One city's "brain drain" is another's "brain gain," and by that logic, the mind of the San Francisco Bay Area is swollen with an influx of workers bearing tech-focused degrees. According to the third annual Scoring Tech Talent report, which measures the number of tech degrees awarded in the US during the last five years against the number of jobs in the respective cities over that timeframe. It was created by commercial real estate firm CBRE, and according to their figures, 89,600 people with tech-focused degrees came to SF from 2011 through 2015, making it the the top destination (and brain gainer), followed by Washington, D.C., Seattle, New York, and Austin, in that order. By contrast, cities like Boston saw 17,200 tech-degree-havers depart over the same period.
As the report makes note, tech-degree holders account for just 3.5 percent of the total U.S. workforce, though that group has grown by 27 percent in the last five years nationwide (and 61.5 percent in the Bay Area). While easy to exaggerate in terms of size, Colin Yasukochi, the report's author, still sounds awestruck by the new numbers, particularly those in the Bay Area, according to a press release.“The growth in tech talent in the Bay Area is astounding given the size of the market," he said, "It hasn’t slowed down in either volume or quality of tech talent, while most other large, established tech markets are experiencing slowing, or even decelerated, growth... Feeding the Bay Area’s continued growth is its ability to attract talent from across the country and world because there are not enough local tech degree graduates to fill all the open tech jobs.”
Relatedly, a recent Pricenomics census analysis attempted to quantify the changing demographics of San Francisco proper as affected by the Bay Area's influx of degree-holding, high-salaried workers. According to that report, "From 2010 to 2014 — the most recent period from which detailed data is available — an annual average of about 60,000 people migrated to San Francisco and 60,000 migrated out. Since San Francisco has around 800,000 residents, that 60,000 represents about 7.5% of the population."
Citing the high tech sector, the report posits that "This demand is the most likely explanation for San Francisco’s net increase of nearly 7,000 people per year—among those at least 22-years-old—with a college or postgraduate degree. This is in contrast to a net out migration of about 3,000 people without a college degree." Further parsing the demographics of those 60,000 leaving versus those 60,000 arriving, the report proposes that, "the people moving in are more likely to have higher levels of formal education, and they tend to be younger, White and Asian. The people moving out are less likely to have completed college, and they tend be older, African American and Hispanic."
Of late, it's been the prospect of tech workers leaving the Bay Area that's drawn the most vociferous attention. Some, especially those running job sites like Hired and Indeed, point out that tech workers in the area have searched in increasing numbers for jobs in other cities, like smaller metropoles or New York. But if the CRBE report's findings hold true, tech-degree holders may keep on coming, especially early in their careers, to the tech mecca of the Bay Area.
