[pdovy]

I think this to some extent depends on what kind of software you are interested in working on. From the perspective of someone working as a developer in finance, SF is nowheresville, you want to be in NYC or Chicago, typically. That's my personal anecdata but I'd imagine other smaller markets have their own niche industries.

If what excites you is web-focused startups, then yeah, you're probably not going to be happy in a lot of other places, but that is just one area of software development and I'd argue it doesn't have any exclusive license on interesting problems or top talent.

[bwc150]

Web focused dev isn't the only area with interesting problems but that's definitely what gets the most attention is frankly probably the most lucrative path for most people. I work in finance as well, and am kind of too specialized in it to switch now, but I do think I'd have been better off working at the FAANGs for my whole career.