IDK about Boise, but the few mid-sized cities I'm familiar with are bemoaning a tech talent crisis and citing huge numbers of unfilled positions. But when I sh

IDK about Boise, but the few mid-sized cities I'm familiar with are bemoaning a tech talent crisis and citing huge numbers of unfilled positions. But when I shop around for jobs in those areas, two things stick out: 1. While they'll generally do better than 58k for non-entry-level positions, midwestern employers won't touch 1/3rd of my coastal salary. Housing doesn't even come close to compensating. Even if someone straight up gifted me a house in the midwest, I'd still net close to 6 figures better on the coast. 2. More importantly, and 100% related to #1, midwestern employers have no idea how to leverage my skills. Therefore, the work is generally less interesting (lots of not-so-challenging implementation roles and a lot of that is web stuff; very little industrial R&D) with no room for growth (except perhaps into vaguely technical mid-level management at a particular type of company, which I'm not interested in). 3 (This one is admittedly purely about personal taste). The local support for public schooling k-12+ is spotty. Some of the best schools in the country, but also some of the worst. And you basically have to live in sprawlville to use the good schools. Meanwhile, the interesting jobs are still mostly where you'd expect and the bike/transit infrastructure connecting wealthy suburbs to downtown areas with interesting jobs just doesn't exist... so, better buy a comfortable car. IMO this won't change for at least one more decade. The tech talent for one type of computer science will begin to fill in just as demand shifts to a different type of computer science. I'd be unsurprised if that continues indefinitely. The only way out is for these communities to build out their own talent pipelines a la Pittsburgh or Chicago. But Chicago is Chicago, and Pittsburgh can pull on its rich institutions from a glorious past. So, IDK how you bootstrap that sort of thing.