For me it's more of a suburbia vs inner city thing. I want to live where I'm a few minutes walk from a grocery store, a few bars and other amenities along with easy public access (walking, riding, public transport) to work. I could live in a large rural town if they catered to this but few seem to.

The other big thing is the lack of job opportunities in smaller cities, solvable via working remotely but still relatively uncommon, particularly for new hires.

For Boston some have this attitude about anything outside of Route 128. However historically that’s where almost all the tech jobs were. Today more has moved into the city but a large number of tech jobs—especially large companies—are well outside Boston/Cambridge.