We left primarily so we can own a house (if that’s your thing which was ours). It is a ton more affordable here. This is why as bad as the bears see it, housing here in SD for what you get is “cheap” for any norcal or LA person. Pay is lower, but housing cost is much higher than your wage would be up there for most jobs (again, unless you are in certain tech fields).

As for the SF lifestyle, I can see your kids loving it, but just picture some mid 30s guys trying to get down with some 22 year olds and it’s a sad picture. 🙂

As for why, just wasn’t interested in it anymore and had no interest in keeping up. It’s hard to succeed if you simply aren’t interested at all in keeping up with the technology which changes rapidly…

If you’ve worked in SV, SV is all work. I think the AMC Mercado was the only place I’ve seen where companies had job postings before the movie starts.

Bottom line, money isn’t everything. Especially if you make more than 75k apparently 😉 so if you’re not really interested in keeping up with the Jones, leaving the rat race behind isn’t really that big of a deal.

I think a lot of people wouldn’t mind making 20% less if they could work less and still keep their job, health benefits, etc…