Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Startups Ditching Silicon Valley For New Cities (economist.com)

Posted by msmash on from the changing-dynamics dept.

The rising cost of living in Silicon Valley is pushing startups out, the Economist reports, and re-focusing innovation in new cities around the country [Editor's note: the link may be paywalled; alternative source]. From the story: More Americans are leaving the Valley than moving to it. In 2017 several counties in the area saw their largest combined domestic outward migrations in around a decade. In a recent survey by the Bay Area Council, a think-tank, 46% of Bay Area residents said they planned to leave in "the next few years," up from 34% in 2016. This is not just a case of people of more modest means being pushed out by carpet-bagging techies. At this year's "FOO camp," a freewheeling annual gathering of hackers and others, a session called "Should I/you leave the Bay Area?" saw a strong turnout. Participants shared their gripes about the high cost of living, bad traffic and a "toxic" culture obsessed with money.

17 of 123 comments (clear)

  1. Makes perfect sense by LynnwoodRooster · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The world is small, thanks to communications and travel systems. Why go to the Bay area with exceptionally high costs and congestion? If you want great central California weather, there are lots of places just down the coast around SLO that are great. The LA/Ventura/OC area is great. And then there's the rest of the country as well. The only reason to be in the Bay area is you want to be there because you perceive it has "extra value" in terms of how others perceive you. In essence - vanity.

    --
    Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
    1. Re:Makes perfect sense by geggam · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Having just left the Bay area and starting to look for work hard I have this observation.

      The Bay moves exponentially faster in the hiring process. It is really hard to not go back simply due to the fact companies outside the bay want to take 3 - 4 weeks to hire you.

    2. Re:Makes perfect sense by jellomizer · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Sounds like hell. Which I think is the point. If you have an environment filled with like minded people then how do you expect to innovate?

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    3. Re:Makes perfect sense by CohibaVancouver · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The night life game there, where admittedly vanity is key, is seen as an end of it's own to a lot of locals.

      Young locals, certainly - But once you're 35, the 'night life game' starts to become pretty unimportant (and for many 35-year-olds it's likely been unimportant for a half-decade already). You'd rather be at a pub with your friends, sharing stories and nachos.

    4. Re:Makes perfect sense by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

      Actually, the night life in SV sucks. But San Francisco is only an hour away. SF is great: Plenty of chicks and a large percentage of the guys are gay, meaning less competition.

    5. Re:Makes perfect sense by PPH · · Score: 3, Funny

      Plenty of "chicks".

      --
      Have gnu, will travel.
    6. Re:Makes perfect sense by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

      The Bay moves exponentially faster in the hiring process.

      Indeed. My company is in SV (San Jose) and if a candidate interviews well, we try to make a job offer before they leave the premises. If we wait, many of them, especially the best of them, will already be working somewhere else by the time we call them back.

      We rarely bother calling references, or doing background checks, because both are mostly a waste of time. Good references don't mean much, and having a criminal record is not correlated with job performance.

    7. Re:Makes perfect sense by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Yes. There are no pubs in Silicon Valley.

      Another reason not to live there.

    8. Re: Makes perfect sense by DatbeDank · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Lolwut?

      Every club I've been in in the bay area is nothing more than a sausage party with techies who lack social skills who then gawk and talk tech with the few girls that do go out.

      I almost feel bad for single women in that city. Hoards of techies with unipolar interests. For goodness sake people, get hobbies that reside outside of tech and start ups.

    9. Re:Makes perfect sense by PopeRatzo · · Score: 5, Funny

      But once you're 35, the 'night life game' starts to become pretty unimportant

      That's true. For me, wild nightlife means putting a few drops of cannabis oil in my CPAP machine.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    10. Re:Makes perfect sense by PopeRatzo · · Score: 2

      You are using a CPAP and putting more shit in your lungs? You are an idiot.

      Don't be silly. I was just joking. I actually put the cannabis oil in my Preparation H.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
  2. There is a lot of talent elsewhere as well. by jellomizer · · Score: 3, Interesting

    You can go to some of the remote areas of the US. And be able to find talent which is just as good if not better then what you can find in SV.
    It isn't like it was 40 years ago, where talent had to be localized to particular areas. People are interconnected and talent can be anywhere.

    --
    If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
  3. Why didn't this happen 10 years ago? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    15 years ago I had an ex-GF who's sister worked in the Bay Area. She worked as a project manager, and couldn't afford a house, and was still renting at 35 years old. It just boggled my mind why she stayed.

    Flash forward 15 years and it's gotten worse. Plus add in the nutty narrow beliefs over there (They freaking banned selling fur for gods sake!), and I just don't understand why anyone would want to live there. Haven't ya'll heard there's a whole other country out here? Everything I've heard about Silicone Valley is utter shit.

  4. so what's new? by crgrace · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is old news. I've been hearing this story (and it's true about out-migration) my whole life. I remember when I first saw a big article about the "Hollowing Out of Silicon Valley" or something similar in the early/mid 1980s. The article was about how semiconductor and electronics manufacturing was the main employment driver in the San Jose area and the offshoring of manufacturing to Asia, coupled with high housing prices, was going to turn San Jose into Detroit by 1990. Didn't happen.

    Interestingly, the article was mostly true. There aren't many (just a few) fabs left in Silicon Valley, and Silicon Valley has mostly turned into Software Valley (and swallowed up San Francisco). What the article didn't anticipate was the combined strength of an innovative culture and importing the best of the best in the world to contribute. I think the cliched term is "Creative Destruction".

    Every since the early 1990s I think more Americans leave California than move here. However, at least in the town I grew up in, it was mostly low-skilled Americans moving out and high-skilled moving in (which has led to SERIOUS gentrification). This effect, coupled with a lot of high-skilled foreign immigration, had made my area more dynamic than I've ever seen it.

    When I was a kid, we had no ethnic food beyond Mexican and Chinese in my town. Now we just opened a Burmese restaurant to go along with the 20 other cultural restaurants. I think that's a sign of progress.

    My whole life (and I'm in my 40s) California was a "Liberal Cesspool of Business-Hating Over-Regulation, one step away from a spectacular collapse". And yet, here we are, doing better than ever.

    1. Re:so what's new? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      My whole life (and I'm in my 40s) California was a "Liberal Cesspool of Business-Hating Over-Regulation, one step away from a spectacular collapse". And yet, here we are, doing better than ever.

      Exactly.

      I grew up in the Bay Area. I left about 10 years ago for flyover country. I now live in a place that is constantly trying to woo tech companies with low taxes, cheap labor, cheap houses, etc.

      I went back to the Bay Area last year for the first time in about 10 and the place is freaking booming. I was actually a bit blown away.

      Every time they open s new office Park here on the so-called “silicon slopes”, local media and politicians gush about all he growth. These yocals have no idea.

    2. Re:so what's new? by Octorian · · Score: 2

      I grew up in the Bay Area. I left about 10 years ago for flyover country. I now live in a place that is constantly trying to woo tech companies with low taxes, cheap labor, cheap houses, etc.

      I hear about these places a lot. I wonder how many of them actually acknowledge what I consider to be the two most important factors in keeping SV attractive:

      - Critical mass of big *and* small employers ensuring that you have opportunity beyond the job that you originally moved there for.
      - Lack of non-compete agreements ensuring mobility amongst said jobs.

      (okay, there's also the bit about VC presence, which feeds into the first point)

  5. Re:Why work in an expensive, high tax state... by LynnwoodRooster · · Score: 3, Informative

    The issue isn't buying land for new office buildings - the issue is the tight housing market with insane valuations. And crazy traffic as well. Or dealing with taxi drivers urinating and defecating in SFO parking lots.

    --
    Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!