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I'll go ahead and contribute to this discussion, since, well, I'm a Mormon. I was a little bit shocked to see this be the top comment. I served a mission in ea
by austenallred 13y ago
I'll go ahead and contribute to this discussion, since, well, I'm a Mormon. I was a little bit shocked to see this be the top comment.
I served a mission in eastern Ukraine (Донецк, Харьков) from 2008-2010 and there learned to speak Russian fluently. Since returning home I've had probably a half dozen offers to work for the FBI or other government offices. Every now and then the highest level Russian classes at BYU will get an announcement from some government agency trying to recruit us, and a lot of them are rumored to actually be the CIA.
It's more than just the language fluency (not all return missionaries speak the same level of Russian,) it's also having lived in the culture and living very conservative lifestyles (no smoking/drinking, emphasis on families, etc.) and fierce loyalty. It's the overall perfect stereotype for what government agencies want.
Combine that with how cheap everything is ($80K/year is a pretty solid job here and $500K bought my parents a 3-story 3,000 square foot house). That's the reason Adobe, Microsoft, Novell, eBay, Overstock.com, Goldman Sachs etc. have all started to put up shop in Utah - it's ideal if you want people who are content to do a good job with their 8-5 and go home to their families.
The new data center in utah is probably a mixture of all of these things; everything is uber-cheap including workforce, so why not put a data center there? (Bluehost is here as well).
- jdale27 13y agoThat's the reason Adobe, Microsoft, Novell, eBay, Overstock.com, Goldman Sachs etc. have all started to put up shop in Utah Off topic, but one of those things is not like the others... Novell was founded in Utah more than 30 years ago.
- 0xdeadbeefbabe 13y agoI've heard Mormons live outside of Utah too.
- JPKab 13y agoWhy were you "shocked"? Was there anything at all I said that wasn't accurate? Mormons are absolutely, astoundingly overrepresented in the United States Federal Government Intelligence Community. This is a well-known and documented fact. When I hear "shocked", it makes me think that you think my comment is prejudiced in some way, or is perhaps making a wrong judgement on motivations for locating a data center. Anyone who thinks there wasn't a big "there's plenty of Mormons there to recruit for the job" factor in the decision is kidding themselves. Cheap land can be found in virtually every part of the country. There are tons of tech workers in Colorado, Arizona, Alabama (Huntsville), Texas (Austin/San Antonio metro area), etc. All of these places have super cheap land.