HISTORY OF THEACHER

History teacher Leon Sultan was raised in a San Francisco that working class
families could call home. That place has, for the most part, vanished.

The city is now the centre of America's thriving tech industry, with some of the
highest housing costs in the US. Homeownership is in retreat and homelessness is
surging, alongside newly-minted fortunes.

Mr Sultan currently lives in a rent-stabilised one bedroom apartment with his wife,
who also works in education, and his four-year-old son. When they move to a
bigger place in a few weeks, their rent will almost double.

"When I was born in the city in 1978, a two-income earning family could buy a
home," he says. "At this point, the only way to buy a home, if you're a normal
person... is to have some sort of edge."

"I feel lucky that I haven't been displaced yet."

'Unsustainable' course
Mr Sultan, and many others, blame the changes on the Bay Area's tech boom,
which has created vast wealth divides.
The growing backlash has played out in fights over new taxes targeting
tech and protests against the commuter buses that ferry workers south from San
Francisco to Silicon Valley, where many tech giants have their headquarters.
 San Francisco: Where a six-figure salary is 'low income'
 Homeless in US: A deepening crisis on the streets of America
 The major cities being designed without children in mind

For years, the tech giants have faced down their critics unabashed. But now there
are signs of change.

In June, Google said it would invest $1bn in housing and Facebook has also
pledged $1bn. Apple upped the ante this month, saying it would devote $2.5bn to
the issue.

"We know the course we are on is unsustainable," Apple boss Tim Cook said as he
revealed his firm's plans.

Those moves followed a flurry of smaller donations and activity from firms such as
Cisco and Microsoft, which said it would invest $500m in housing in its home state
of Washington.