Why People Throw Rocks: A Big Tech Take Down

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Over the last few years, technology employees have overwhelmed the San Francisco Bay Area’s already-fragile housing market. As rents skyrocket, residents frustrated with their changing neighborhoods have targeted the buses that deliver tech employees to and from Silicon Valley, from San Francisco and Oakland.

In his new book, “Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus How Growth Became the Enemy of Prosperity,” Douglas Rushkoff dissects the protests against those buses, and finds examples of Bay Area frustration throughout the country, where tech companies are growing at all costs—to the detriment, he believes, of CEOs, employees, and communities.

As these companies grow exponentially, Rushkoff says, Americans are taking note, that “all these people are having to drive Uber cars and all these other people are having to rent their apartments on AirBnB.

“People are becoming aware of the fact that the growth of all of these companies is not leading to any sort of participation or distribution of the assets to others,” Rushkoff explains.