from coastal erosion.
Save Sunset Dunes. No on Prop G.
Peter Wu retweeted
Impressive. This set of talks, along with the new America dot gov website, has the unmistakable feel of an Apple launch event. They're rebooting the federal government as a tech startup. Several observations.
(1) First, with this new AI interface to the entire federal government, if it works as promised, there won't be a single American who can't say their life wasn't helped at least in part by AI, or that the benefits accrued solely to zillionaires. This in itself cannily mitigates anti-datacenter sentiment.
(2) Second, Joe Gebbia and Marco Rubio's talks on simplifying name changes and passport filings introduce a completely new era where the US government is actually launching tangible features that benefit users.
(3) Third, this launch event in and of itself may visibly drive reform. It could become much more important than the State of the Union. Unlike laws, code is user-visible, and can be instantly audited by the public, as Obama found out with the failed obamacare website launch. So: the annual America dot gov event may be substance, whereas SOTU is traditionally optics. I wouldn't be surprised to see the President present at the next one.
(4) Fourth, this kind of event is a perfect example of where tech and red cooperate best. They both hate bureaucracy. Automating paperwork with code reduces the power of statists over both capitalists and nationalists. It's also hard to undo by other admins: once you digitize a process, hard to turn it back to paper.
(5) Fifth, it's an obvious point perhaps, but think about how much influence YCombinator has had in 20 years. From Gebbia's Airbnb joining their 2009 batch to a complete overhaul of the user interface of the US bureaucracy, and thus the US government.
(6) Sixth, this is another take on the network state. The functional part of the US (the network, meaning tech) is merging with and partially reforming the dysfunctional part (the state, meaning bureaucracy) by automating 20th century paper forms.
As a tech startup, there will no doubt be bugs and user issues and so on, but unlike with paper laws those issues will be visible and the code fixes will be verifiable. A new era of AI America. Rooting for them.
Peter Wu retweeted
San Francisco is running an experiment this year where first time home buyers got $5,000,000 down payment assistance from venture capitalists and somehow it didn’t make things more affordable
Peter Wu retweeted
Fuck yes. Desperately hope @SFMTA_Muni cuts at least 50% of stops on most routes. The 1 california quite literally stops on every single block in the entire eastern half of SF. It's absolutely unusable.
Peter Wu retweeted
This is cool to see. A UC Regents member is changing his mind on the value of standardized tests:
“Last time around, I voted to get rid of the SAT, & I’m starting to believe I might have made a mistake”
Peter Wu retweeted
Fan of Lurie but this plan is terrible… most are bad policies and none address the actual problem.
SF has a severe supply-demand imbalance in housing.
More rules governing the existing stock don’t fix that… making it harder to evict tenants behind on rent, limiting rent increases when landlords make capital improvements, and spending $1M telling people about existing laws does not create cheaper housing… in many cases it limits supply.
If I have an ADU that I’d consider renting out, but you made eviction for nonpayment harder, I will think twice about renting it out. If I can’t increase rent when making capital improvements I will not make capital improvements!
In the short run, we should help people facing real hardship and do everything possible to get vacant, ADU, and near-ready housing onto the market fast.
The long run answer is obvious: build more housing
Lurie has made some good progress on upzoning and cutting development fees but there is a long way to go: other cities finish building projects before San Francisco even approves them.
A few years ago, San Francisco had lost its way. Today, crime is down, unsheltered homelessness is at its lowest level in 15 years, visitors are coming back, companies are bringing jobs, and San Franciscans feel our city is moving in the right direction.
But too many are asking: Can I still afford to live here?
This year, rents have risen more than 25% and more than 1,000 eviction notices have been filed.
San Francisco is in a rent emergency. Today we are taking urgent action to help San Franciscans stay in their homes.
Working with the Board of Supervisors, City Attorney David Chiu, and leaders across government and communities, we are putting forward a sweeping package to protect renters from eviction and prevent rent spikes.
In partnership with Supervisors Danny Sauter, Matt Dorsey, and Jackie Fielder, San Francisco will:
➡️ Protect rent-controlled tenants from sudden spikes by capping combined annual impact of banked rent increases and capital improvement costs at 10%
➡️ Protect renters against evictions when they fall behind by less than one month of rent
➡️ Invest an additional $3 million in Tenant Right to Counsel, so more San Franciscans facing eviction can get full legal representation
➡️ Raise Ellis Act relocation assistance by 25% to reflect the rising cost of finding a new home
➡️ Strengthen enforcement of our tenant protection laws and invest $1 million in a citywide Know Your Rights campaign
➡️ Invest more than $54 million this year in emergency rental assistance, legal defense, and more
As we help people stay in their homes today, we must confront what is driving housing costs up in the first place. We need more homes.
So we’re doing both: building more housing to make San Francisco more affordable for the future, and keeping people in their homes today. We still have work to do, but people want to be here again—we should welcome them.
And to build a lasting recovery, we need the people already here. The people who teach our children, keep us safe, run our restaurants, create our art, start new businesses, and make San Francisco a vibrant city. As our city grows, we should make sure that you can build your future here too.
