On a United flight from San Fran to Washington Dulles yesterday, I found the flight attendants particularly professional and courteous. When I went to the back to stretch my legs, I did what I often do: asked a flight attendant where she was based. This particular one answered that she’s based in San Fran but lives in Miami. So she arranges her schedule so that she is in San Fran for 3 weeks and Miami, with her boyfriend, for 5 weeks. I asked her how that works: where does she stay in San Fran?

Her two word answer: crash pad. I didn’t know what that was. She explained that 18 flight attendants share a 3-bedroom apartment near SFO. She said it’s illegal, but I don’t know whether that means that the local government has a regulation forbidding it or it means that it violates the rental contract. I asked her what the maximum number of people sleeping overnight it is at any one time. The most she’s seen is 7: two in each bedroom and one on the couch. Her share of the rent: $420.

I love hearing about the various ways people with unusual schedules adjust to high housing costs in the Bay Area.

On a later stretching-my-legs trip to the back, I asked another flight attendant what she did. She led by saying that she doesn’t have a “crash pad.” Her familiarity with the term made me think that it must be a common living arrangement. She lives in Fresno and drives to San Fran.

I’ve categorized this under “Revealed Preference,” but it’s really about people doing the best they can, given their knowledge, within constraints, in ways that no central planner would be able to figure. So I’ve also added “Central Planning vs. Local Knowledge.”