Will the tech heavy areas (Silicon Valley/PNW/parts of the Sun Belt) go the way of the Factory Belt/Rust Belt?

[cBach]

Tech seems more like the oil industry in the sense that there are peaks and valleys than the auto industry which was more like a mountain, climbing ever so highly until around 1950 and then lowering gradually and then speeding up as you go down the hill.

The tech industry will not go away. People will need apps to constantly be updated, servers will need to be replaced, data farms will have to keep growing and new data farms created as people store more and more.

I can envisage a future when basic programming is fully replaced by AI machines programming or machine based learning, but there will always have to be architects designing the AI machines, hardware engineers designing the servers, techs installing the equipment, and IT managing the infrastructure.

High tech has become more like a service than an industry in that regard and hence why it resembles the oil industry. You pump your gas at the gas station and there is always demand for gas. You store those photos on the cloud and there is always need for more storage, etc...

Now the question is whether the current centers like SF, Seattle, and Austin will continue to grow or whether other centers will take over. I think that a lot of tech will become diversified out of the SF Bay area. You're already seeing this with google campuses in LA (Silicon Beach), NYC, Austin, etc... You continue to see this outward movement.

I don't foresee either Seattle or Austin declining anytime soon. They are both relatively cheap compared to SF and they offer two entirely different options (cold and wet or hot and dry) that appeal to the two different types of people that may leave SF for greener pastures. A sunbird would probably seek out Austin as a second option to SF, someone who favors cooler weather would favor Seattle.

[bluecarebear]

Originally Posted by 18Montclair

I can recall no less than 4 recessions hit the Bay Area in the past 30 years. Silicon Valley lost 10% of it's jobs in the dot-com bust of 2000-2001, then gained them back and then some but then lost 10% of all jobs again during the great recession and now is booming like gangbusters yet again. I feel a recession is probably on the way again.

Many of the tech companies aren't profitable but cities are embracing them as they buy up the hottest spots in town. A lot of money is being spent without the guarantee of long term growth or success. This isn't going to end well.

[18Montclair]

Originally Posted by bluecarebear

Many of the tech companies aren't profitable but cities are embracing them as they buy up the hottest spots in town. A lot of money is being spent without the guarantee of long term growth or success. This isn't going to end well.

My point is the tech industry keeps reinventing itself through imnovation. We have 2 recessions every decades but man's constant need to discover the next big thing is what makes Silicon Valley different from a Detroit. The Valley is far more resilient.

[MN_Ski]

It does seem like we are hitting an affordability ceiling with the big tech cities now.

Zillow just ranked Denver the worst city for tech workers, citing it's high housing costs and low salaries. The average worker comes out ~$140 a month behind compared to a worker in SF. Inventory for housing in all of these places keep going down, the prices are leveling off, and we have just rode a good 5 year economic boom...my guess is that companies will try to trim up, and start to move out some of their resources to cities like Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Atlanta, etc.