[collias]

Former Kentuckian here. I moved out to California shortly after college, partly due to the exact reasons you described. There's simply no parallel job-wise to west coast tech jobs in Kentucky, including my hometown of Louisville.

I know several fellow southerners and midwesterners who are working at large tech firms out here. No matter how much we may love where we come from, there's simply no realistic avenue for us to go back.

Places like Kentucky already have huge tech talent pools, but the workers are currently in exile in the coasts. I'd imagine if these states focused more on bringing tech firms to their state, they'd see a lot of that tech talent return home.