[emathias]

Cost is only part of it. I personally have no desire to live in the Silicon Valley because I've been there and it just felt like one long strip mall. And sure, San Francisco is just an hour away, but why on earth would I want a guaranteed hour commute in order to have an urban lifestyle.

I'd move to San Francisco for the right job, just like I'd move to Manhattan for the right job, but I'm quite happy living and working in central Chicago and I'm not about to have a guaranteed reduced lifestyle for a far-from-guaranteed better job. My perception of the Silicon Valley job market for mid-career types is that there are either jobs that pay above average but have very little likelihood of hitting it big because they're with big, stable companies, or there are jobs at no-name companies that require insane dedication to work for survival-level pay for what *might* turn into a decent payday. There are only so many people who can, let along will, take the second kind of job, and the first kind of job basically means people who take them really want to live the (nice but) suburban lifestyle of the Valley where prices are so high you still only really enjoy a middle-class life even on upper-middle-class pay. Many families would rather make a little less in some place like Austin.