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From my outside looking in perspective, it seems the gold rush is waning in the Bay Area. There will always be a pretty healthy tech industry there but anecdota
by S_A_P 9y ago
From my outside looking in perspective, it seems the gold rush is waning in the Bay Area. There will always be a pretty healthy tech industry there but anecdotal evidence tells me that fewer people are heading west to make it big in startups. This is probably a good thing for everyone except real estate speculators though.
- regularfry 9y agoI'd be intrigued to know how much of that is because of remote working, and how much is because of traditional jobs growing in other places (and, of course, how much is people not doing startups). My gut says that remote working isn't big enough to cause this sort of shift, but I'd love to know if I'm wrong.
- delphinius81 9y agoOther cities with much better cost of living are gaining reputation in tech / start-ups and attracting talent (or just keeping the talent that went to school there).
- sidlls 9y agoReally? Which ones?
- jknoepfler 9y agoMinneapolis springs immediately to mind. Companies like Amazon are opening dev offices in medium-sized American cities now as well, because importing everyone into Seattle or Boston isn't sustainable. From my experiences in places like Minneapolis and Cincinnati, I'd project a pretty serious difussion of tech talent back into the Midwest.
- sidlls 9y agoI've interviewed with "tech" companies in some of the cities you mentioned. The compensation was substantially lower than anything I can get in the Bay Area (by about a factor of 2 compared to my current compensation, for example). The CoL adjustment wouldn't be greater than the reduced savings rate. These companies need to realize that the market rate for the kinds of engineering and talent they demand is set in the bigger cities, not their little slice of the Midwest. I understand why they're doing it, but for all the issues in the Bay Area the opportunities are still better than almost anywhere else and so is the pay.
- icebraining 9y agoAmazon does have 29 positions open in Minneapolis. On the other hand, they have 187 positions in Palo Alto plus 185 in San Francisco. And 7260 in Seattle.
- vanattab 9y agoPhilly, Columbus, Atlanta,Austin
- notfromhere 9y agoChicago
- chadgeidel 9y agoDenver/Boulder. Google just opened a big office up here and there are several incubators here as well. Housing costs are eye-watering from my perspective, but cheap for someone from SV or even Seattle.
- juandg 9y agoThe Bay Area has a pretty bad remote work culture. The vast majority of companies prefer if you’re physically here. Sure you can work from home or work remote while traveling for a few weeks, but for some insane reason most companies insist on your home base being here in the Bay Area. I’m sure there are notable exceptions and some people will disagree with me, but after 5 years here I’ve experienced first hand the aversion to remote work suffered by most Bay Area companies.
- borski 9y agoOh come on, you must know it's not just "some insane reason." A culture of remote work takes a lot of discipline, as it's so easy to have an in-person conversation, make a seemingly small decision at the time, and immediately the remote workers feel out of the loop. Remote work is actually /hard/ to support, and a company has to make it a priority to do it well and be disciplined about writing down all communication. Otherwise, they're setting up their remote employees for failure, which nobody wants. Also, there are things a remote worker just can't do; stand at a whiteboard and evaluate paths forward, for example. If a company values that sort of collaboration above anything else, it is certainly not "insane" to want people in the office.
- gozur88 9y agoI work on a big company with offices all over the US. My team is spread out over five different offices (which is pretty impressive given there are only seven of us). There's not much difference between being the only one on your team at your location and working from home. While it's true you have to have software and processes in place to communicate, it is doable.
- borski 9y agoI didn't say it was impossible. Plenty of companies do it successfully. All I said was it isn't /insane/ to not want to do it.
- sidlls 9y agoYour last point is one I'd take a step further. The kind of collaboration you describe is necessary for non trivial products. So for them, at least for the people working on the harder problems, 100% remote just isn't feasible.
- stevenwoo 9y agoI own and am considering selling to retire (versus going to work to finish paying off the mortgage), it's kind of crazy real estate wise out here - the amount that zillow/redfin reports as positive home appreciation every month feels like more than the last bubble. Maybe the bubble is about to burst, but I don't know how to determine that.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- gozur88 9y agoBubbles always take far longer to burst than you'd think, but when it happens, it happens fast.
- sjg007 9y agoI look at median salary, median home price, median rent and debt levels. Then again Google and Facebook print money...
- nfriedly 9y agoFirst, congratulations! Second, don't try to "time the bubble". Instead think about your goals. What do you actually want, and what is best for you (and your family if applicable). What's going to make your life more meaningful? What would make it a better story if someone were to tell it? If cashing in now and moving someplace cheaper is in line with your goals, then do it! If staying put and finishing off the mortgage is a better match, then so be it. Lastly, financial independence doesn't have to mean not working. I'm still 10-15 years away from that point, but I certainly plan to keep working well after I have enough to retire. I'll just have a bit more flexibility in what I choose to work on.