I’m bailing on San Francisco

The author works all the time, and thinks that by moving to New York, of all places, he will achieve a greater work-life balance. Having lived in both places and having struggles with the same issues: the work-life balance in both places is heavily skewed towards work, and in those places, that balance is heavily dependent on the person&#x27;s ability to say &quot;no&quot; and to stand up for oneself. If the author had said &quot;I am moving to a sleepy suburb in the midwest&quot;, then I&#x27;d say he&#x27;s making a good choice that will require very few changes in his own ability to manage his life: the environment would impose. As is, he&#x27;s just switching one high-pressure area for another.<p>Edit: apparently work&#x2F;life balance isn&#x27;t the issue, as the essay and comments here clarified. Very well.

Hey all,<p>I mean, I already wrote the post, but what I will say is that I&#x27;ve spent a ton of time in New York, and I know exactly what I&#x27;m getting into. For example, the bustling environment will actually _invigorate_, not drain, me, because that&#x27;s the kind of place I enjoy. I&#x27;ll also be saving money on rent, get to enjoy the wonderful subway, and a whole host of other things.<p>There&#x27;s also quite a lot of value in _being_ in San Francisco. If I was going to start a company, I wouldn&#x27;t bother with anywhere else. But I&#x27;m not starting a company. So it&#x27;s not for me. This post isn&#x27;t titled &quot;You should bail on San Francisco.&quot;

For those of you disappointed by this article and want a great article about leaving SF, try this:<p><a href="http://needwant.com/p/im-moving-san-francisco-st-louis/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;needwant.com&#x2F;p&#x2F;im-moving-san-francisco-st-louis&#x2F;</a>

My girlfriend and I (both in tech) have also left San Francisco as of last month, but for slightly different (but related) reasons. The 75,000 mentioned people who have moved to the bay area for tech have caused rent to rise by such a large amount, that even though we can afford to pay, it feels like a huge waste of our money. We could be spending it doing other things or just saving for our future.<p>Instead we&#x27;ll continue to work in tech doing consulting work, but we&#x27;re going try our hand at being completely nomadic while doing it (starting with Central and South America, though we&#x27;ll be picking a place and staying there for a few weeks to a month at minimum). We&#x27;ve sold pretty much everything we own and have whittled down our belongings to a large backpack and daypack each. It feels pretty amazing to be this lightweight and mobile, and our current budget has spending about 3x less than we were while living in SF (and still living very well).

&quot;Grass is greener&quot; isn&#x27;t a cliche for nothing. Seems like the author is making a classic mistake assuming different will be better. The main argument here seems that he enjoys taking vacations in NYC, not that there&#x27;s anything there that will improve his daily life.

I know what it&#x27;s like to move out of a &#x27;vortex&#x27;, sometimes you just have to do it.<p>Don&#x27;t listen to the naysayers! Good luck and do whatever it takes to get the SF FOMO out of the system.

I know a handful of developers that moved to New York. Seems to me that New York is where the developers go when they are tired of SF. I am thinking Denver or Chattanooga, where I could actually afford to buy a house and a yard.<p>Edit: I have been in SF for 3 and a half years. It was only suppose to be 2 years to get my career started. I feel the black hole pulling and next thing I know it will be 10 years.

Living outside of the Bay Area has consequences as well. For example, I&#x27;m an out-of-work developer currently living outside of SF, and I can therefore only really apply to positions that allow for remote work (which are much rarer than HN would have you believe).

I hate San Francisco (and NYC and DC, and to a somewhat lesser extent, the non-SF SFBA cities). Unfortunately, it really is the best place for tech company employment, at least in a 15-500 person company. You need to have enough companies in a given area to make it possible to switch jobs without relocating, and I just don&#x27;t see that anywhere else (NYC for non-core-tech tech-using companies, and DC for gov contracting).<p>Peninsula is losing out to SF itself for a lot of companies, too.<p>For a startup, having service providers in an area is important, but investors are more important, and remain reluctant to do anything remote to themselves.

I was expecting it to be about getting outside the echo chamber of the valley, but it sounds like he just needed a change of pace.

SF can suck you in, but there are loads of people in SF that have nothing to do with Tech at all. When I lived there my friends included a guy who worked on the Bay Bridge, a Hotel Manager, a financial advisor, a set designer, and a couple of musicians. The only tech people I talked to were at work. Those people are easy to find if you look.

Why did this post disappear from the front page?

Some of the Pages on the author&#x27;s domain are blocked on Chrome (Chrome Detected Malware).<p>Be careful if you are not using a secure browser.

This thread is hilarious. People insulting Steve for wanting to leave SF and yet every other article TODAY on the FRONT PAGE is &quot;Why is SF public transit so shitty?&quot; or &quot;Why is SF so expensive?&quot; Get out of here.

&gt; So, at the end of the month, I’m leaving Balanced and the city. I’ll be arriving in Brooklyn [...]<p>&gt; Every hour I spend in New York, I feel excited, and every hour I spend in San Francisco, I feel drained.<p>To each his own, and from the looks of the comments here, he seems to be in the minority.

Seeya! How is it SF&#x27;s fault that you can&#x27;t take a break?<p>Instead of changing things, you whine then leave. Yeah! That&#x27;ll change the &quot;SF work culture&quot;!<p>Personally, I just went outside for the first time in two or three weeks. There are just more interesting things inside than out. I everything I need delivered or transmitted over the internet, including friends.