On the positive side there, there's an "energy" (please excuse hippie nonsense) to people here I haven't seen in other places. A kind personal momentum that is intoxicating - hard not to get crazy shit done around here.
Certainly not for everyone, including me on occasion, and it's got its downsides...but I haven't seen a place better for the ambitious to design their future than SV.
A sad reality.
Isn't it?
I kid, I kid. Mostly. But the revealed preferences of where people choose to move and at what price does say a lot about places. Most people, given a choice of buying a nice house in Fargo or Macon for $150k or a nice house in San Francisco or Palo Alto for $150k, probably will go for the latter.
I moved out of SF about a year ago, I am now paying less for housing, in a better neighborhood, in Manhattan.
The alternative to paying ridiculous sums to live in SV/SF isn't a complete change in lifestyle.
The point is about what people are willing to pay to live in an area, though. The fact that people are willing to pay so much more to live in the Bay Area is revealing.
1. Housing costs (too expensive)
2. Transportation time / locality (takes too long to get elsewhere in the Bay Area, probably can't live near the job because of #1)
3. Climate - San Fran is rather cold nearly all year round.
4. Because of 1 and 2 likely would not have a garage or space to do projects in.
5. Sometimes things seem rather legally onerous in CA/Bay Area.
6. Regional tunnel vision. When I lived in Northern California I got sick of hearing how it was 'the best place on Earth.'