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Tech Leaders Fled San Francisco During the Pandemic. Now, They're Coming Back. (wsj.com) 122

Posted by msmash from the hard-things-about-hard-things dept.
Founders and investors who moved to Miami and elsewhere are returning to a boom in AI and an abundance of tech talent. From a report: In 2020, venture capitalist Keith Rabois urged startup founders to join him in ditching San Francisco for Miami, praising the city's safety, lower taxes and tech-friendly mayor. The self-proclaimed contrarian investor, who made a fortune backing companies such as Airbnb and DoorDash, once tweeted that San Francisco was "miserable on every dimension."

The hard pivot to Miami has faltered. Several of the startups that Rabois backed are relocating or opening offices elsewhere to better attract engineering talent. Late last year, he was pushed out of his old venture firm, Founders Fund, after falling out with some colleagues. Now, he plans to spend one week a month in San Francisco for a new employer, Khosla Ventures, and is busy renovating a house there. During the pandemic, scores of Silicon Valley investors and executives such as Rabois decamped to sunnier American cities, criticizing San Francisco's dysfunctional governance and high cost of living. Tech-firm founders touted their success at raising money outside the Bay Area and encouraged their employees to embrace remote work.

Four years later, that bet hasn't really worked out. San Francisco is once again experiencing a tech revival. Entrepreneurs and investors are flocking back to the city, which is undergoing a boom in artificial intelligence. Silicon Valley leaders are getting involved in local politics, flooding city ballot measures and campaigns with tech money to make the city safer for families and businesses. Investors are also pushing startups to return to the Bay Area and bring their employees back into the office. San Francisco has largely weathered the broader crunch in startup funding. Investment in Bay Area startups dropped 12% to $63.4 billion last year. By contrast, funding volumes for Austin, Texas, and Los Angeles, two smaller tech hubs, dropped 27% and 42%, respectively. In Miami, venture investment plunged 70% to just $2 billion last year.
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Tech Leaders Fled San Francisco During the Pandemic. Now, They're Coming Back. More

Tech Leaders Fled San Francisco During the Pandemic. Now, They're Coming Back.

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  • Who could have predicted (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 19, 2024 @11:28AM (#64251536)

    The talent pool in Florida is garbage. Wonder what percentage of Trump's gofundme donations are coming from Florida? You know the guy living in a trailer who signs his paycheck over to a supposed billionaire because he's pwning the libs.

    • Well gee whiz... who would have thought that having two UCs (three if you're doing biotech and UCSF counts) plus Stanford plus three CSUs plus a whole bevy of other excellent private schools that would be very tedious to list, all in close proximity to each other, would cultivate a talent pool that not only provides a massive clutch of excellent candidates themselves; but also attract many of the best and brightest from the rest of the country who prefer to be around other smart people?

      (Yeah, California's p

  • They all want to move to Fl & Tx (Score:4, Interesting)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Monday February 19, 2024 @11:41AM (#64251582)
    for the low taxes but there's a few major problems.

    First, both states criminalized abortion, and there's tons of women who won't take that risk. A quick google search will find tons of stories of women hanging out in hospital parking lots waiting for the bleeding to get bad enough that the hospital will OK an abortion for the dead fetus in them, suffering in horrible pain the entire time. You can leave the state, but that carries it's own risks. For one thing more often than not you don't know when you're going to need a life saving abortion and there isn't time unless you own a private jet.

    Second, those low taxes come with crappy schools In the past that was taken care of by property taxes used to fund good schools in middle class neighborhoods while screwing over the lower working class, but school voucher programs bypass that trick draining a ton of money from even the "good" districts.

    And finally you used to be able to move your staff to FL or TX and the cost of living was so much lower they felt like that got a huge raise. That's not true anymore because billionaires like Blackrock are buying all the houses anywhere jobs might be.

    The result is employees don't want to move and they don't, so you lose talent. And top talent can go where ever they want.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by RedK ( 112790 )

      > OK an abortion for the dead fetus in them

      If the Fetus is dead, it's not an abortion and no hospital would leave it there.

      Tell me you never had a pregnant wife have a miscarriage without telling me.

      • That's beside the point, you idiot. The point is that women wouldn't want to find themselves in that situation.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by RedK ( 112790 )

          > The point is that women wouldn't want to find themselves in that situation.

          So your point is a strawman.

          Women aren't in this position anywhere, because a dead fetus is a health risk and it's not an abortion to remove it. It's a miscarriage and isn't uncommon in the 1st term of pregnancy.

      • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

        by stabiesoft ( 733417 )
        You must live under a rock if you have not heard these stories. No the fetus is not dead, it is not viable though and will die. A woman in TX a month or so ago sued the state over the policy because she had an unviable fetus that may as a result have caused her to become sterile(or kill her) if it was not aborted. It went to the supreme court of TX. They ruled against her. https://www.texastribune.org/2... [texastribune.org] She went out of state for the abortion, ironically becase she wanted more kids. The relevant quote fro

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by DarkOx ( 621550 )

          Typical - lies

          "trisomy 18, a lethal fetal anomaly."
          Lots of things are fatal if untreated! There are quite a number of people that have had their hearts surgically repaired with trisomy 18 that have now gone on to enjoy life at least into their late teens; they will probably continue to live as well.

          We don't know if it was possible to save that child in Texas. Because they were murdered!

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by stabiesoft ( 733417 )
            I suppose it is possible(small) the child could have survived. From https://www.health.state.mn.us... [state.mn.us], "Trisomy 18 occurs at a rate of 1 in 2000 live births. It is somewhat more common as the mother ages but can occur randomly to parents of any age. Most babies affected are girls. There is no known cause of Trisomy 18. Studies have shown that only 50% of babies who are carried to term will be born alive. The median of survival among live births has varied between 2.5 and 14.5 days. About 90% - 95% of babie

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by theCoder ( 23772 )

              The site you pointed to did not mention any potential complications for the mother during the pregnancy or birth, only issues for the child. The more likely truth is that the mother in this case did not want to waste time on a pregnancy that she thought would end with a child that did not survive long. Perhaps I'm wrong about that, but the courts seemed to think that the threat to her was not enough compared to the potential life of the child.

              Outlier cases like this make for good anecdotes, but they are o

              • Let me know when you're willing to vote for mandatory organ/blood donation without your consent as long as it would save the life of another.

              • A sobering statistic is that there are more abortions worldwide each year (about 73 million [worldometers.info], also WHO [who.int]) than deaths from all other causes combined (about 61 million [ourworldindata.org]).

                Fascinating that you compare abortions to deaths from all other causes combined. Which presumably includes murder and war (like in Ukraine or Palestine) and all the other very bad stuff as well as accidents.

              • I'm not sure you saw this, but WaPo reported "Cox had been to the emergency room at least three times during her pregnancy, The Washington Post reported, with “severe cramping, diarrhea, and leaking unidentifiable fluid.” Cox has had two prior C-sections and would have probably needed a third if she carried the pregnancy to term, according to the complaint — which doctors said could have affected her ability to have more children." from https://www.washingtonpost.com... [washingtonpost.com] Now if it was my wi
          • You must be in hog heaven with Alabama's latest ruling. https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/21... [cnn.com] Embryo's are now people. Could be a good thing though, less kids again. No clinic is going to store eggs if they can be prosecuted for murder if they don't use all the eggs.
      • don't just miscarry. They can and do go through horrific agony that can scar or even kill them.

        Just because your wife once miscarried doesn't mean you're qualified to be a doctor, and that's why Abortion is such a useful issue to string guys like you along. You think you're personal experiences make you an expert.

        As Issac Asimov said, "...ignorance is just as good as knowledge.”

      • Technically speaking abortion is the removal of foetal tissue, even if it's dead. It also includes the placenta.

        And people have already died because doctors refused to remove a dead foetus fearing incarceration. As usual the Republicans didn't think about women when creating this law.

    • Re: They all want to move to Fl & Tx (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Midnight_Falcon ( 2432802 ) on Monday February 19, 2024 @12:21PM (#64251750)
      Absolutely true about the schools. I had family move to Florida so they could afford to retire early on a pension. The consequence is their children went from being on track to going to a good, selective college such as a UC to going to a crappy, nonselective Florida state school. The public schools in Florida are a year or two behind where they were academically. Their guidance counselor is a moron who can barely write complete sentences. There's also now not enough money to send them out of state for school, so their move to Florida has handicapped their kids' future. Now one dreams of being a grocery store manager. Florida, where you can work harder and longer in life for less money cuz "freedom," which is a cruel joke for most who would be more free with the education and upward mobility in California.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

        Notably, that makes them significantly better than highest per student budgeted schools in the nation. And that is why no member of upper middle class would send his/her children in one in US.

      • My brother's ex spent a significant part of her childhood in the US. Around the time she was in pre-med the family had to return home to Europe.

        It turned out her US qualifications were so awful that not only her pre-med years were considered non-existent, even her high school diploma was worthless.

        So she was left without any degree, and works in retail now. US schools destroyed her life.

      • It's even worse than that. As you say, Florida schools were already pretty bad. There were exceptions, of course, but the state was never known for academia. But DeSantis is utterly wrecking the handful that were good. Just look at the plight of New College of Florida. It used to be one of the few shining stars in Florida's school system. But it's rapidly crumbling into little more than a right-wing indoctrination camp, with top-tier applicants (And anyone who's not hetro or WASPy enough for DeSantis'

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

      Tech bros don't have uteruses, no matter what progressive religion tells you. And with that money, getting an abortion is about taking a day off to fly to where it's available. Abortion limitations are about poor people, not rich ones. Hence the Miami celeb scene, which is one of the most promiscuous in the world. Think any of them need local abortion clinics for their abortions? Please.

      Tech bros don't put their kids in public schools. They might have minorities that aren't pre-vetted, and so would act as i

      • Tech bros tend to be Progressive Liberals, the abortion ban puts a bright spotlight on the fact that they would be moving to a State dominated by Ultra Conservatives who's ideology and policies they really abhore.
      • In the Bay Area, I assure you most tech bros (and non bros) send their kids to public school. We have some of the best public schools in the nation. People will pay exorbitant amounts for houses in Mill Valley for example so their kids can go to Tamalpais high school, which is better than most of the "colleges" in Florida.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

          Should I believe a random leftist with a chip on his shoulder, or local newspaper that has at least some facts available to punch through.

          https://sfstandard.com/2021/09... [sfstandard.com]

          Oh wait, you mean "public" school that you pay for more than private, that is exclusive for those that can pay that and that doesn't have bussed in "diversity", i.e. a de facto very expensive private school, that gets a private label in name only.

          Now, here's a real question. Why bother with twisting yourself into such a verbal pretzel just

          • Ah, the standard conservative talk radio strawman spin: You posted a three year old article about SF schools slipping during the pandemic, a nationwide issue in all schools. I talked about Tamalpais High School in Marin, and how Florida schools are far worse, and how tech bros do send their kids to public school. Nothing in what you posted even begins to address my point. Tech bro families tend to live in the East Bay, Peninsula and Marin; far less in SF. Even then, those SF public schools beat out those

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

              As usual, the leftoid projects. I'm not even from your country, I find your education system abhorrent. This is why I note that normal people that go from here to work in US do not subject their children to public school system of US. I know of several such people.

              What I'm mocking is the naked and utterly pointless virtue signaling about public school that is private in all but name, and then use that as an example of how good public schools are doing.

              You're indeed left. Specifically progressive left. Or as

              • I am impressed by how when informed you're using a strawman argument, you proceed to dive into the other logical fallacies of ad hominem and "no true scotsman" to further a nonsense argument about how public schools in the Bay Area aren't really "public." These schools are genuinely public, and educate children free of charge. In addition, you project this completely nonsense persona upon me and also seem to have positive opinions of the MAGA movement, your post history reading like it was written by Rush

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

                  >and educate children free of charge*

                  *As long as you buy an exceedingly expensive piece of real estate, which is totally not paying for the school and gatekeeping the trash out, honest.

                  See, it's this horrific, scumbag tier dishonesty practiced by the wealthy that specifically keeps the working class down, while they get to pretend that they're elevating them through "giving all public schools a good name", while people coming out of them are barely literate and obviously eliminated as potential competiti

                  • Your "no true scotsman" fallacy relies upon this notion that you have to buy an expensive piece of real estate to attend these schools. However, the school I mentioned (Tamalpais High School) counts Tupac Shakur as one of its most famous attendees. Do you think Tupac's family bought one of those expensive pieces of real estate? No, they lived in the projects, and Tupac went to an excellent public school as a result. In major cities in the US, the majority of the population are renters, 65% in San Francis

                    • Re: (Score:2)

                      by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

                      I must say, the level of deception and racism employed here would astound me, if I didn't know you were a Shampagne Socialist. "But n*ggers are obviously poor and stupid, look at us great and wonderful whites allowing some of them to attend our best schools".

                      By selecting the best among them only, and making them your pet monkeys. Kamala fucking Harris is your example. A massively pre-vetted, child of extreme privelege who criss-crossed many nations and went to many elite schools where she was sent by her re

                    • Due to your lack of the intellectual faculties to respond to arguments, you've now taken ad hominem to a new level accusing a person of both being racist and then repeating a racial slur numerous times. Your comments read like an unhinged drunk redneck uncle, and you seem in dire need of psychiatric help.

                    • Re: (Score:2)

                      by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

                      >Your comments read like an unhinged drunk redneck uncle

                      Like I said above:

                      >Such phenomenal levels of lying, including to yourself as I completely believe that you convinced yourself that you're [right].

                      You're like the Gemini product head. That screams about systemic racism towards blacks and that whites need to repent. And then builds an google's AI image generation as a systems specifically aimed to replace whites with as many blacks as possible, to the point where it finds the very existence of whit

                    • Despite reading at least five times you've failed to respond to my arguments, you continue to ignore them and dig into the unhinged uncle talk, this time invoking "Replacement Theory." [wikipedia.org] Replacement theory is literally a far-right, white nationalist conspiracy theory.

                      No one brought up any of these things that you did, you are just strawman-ing with info from random articles that appear in far-right publications. Clearly, there's no logical way to dig yourself out of the hole you've made with incorrect

    • TX has insanely high property taxes. While the level of road rage is variably less than Los Angeles, there are still dumbasses and a lot more people commute extreme distances causing lots of traffic. Furthermore, there is insufficient and improper regulation that allows absurd soil, water, and air pollution. Finally, the people who move to TX now tend to be dumbass corporate clones from the middle of the country and dumb money looking to party, not over-educated workers or gleam in their eye entrepreneurs.

  • PR (Score:2)

    by groobly ( 6155920 )

    Piece sounds like a PR piece from SF dept. of PR.

  • Miami is worse than SF (Score:5, Interesting)

    by backslashdot ( 95548 ) on Monday February 19, 2024 @12:08PM (#64251690)

    Miami has a much higher (more than double, actually) murder and drug overdose rate than San Francisco. And furthermore Florida overall has a higher homicide and drug overdose death rate than California. Nobody ever asks DeSantis about that. Move to Florida and find out.

    The only difference is you don't see as many homeless people. SF policy is to reduce penalty for theft so that there is reduced need for homicide.

    • Re: Miami is worse than SF (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Midnight_Falcon ( 2432802 ) on Monday February 19, 2024 @12:24PM (#64251762)
      Also when you walk outside in summer in SF, you need a sweatshirt. In Miami, the oppressive heat will allow you to boil an egg on your car. Most tech workers I know also don't tend to be the beach bikini tanning crowd, so it's not a plus for them.

      • Don't forget the mosquitos, no-see-ums, stink bugs, blister beetles, fire and other biting ants, giant cockroaches that sprout wings twice a year and fly at you, and... for an extra-double-super horror... love bugs.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Tablizer ( 95088 )

      FL Slogan: we hide failure better!

    • Do facts matter? In fact when all crimes are considered, SFO is more than double the crime of Miami.

      According to Neighborhoodscout:
      "With a crime rate of 67 per one thousand residents, San Francisco has one of the highest crime rates in America compared to all communities of all sizes - from the smallest towns to the very largest cities. One's chance of becoming a victim of either violent or property crime here is one in 15. Within California, more than 98% of the communities have a lower crime rate than Sa

  • Tech abandoning SF, because California regulations

    Tech starts moving back

    Oh, noes, fake news that people like SF, and like California...

    • The headline is fake news. The article clearly says they are not moving back to CA and SF just that the tech bros are moving to Miami but their workers are not. Remote work is a thing. Some people move back to California, the majority has not.

  • AI bubbles happen. Most these AI companies won't be able to compete, and when the market collectively realizes this, they'll pull back investment at the same time. Even if the AI claims turn out true for the sake of argument, it will probably be only a couple of companies who got it right. The rest will be bought out or smoked.

  • Journal and NYT are engaged in culture war (Score:3, Interesting)

    by BishopBerkeley ( 734647 ) on Monday February 19, 2024 @01:01PM (#64251882) Journal
    New York Times and WSJ are engaged in a disparagement campaign against California and Bay Area in order to draw attention away from New York's culture of corruption and the fact that the Bay Area is the new economic superpower, not New York. Almost all companies driving the stock market higher are based in the Bay Area, not in New York. Furthermore, New York doesn't generate nearly as many startups in physics, materials, chemistry, medicine, biotech, batteries, engineering, robotics or agriculture. WSJ focuses on AI in order to conceal the fact that the Bay Area's tech landscape is incredibly diverse and incredibly resilient, as a result. Don't believe anything your read about SF in the NY Times and WSJ. They are engaged in a propaganda campaign against California. This is the only true culture war that is going on.
    • The stock market and most of the banking industry is in NY. NY is the Financial capital of the world, that's what it specializes in. Unfortunately the rules set-up to foster the Financial Industry are detrimental to start-ups (eg: NY has some of the weakest bankruptcy protections in the Country, non-competes are pretty much standard practice) Of course the rules California has to foster start-ups make it unappealing to some sectors. As the saying goes. You can't have the cake and eat it too.
      • I didn't realize there was as structural aspect to it. This is a fascinating point. Nevertheless, the Times and the Journal could be leaders in fostering a structure change instead of disparaging California. Their coverage of the Bay Area has been horribly biased.

  • Is SanFran running out of tech bros to stab that this ad was needed to get more?

    Black humor that hits close to home is bad, I know. Get over it.

  • Turns out that the kind of people who create an environment where you need a poop map to avoid all the homeless dumps on the sidewalk are not particularly welcome elsewhere.
  • And it's an election year and alot of dumb things are being said :)

    Tech workers (I assume software devs) don't want to be in San Fransisco, or in any high priced areas. These workers are mostly remote now, so getting good talent from anywhere is easy and very possible (even if someone has to stay in a high priced abysmal state like CA, if they are remote, pay them less and force them to go where CoL is possible). The A.I. thing is the latest fad, remember Linux, cloud, mobile, etc. If someone thinks they
  • I strongly recommend someone to spend a month or two actually living in Miami before you decide that itâ(TM)s some sort of tech or entrepreneur Wonderland. Remember, this is the place with a guy who was eating somebody elseâ(TM)s face a few years ago? Crime in Miami might have lower statistics than SF butquite frankly, because itâ(TM)s just not reported. Since a large number of the population comes from the wonderful overcrowded cities of South America, their standards and expectation are no
    • Hey now, Miami is good for something.. if that includes clubbing, drugs deals, exotic cars, hurricanes, lightning, humidity, gators, morbid obesity, and old, drunk people blocking traffic in golf carts.
  • But who wants to live in expensive, poop-strewn, lack of affordable housing or care for the unhoused SF for "startup salary discount" wages? WfH or GTFO.

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