This feels accurate to me. I recently moved back to Portland from Silicon Valley, and the extreme cost of living, the lack of culture, lack of good food, and workaholic culture were a big part of it. If you live in Cupertino, Campbell, Sunnyvale, I struggle to even think of things like a decent bar.
I enjoyed my time in San Francisco, but really got a sense that it was not a place in "equilibrium", so to speak. Families can't really live there unless there's a million dollars for a house somewhere, which means that you have to be pretty wealthy, or you're headed out to some other city in the bay area. SF was great for being single, but it just struck me as being a bit artificial. Here in Padova, there are wealthy people, poor people, young people, families, elderly people - a nice mix, in other words. Same with Portland.
Also, he's right about so many people being in tech. Here in Padova, I have more friends who aren't in tech, and that makes me happy - I love to hang out with my tech friends too, and talk about this or that, but sometimes it's nice to get away from that, and in SF I never felt I could, despite trying.
That said, as someone born and raised in Oregon, I just don't think I could deal with moving back to the rainy part of the state. Endless drizzly gray days get pretty depressing. They don't even feel very 'cozy'; winter in Innsbruck was way better; watching the snow fall or waking up to a brilliant blue day with snow covered mountains was much better than sloshing around in the dismal gray day after day.
I'm actually not sure where I'd go if I went back to the US. Southern Oregon is nice in some ways, but not much going on at all in tech. Boulder looks appealing in several ways, but I've never been there, and it looks like they have a strong sense of 'smug' of their own, something I'm not a big fan of.
Edit Let's see... other random notes
* Portland, for me, had better food than SF. This was because I worked downtown in Portland and had a nice variety of affordable and diverse lunch options. Where I worked in SF didn't have nearly as good a selection.
* Portland has Powells. Powells is awesome.
* Portland is closer to more outdoor stuff, although I always got depressed in summer because of the thought of my precious few sunny days slipping by sitting in an office. Even with good technical gear, it's hard to stay warm in 5C and steady rain on a bike.
Neither Portland nor Seattle can match the Bay Area in terms of overall culture. Neither has a world-class orchestra or opera, to say nothing of the early-music scene in the Bay Area, which is easily the best in the US. Neither measures up to the Bay Area in the art scene, either. Or the restaurant scene. Or the wine scene.
Neither comes very close in terms of climate, although that argument is muted lately due to California being on fire for 4 months out of each year now. But Portland and Seattle are already experiencing their own climate-change-related impacts.
And no, neither measures up economically either. Comparing the tech industry in Portland or Seattle to the Bay Area (Apple, Facebook, Google, Twitter, and basically all of the startup scene) is a joke.
I could go on, but really, there is no competition.
I grew up in San Jose, went to UC Davis, worked at Stanford (near Palo Alto), and then periodically-commuted between Mountain View and the Chico area. I left because of the fires/smoke, risks of earthquakes and megafloods, costs, worsening attitudes of people, and it just generally sucked. In Austin now, and much happier so far. Will see if it's New Relationship Energy and whether I need to move to Portland.
I never understood why anyone would want to live in unsustainable SF, no matter how "good" or "cool" it is or was, when the vast majority of people don't make anywhere near enough (>50% income to housing) to build a long-term future there.
I recently visited the college town where I studied with my wife, and I am considering moving there, because the bay area has become practically unaffordable. I know that the weather is really something to die for, but the financial situation of the state is dire -- that makes for a very bad long-term outlook.
Portland appears to be a very nice place, strikes the right balance between sprawl and compactness. If only it had better weather....
I've been looking in to relocating recently; the area between San Fransisco and San Jose has been high on my list, but I've always been a little put off about the fact that it's hard to find any balanced discussions about what the quality of life is like there. I get that it's the #1 place for a geek to be, but I'm taking my wife as well and she's not a geek at all.
It's nice to see someone talking a little bit about the area without all of the gilded verbiage.
(Of course, #2 on my list right now is Portland, and I'm finding myself having a similar problem with discussion about that city right now as well ;))
that sounds like the koolaid talking. while SF offers a lot of "culture", portland and seattle have great "scenes" too. restaurants in both cities easily rival those of SF, which tend to be long on cost and short on flavor. but in CA, LA outdoes SF for food, weather, art, music, entertainment, fashion, and shopping, with a more diverse (not tech-centric) economy to boot.
Ive lived in San Jose and I can assure you that besides jobs, San Jose kind of sucks as a place to live. It's mostly just strip malls and good weather, imho. Campbell was a little nicer and had some cute shops.
To provide a counterpoint, as someone who lived in Silicon Valley forever and still owns a place there, one of the reasons I moved away is that it is too far from good outdoor activities. Good mountains are 3-4 hours away, and while I made that trek on hundreds of weekends, it was far from optimal; I also hiked the hills around the Bay Area frequently but that isn't even close to the same. Similarly, the ocean around the Bay Area is okay but not great; no one would ever confuse it with Southern California, it has more in common with the Oregon coast.
By contrast, where I currently live (Seattle) is 45 minutes from the Cascades which has fantastic hiking, backpacking, etc (better than the Sierra Nevada in some ways) and a much more pervasive boating culture than exists in the Bay Area thanks to the history and geography of the region. Living here has made a high-quality outdoor lifestyle much more viable than it ever was in the Bay Area because the logistics are so much easier.
The tech scene in the Bay Area is unparalleled, but if you removed that aspect, there isn't that much to recommend a suburb like San Jose from a lifestyle standpoint. The South Bay in particular also doesn't have the mild weather of the peninsula and San Francisco -- it is more Fresno than San Diego.
I would love to echo that point. Living in SF is depressing because you're stuck with a hard choice:
1. Live in a nice place
or
2. Have money to do things in your free time
If you choose 1. you sit in your nice home alone and bored
if you choose 2. you have to either have the mental fortitude to deal with cramped quarters, loud smelly neighbors, the tenderloin, OR ride the train for 2-3 hours daily (live in the surrounding area).
Maybe live in portland? Seemed like a nice healthy place, albeit the weather may exacerbate your conditions.
Totally. The nice thing about being in Portland is that the Bay Area is only an hour and a half flight. We still have family down there so we spend some time there, but we have kids. So one big reason we left the Bay Area was just to find better quality education and we definitely do not regret the move after finding amazing schools here.
But to your point, there are some great events and conferences which is probably the biggest thing missing from Portland. There are a few good events, but nothing at the scale of what happens in SF.
Maybe Indianopolis isn't the perfect example for everyone. Portland, perhaps. Better proximity to great nature, still a lot of things to do, great weather (and getting better every year thanks to climate change, while California gets drier and drier), somewhat lower cost of living, etc.
i moved here 6 months back. live in south bay (sunnyvale) and commute to the city for work.
For starters, the weather in the city simply sucks. Its cold, windy and foggy most of the times - on the contrary, south bay remains clear, sunny and quite warm.
Even bigger gripe against bay area is the cost of living. Everything from housing to everday stuff to gas is insanely expensive. Paying 1600$ + for a crappy apartment built in the 60's without any washer dryer was a huge shock as compared to raleigh, where i moved from.
This makes me want to check out Southern California more again once it's more feasible.
I'm up in Silicon Valley, and... would say some things have gotten better in 10 years. The craft beer explosion has definitely hit here, too, and even more so around Sacramento.
A terrific new tiki bar opened in Oakland (The Kon-Tiki) and multiple terrific new tiki bars opened in San Francisco (Pagan Idol, Last Rites, Zombie Village; Smuggler's Cove opened in 2009, so not technically within 10 years, but they're considered one of the best bars -- not just tiki bars -- in the world).
As much as San Franciscans like to dump on San Jose, I think downtown San Jose has actually gotten pretty cool in a lot of respects, and that's entirely in the last decade.
There's a fair number of other smaller towns scattered around the Bay Area which are seeing some silver linings of gentrification.
I could probably come up with a more detailed list, but despite some very real downsides, particularly economic -- real estate prices really are out of control (and there is no One Single Cause to point to, despite a lot of folks trying); homelessness has become a genuine epidemic -- it's still a great place to be, and it's hard for me to think of another place in America where I'd genuinely rather be. (This is distinct from "another place I'd still like.")
I'm living on the border of Sunnyvale and Mtn. View at 23 years old, and it is depressing as hell. Absolutely nothing within walking distance that's worthwhile, no one remotely my age, nothing going on other than the farmer's market (forgive me for not being excited about it). There are some positives, but I had no clue how BORING this place was before I moved here. I'm moving to San Mateo or farther north ASAP, but then will just have to commute even further...
You're right about everything but the weather. It's only good for about 2 months of the year. 10 months out of the year it's either too hot or too cold. Air conditioning is a must. If you love Bay Area weather, you might want to stay in the west coast instead. Portland seems to be a good alternative.
I don’t live in California but visit[ed] a bunch for work and family reasons. San Jose has essentially always felt like a rust belt city with better weather. Even up until 2020 the downtown restaurant and bar scene was like going to the cool part of Toledo. I don’t understand why that is, but it’s not surprising to me that any small economic downturn would result in flight.
Disclaimer: I live next to downtown by I-35. Did move during the pandemic from NorCal to TX. (Have family in TX.)
Many issues:
The charm is gone with too many highrises like San Jose downtown.
It's hot AF. 110 F for 3 months every day. 100 F every day for another 2 months on either side of that.
In winter, it can randomly freeze down to 11 F, and say "hello" to no power and no water for 2-3 weeks.
The housing is slapped together and lacks architectural design. The new apartments are tiny and expensive, and not very good.
There's just as many homeless as SF, including rampant retail theft.
The costs are just as bad as the Bay Area.
The roads are worse than those in Bay Area, and I didn't think that was possible without snow and ice.
Lots of tourists, which could be a negative for some people.
The schools are so-so.
It's Texas and abortion is illegal.
Fewer batshit insane people than LA but more than Denver. And anyone can CCW or open carry without any documentation. If you have no criminal record, you can buy a handgun over at Academy without any waiting period at all.
Property taxes are absurd. If you think Palo Alto is bad...
APD is critically underfunded, understaffed by 200-250 officers, morale is terrible, and non-life-threatening calls have a 48 hour backlog. If you have an AirTag on an item, it's stolen, and the location is known, the police won't lift a finger. There is zero routine traffic enforcement.
Crowded with 2nd- and 3rd-tier school tech bros, corporate clones, and dumb money lazy people... people who are simultaneously uncool and boring.
Don't go to Whole Foods because it screams conspicuous consumption. The HQ is unimpressive.
There isn't much of a tech scene compared to the Bay Area.
On positive notes: Even though TX-35 is a national gerrymandering joke reaching from downtown Austin to downtown San Antonio by an "umbilical cord" along I-35, Greg Casar is one of the most reasonable, ballsy, sharp, empathetic, and progressive reps in Congress.
H-E-B.
There are a few used bookstores still in operation.
Plenty of vinyl shops, although none compares to Discogs.
Absurd number of tall people compared to anywhere else in the US and the world, including Oslo.
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