As someone who's lived in both the Dayton and San Francisco areas, I have to say: SF has a lot more going on and might be my choice if I were still single. But

As someone who's lived in both the Dayton and San Francisco areas, I have to say: SF has a lot more going on and might be my choice if I were still single. But with a family, I'm a lot happier living in the Dayton area now. It helps that my mortgage here it ~1/2 of what rent was in the bay area (and ~1/4 of what I would have paid for a smaller place in SF proper.) Of course, the big differentiator in my case is that with working in software, I can work remote - I've spent more time working for California companies from Ohio than from California.