Austin vs. San Antonio - IT jobs (Dallas, Round Rock: for sale, homes)

[love roses]

Then try and go to Padre Island. Corpus as a city only has a symphony orchestra and a Hockey team as far as "cultural" events go, so I wouldn't really say move there (although I do have family that lives there and I LOVE to go and visit). Beach activities out the wazoo in both places (corpus and padre).

[iguanas4]

Originally Posted by love roses

Then try and go to Padre Island. Corpus as a city only has a symphony orchestra and a Hockey team as far as "cultural" events go, so I wouldn't really say move there (although I do have family that lives there and I LOVE to go and visit). Beach activities out the wazoo in both places (corpus and padre).

hi Love Roses,

Actually, we just did come back from a minivacation on South Padre. We had a good time, and the beach/water was pretty nice. But it took about 6 hours of an insanely boring drive to get there. Not someplace you can go for just the day, like we used to go to Santa Monica or even Santa Barbara when we lived in LA.

My bf was complaining that it was "boring" there (SPI). And it was pretty dead, but that was cool with me. I like to just lay on the beach and do nothing but read or stare at the water. He likes to walk around to shops and stuff like, well, Santa Monica or Santa Barbara! SPI seemed to have nothing but tacky Tshirt and souvenir shops, and it wasn't very walkable. The shopping area I mean, the beach was great to walk on.

[pwherman512]

iguanas4- sounds like Cancun is in your future!! I love doing things out doors, so Lake, biking and hiking activities are my passion. I agree 100% that if you want things like Fiesta Texas, Sea World and a great zoo then SA is the way to go. Speaking of- have you ever been to our zoo? WOW!! Was it bad. We did see some birds (in the monkey cage instead of monkeys!), but that was about it.

[love roses]

Yeah, you'd have to do that as a weekend trip. San Antonio is a great place to go for day trips. I still haven't gone to the zoo there. The one near Waco is supposed to be pretty nice too. The Austin zoo is more of an animal rescue type thing, I think that's why there's not much going on there.

[noname_com]

Austin is great for homebrewers.

[nativeDallasite]

Originally Posted by guerosincero

I can never get enough of the Austin vs. San Antonio debate, especially when folks use statistics to prove a point as though the total experience one has living in one place versus another (which probably has about as many variables as the weather) can be quantified with three or so statistics.

But if you are going to use statistics, at least use ones that matter. Take for instance a median family income figure, like the following one:

Median family income (in 2006 inflation-adjusted dollars):
Austin $58,241
San Antonio $ 47,306 (which is WELL below the State Median)
Winner- Austin by a lot of $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Who cares about the difference in absolute terms? What is the cost of living? That is what matters, and a google search confirms that at least one survey of Texas cities found the composite COL index for Austin to be the highest in Texas (at 96.1) than any other survey city/town in Texas, even more than Plano (95). San Antonio, meanwhile, is at 91.6, meaning that your dollar will go farther in San Antonio in buying your average basket of goods.

I don't have the time to gross up this figure to give a complete apples-to-apples comparison, but know just from having lived in both places that Austin, whatever its charms, is a hell of an expensive place to live and needlessly so. You pay out the nose for housing that is anywhere near where you may work or want to be on a regular basis and still cannot escape the traffic gridlock.

Ladybird Lake is admittedly an awesome attraction, but what is there past that immediate area that is getting only more and more crowded by the month with folks moving into condos nearby so they can get views of the lake and the neverending gridlock on 35 and SoCo? San Antonio on the other hand just opened Government Canyon to add to a good number of parks it already had, has bought an absolutely gorgeous piece of land in the north side, and has already started the process of turning the rest of the San Antonio River (13 miles of it) into a linear park stretching from the museums in the northside to the missions on the southside.

Or how about education statistics:

Education (Bachelor's degree or higher):
Austin 42.9%
San Antonio 23.1%
Winner- Austin

Setting aside the dubious proposition that formal education is the only measure of intelligence, if nearly half of your population has a bachelor's or higher, who does your plumbing, fixes your car, or any of the number of other things that are needed by most citizens?

Sure, I have run into more than a few Ph.Ds schlepping coffee at the umpteen number of coffee shops in Austin, but is this supposed to be impressive?

Also, if I could live in a city where I have more folks competing for a job I might want because there are roughly twice as many people with at least a bachelor's degree versus living in a city with half as many people with a similar level of education and a lower cost of living, which one should I choose?

Workforce (People above the age of 16 in the workforce)
Austin- 73.6%
San Antonio- 64.0% (Again below the State average)
Winner- Austin

I would be interested to see where this came from, but have a hard time believing this doesn't include students who have work study. It could also be skewed by, among other things, the number of retirees and stay-at-home parents, both of which I would be willing to bet are higher in San Antonio. Regardless, I don't know how much it really proves.

Brilliant, couldn't have put it any better myself. In SA there are fewer IT jobs but there's also far less competition for them.

SA is also very popular with retirees. My grandparents lived in SA for 30 years after my grandfather retired and they adored it. Almost everyone on their block was a retiree when I was a kid. Now most of the retirees have passed on (including my grandparents) and the houses are being snapped up by...you guessed it...IT workers with young families.

I personally wouldn't live in SA...I just don't like it...but I wouldn't discourage other people from moving there. I still have family down there and they all love it. Takes different strokes, etc.

[Chris_Marie]

I've lived in Austin for 3+ years and have been dating a guy in San Antonio for almost a year. We used to jokingly bicker back-and-forth about which town was better and he always would concede, " Alright, Austin wins." Even so, I must admit the traffic has gotten beyond horrendous, we are at %100 capacity of what our roads were meant to handle, the roads were not built for the never-ending influx of new populace that keeps arriving. There is almost literally a homeless person panhandling on every corner and you cannot walk downtown or around the campus area without getting hustled at least a couple times as the homeless shelter is located mere blocks from popular night-time party destinations.
There is a lot of "new money" hipsters and new eye-sore condos to go along with them. Austin is a town that is always crowing about how great it is, which can get annoying, even for a local. There are so many festivals and things going on on weekends that for persons using public transportation, the frequent bus detours can get down-right infuriating. Bus detours have more than a couple times caused me to be late to work. There is a lot going on in Austin at all times, it's a very happening place, but it's quite expensive to live there. I was living alone and working all the time and still barely getting by each month when rent came. I miss it sometimes as it has been home to me for so long but it just isn't what it used to be. Austin is a cool place to go to school at, to visit on the weekends, but don't live there. It's a party city and a great place to party but not always the best place to cal home.

[SweethomeSanAntonio]

Originally Posted by pwherman512

"If you over 30 in Austin there is no where to go and do"- Are you serious? Wow, I have heard it all now. Let's see over 30 crowd: Town Lake, Lake Austin, Lake Travis, Zilker Park, Barton Springs......... ah forget it, there is not enough room on this webpage. Man, I am just at a loss for words now. That has to be the craziest post yet- but hey to each his/her own.

And San Antonio is going to "boom like no other"- When? They were saying that in 1993 when I moved there! Hello it's 2007, when is the boom coming? Toyota was supposed to be it, but guess what, the suppliers that were supposed to bring even more jobs decided to move north of San Antonio.

San Antonio has seen tremondous growth, it was the third fastest growing city in raw numbers in the U.S. after L.A. and NYC last year and has outpaced Austin several times over the years. The IT industy in San Antonio is almost a $9 billion industry and is projected to double in size in the next 5 years. Healthcare/Biomedical Research is over $25 billion and Finance/Insurance is over 21 billion the two largest. San Antonio's economy is more diversified compared to Austin's. Both have promising futures.


S.A. New Cyber City
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?play=1&video=1410041474 (broken link)

[hoffdano]

The San Antonio IT industry is not a $9B industry.

The SA Chamber of Commerce claims an "economic impact" of $9B but that is not the same as saying it is a $9B industry. The IT payroll in SA is less than $1B ($882M). Rackspace, a nice (maybe even great) company, has revenues of ~$550M.

IT is not doubling in five years. SA says it has grown 20% since 2005 (doubled over the last decade). The employment in 2008 is barely above the level it was in 2003.

The USAF "cyber security" push is great news and a nice coup for SA. I'm glad it is in SA and Texas instead of somewhere else. I'm also glad Microsoft built its newest datacenter in SA.

All of this is based on the SA Chamber's newest report.

Greater San Antonio Chamber of Commerce

I'm happy for SA and its IT industry growth. But it is exaggeration to characterize SA as a soon-to-be IT powerhouse.

[twenty1]

Originally Posted by hoffdano

The San Antonio IT industry is not a $9B industry.

The SA Chamber of Commerce claims an "economic impact" of $9B but that is not the same as saying it is a $9B industry. The IT payroll in SA is less than $1B ($882M). Rackspace, a nice (maybe even great) company, has revenues of ~$550M.

IT is not doubling in five years. SA says it has grown 20% since 2005 (doubled over the last decade). The employment in 2008 is barely above the level it was in 2003.

The USAF "cyber security" push is great news and a nice coup for SA. I'm glad it is in SA and Texas instead of somewhere else. I'm also glad Microsoft built its newest datacenter in SA.

All of this is based on the SA Chamber's newest report.

Greater San Antonio Chamber of Commerce

I'm happy for SA and its IT industry growth. But it is exaggeration to characterize SA as a soon-to-be IT powerhouse.

Great clarity.