Yes, there are talented programmers in every metropolitan area but the Bay has significantly more of them than anywhere else.

For one, you have a lot more competition from other applicants, because every brogrammer thinks that he needs to move to SV to be part of the scene (and I really dislike that SV is becoming Hollywood-for-nerds; flooded with tons of fledgling wannabes who worship at the feet of an elite few).

For two, you have a lot more snobbery and people expecting specific pedigrees. They want Ivy League, they want other startup or big-name tech experience, etc. There are a lot more people who think talking to a candidate coming from a job in Nebraska where he wrote software for a company that runs a machinery rental business (for example) is below them. That type of experience is severely undervalued, and if SF needs anything it's more people with an appreciation for a stable production ethos.

For three, SF is appreciably worse along most axes and the extreme cost of living means the "extra" money go down the drain very quickly, seriously diluting the real value of the salary. This is compounded when you consider that taxes are also very high in CA and SF, especially compared with states without income taxes like TX or FL.

Four, we're talking about "the Midwest" as a unit here, but the fact is there are a lot of cities in the Midwest and some of them have a lot more bustle than others. There are not many companies that are strictly tech companies, but there are hundreds of potential employers in every metro area, and again, some are much more active than others.

Also, when discussing job markets in the "Midwest", I'm really referring to everything that's not a tech hub, because the distinction is really tech hub v. non-tech hub. Houston and Dallas/Ft. Worth are in the top 5 biggest metros in the US and I'm sure there's plenty of tech work there. Florida is one of the most populous states in the US and the availability will depend on the metro, but they have a good share of tech work. The Mountain West has much to offer (especially Utah).

The point is that there is plenty of opportunity for someone who wants to look outside of NYC, SF, SEA, and LA. No one should feel like they're trapped there as long as they're willing to work for some companies that aren't household names.

Lastly, you never run out of opportunities if you're willing to work remote, and this can be a good way to maximize the benefit of low COL areas.

I'd also add that there is something to be said for diversification of industry. Anecdotally at least, it seems like the last time the tech bubble burst, the bay area was hit the hardest. Other cities had more to fall back on in other industries that need tech (finance, insurance, medical etc). The real advantage to SV is 1) access to VC and 2) it comes back faster after a down cycle.

The network effects are unparalleled. We're paid far better (my salary nearly doubled when I moved to the Bay, my rent didn't). It's far easier to find quality talent and freelancers for startups than elsewhere.

But most importantly, the money and culture is here. Raising money outside of the VC scene here is orders of magnitude more difficult and you get far less for the time you spend.

And I could go on about how places I've been (South Florida, Chicago, Research Triad, etc) all claim to want to be the "next Silicon Valley" but they won't. Partly because SV didn't become the "next" anything, it garnered a unique culture that funded massive amounts of innovation, and anyone chasing a trend is too late. But mostly because the money and tech people in those cities are too cowardly to do anything truly innovative, by and large. There are outliers, of course. But frankly there's not a lot interesting going on anywhere outside the Bay and it pays way, way worse.

1) IS THE BAY AREA THE ONLY GOOD PLACE FOR SOFTWARE ENGINEERS?

I think most would agree there are other good cities. Seattle, New York, or Boston are great examples with large tech companies located there.

2) WOULD YOU BE MISSING ANYTHING?

Absolutely. Whatever city is behind Silicon Valley in second place, is very far far far behind. The best and the brightest talent head straight to silicon valley, so if you want to be exposed to new technology then Silicon Valley sits a head and shoulders above the next place.

Peter Thiel made the statement that they are not opening Venture Capital offices in any other city because they didn't think there was enough value, meaning that the big ideas come to Silicon Valley - so venture capital will wait for it there.

There is no EASY way to simulate the same network from afar. It works for most people for 2-3 years or you need to actively visit regularly, but usually it's some combination of the two.

In summary : if you care about working with great developers, learning new technology, building a company/raising capital, or building a professional network then Silicon Valley is a smart choice. If you care about having work life balance, being near family, or saving earned income then the bay area maybe a big mistake.

The bay area gets a lot of attention because it's the software capital of the world, and software has these crazy gross margins and rapid life cycles that allow companies to be born, experience explosive growth, make insane profits, (potentially) suffer radical declines, leading to a quick boom or bust. Software companies make great news stories, so the bay area gets a lot of attention, and many talented people who aren't sure where to go decide to move there.

I live there now and work out of coworking spaces where I've met a number of startup founders. Many of them are self-proclaimed visionaries hyped up by VR and AR or IoT. Few of them are as smart as my friends who are getting their Masters and PhD degrees at Duke, Wash U, or Case Western. The most impressive startup I saw in the last year was being made by a self-taught programmer/entrepreneur building his own company out of Colorado Springs.

Beyond just my anecdotal evidence, where do MIT and Harvard graduates go? Where do Georgia Tech, Rice U, John's Hopkins, Carnegie Mellon graduates go? Silicon Valley doesn't take all of their students nor just the top in their class. Some people move to DC, Seattle, Chicago, Boston, Austin, NYC, or Denver because they have family or friends there, or because the kind of work in these other cities is more appealing than The Bay.

Apologies for the rant. I realized after writing it that your 'Not really' comment was probably in response to the parent's assertion that companies should hire from outside the bay area, while I took it as 'Not really' in that there are no engineers of the same calibre outside SV.

Regardless, the amount of hubris and hype over the Bay Area is staggering when there are so many equally talented engineers all over the US.

NYC isn't bad on these metrics, but the bay area is just noticeably better.

All that said, first, well, the silicon part is all but gone. I find the signal to noise ratio pretty low. For every 10x developer, there are 50 people who did a bootcamp and/or moved for the easy jobs. Salaries are high because the cost of living is on the breaking point. People complain about the area because of high taxes, high cost of living, and of course the homeless epidemic. And to top it off, everyone who can seems to leave the area when they get the chance.

Again, I mean no offense, I think it's a nice area on the whole. But if I were in need of a lot of good engineers today, I'd first offer remote only. If I needed collaboration or a lot of people in one area, I'd look to New York or Northern Virginia before the bay area.

Boston is the second biggest location in the U.S. for startups, but as a tech worker, it was a much worse place to be status-wise. Boston is teeming with doctors, corporate lawyers, management consultants, investment bankers, etc., who generally have much higher status (and typically earn much, much more money) than a developer there.

I mean, it is great, but a developer would have no problems finding a good job in New York or Boston, at least.

I've never understood why so many tech companies over the last decade went up to SF. Before that most were down the peninsula and in San Jose. I'd pick the lower peninsula over SF no question.

But, if you are top 10-20% (not necessarily a superstar), it's definitely the place to be. Whether you want to work at startup or a big company, the pay vastly exceeds the extra cost of living.

At a startup, you actually have the chance to make lots of money in an acquisition or IPO. In other places, you really don't. I used to live in NYC. There's tumblr, mongodb, and zocdoc, all in the $1 billion range, which only makes the founders and a few early employees rich. Foursquare was really hot for awhile, but ended up disappointing. Rapgenius imploded. Betaworks companies either stagnated or outright failed. I know tons of great people who got jobs at the hottest companies in NYC at the time and ended up with nothing. In SF/bay area, there's uber, facebook, google, palantir, airbnb, twitter, linkedin, pinterest, lyft, stripe, square, etc, etc, etc. All of these recently started companies are worth billions, and have created or will create lots of millionaires. More importantly, I don't remember any big disappointments in bay area companies, besides maybe dropbox. Almost every hot company from 5 years ago is now worth a lot more money. It's fairly easy to select which startup to work for if you want to optimize for equity payout. Today, I would probably pick flexport.

At a big company, you get to work on the most interesting projects. The top executives for all the biggest tech companies are here, so all the best projects are going to be here as well. And the pay is very good - I don't know any senior engineers making less than $300,000 a year, including people who are just a few years out of grad school.

In both cases, you get to work on the most interesting technology. For example, there are no self-driving car companies in other areas (besides Pittsburgh). The most successful blockchain businesses (coinbase, ripple) are here. The companies that have to deal with the biggest scale are here (google, facebook).

Personally, I more than doubled my already-high pay in NYC by moving to SF. Not moving here earlier was a big career mistake - I would have worked on far more interesting projects with much more competent coworkers and I would have been able to retire by now.

Everyone I know who moved from NYC to SF before me is now a multi-millionaire, because they got a job at stripe, palantir, pinterest, or some small companies that managed to get acquired for a large amount of money.

I moved from SF to a smallish city in my late 20's, and I was only able to find one tech job to apply to, and it wasn't even for a technology I already knew. I was offered the position, and spent the next 6 years treading water at a mediocre job because there just weren't any other options: I could either stay at that job, or leave a town I loved.

When my wife and I decided it was time to move (she had just completed her Master's), job opportunity weighed heavily in our decision making process. We had a lot of other considerations (we wouldn't live someplace we didn't like just because it was good for our careers), but we wanted to make sure we at least had multiple options when it came to work, and that is absolutely something the Bay Area provides.

Compare with the tech scene in NYC which is almost entirely based in Manhattan - a 5-mile stretch of it no less (from Bowling Green up to 59th St), that you can traverse by train or cab in a matter of 20-25 minutes.

If pure concentration of people/companies is the X-factor, NYC should've trounced California by now :P

In LA you have something similar with movies -- most people are aspiring actors and there are many people in filming and sets. However, working as a programmer in LA versus SF is very different -- there are a lot fewer engineers and entrepreneurs here per mile than the Bay Area.

It comes down to proximity to people of the same talent set. Where are the people who are good at X living? That's where X is thriving. If suddenly all the engineers left Silicon Valley, it would no longer be a tech hub.