Miami Tech overhype (house insurance, theatres, high school)

[Lakeland-Winter Haven MSA]

Despite the pros and cons of this thread, I hope the numbers materialize for Miami.

[elchevere]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...w?srnd=premium

“ While Miami may be a favorite destination for libertarian-leaning tech titans, investment bankers and real estate developers, it has always been thin on tech talent: The metro barely cracks the top 50 on its share of knowledge, professional and creative class workers, far behind leading tech hubs and roughly the same as Grand Rapids, Louisville, Las Vegas and Memphis. Fueled by the recent influx of the super-rich, it has lost much of the advantage it once had in terms of affordability. Miami ranked second to New York on a recent ranking of America’s least affordable housing markets, with the median-priced house eating up a whopping 80%-plus of median incomes.

Bill Bishop long ago noted how Americans sort geographically based on their income, education, values and political orientations. Affordability, weather, lifestyle and taxes play a role as well. Now, add to that our positions and preferences on Covid policies and restrictions. For the foreseeable future, top tech talent is likely to continue to prefer the social and political climate of coastal tech hubs and superstar cities, even as their bosses flock to Florida and Texas.”

[vacollins]

I have to disagree on this one. I think those same coastal hubs are so expensive that top tech talent will be willing to leave esp. to places like Texas.

[CXT2000]

Originally Posted by elchevere

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...w?srnd=premium

“ While Miami may be a favorite destination for libertarian-leaning tech titans, investment bankers and real estate developers, it has always been thin on tech talent: The metro barely cracks the top 50 on its share of knowledge, professional and creative class workers, far behind leading tech hubs and roughly the same as Grand Rapids, Louisville, Las Vegas and Memphis. Fueled by the recent influx of the super-rich, it has lost much of the advantage it once had in terms of affordability. Miami ranked second to New York on a recent ranking of America’s least affordable housing markets, with the median-priced house eating up a whopping 80%-plus of median incomes.

Bill Bishop long ago noted how Americans sort geographically based on their income, education, values and political orientations. Affordability, weather, lifestyle and taxes play a role as well. Now, add to that our positions and preferences on Covid policies and restrictions. For the foreseeable future, top tech talent is likely to continue to prefer the social and political climate of coastal tech hubs and superstar cities, even as their bosses flock to Florida and Texas.”

Yup, Miami and Florida in general are sparse with tech talent. Sure, Miami is getting some people from SF/NYC, but majority are going to Austin or other parts of the country. Miami also sees huge brain drain, they go to either SF/NYC/LA, some go to Orlando and I've even seen quite a few end up North of the border. I have friends in the tech scene there and they're always telling me how hard it is to find talent there and have had to scale back operations. I've heard the same when I have personally been part of recruitment missions as well from certain companies in the tech scene.

And this circles back to the main point I brought up a few posts ago. Sure VC and tech investment has increased in Miami, but it's been like that globally. Literally every city on every continent has seen record amounts of VC and tech investments. Miami's focus on bringing talent from SF/NYC is discouraging the local market, and they are leaving at a faster pace to other cities than talent coming in. Combine the numbers from the DDA (which again, all tech jobs created in MDC have been in the DDA boundaries) and the +286 jobs created out of 1.8K (over three years) is further proof that the Miami tech "movement" has been overhyped to death. Of course, add the bonus of low salaries + insane COL, a very conservative government and Miami's corruption/third world infrastructure and it just turns people off. Like I have told people before, don't let the sunshine fool you, cause it will burn you.

Miami is good for hedge funds though, I will say that. But for tech? it's so behind major cities and even medium sized cities that Miami is gonna try growing it faster than demand and then you're back at yet another typical boom/bust Miami cycle.

[Marc Middleton]

Originally Posted by vacollins

I have to disagree on this one. I think those same coastal hubs are so expensive that top tech talent will be willing to leave esp. to places like Texas.

Until they get to Texas

[elchevere]

I agree with that….though hedge funds/investment banks are being run more and more these days by STEM techies (mathematicians). Those are the ones writing the algorithms, making the big decisions, trade desks make the big money with programmers the brains behind the banks; so in that regard, Miami should do well with fintech and less so with IT and software programming outside of having a limited presence that caters primarily to the Latin markets.

Originally Posted by djesus007

Yup, Miami and Florida in general are sparse with tech talent. Sure, Miami is getting some people from SF/NYC, but majority are going to Austin or other parts of the country. Miami also sees huge brain drain, they go to either SF/NYC/LA, some go to Orlando and I've even seen quite a few end up North of the border. I have friends in the tech scene there and they're always telling me how hard it is to find talent there and have had to scale back operations. I've heard the same when I have personally been part of recruitment missions as well from certain companies in the tech scene.

And this circles back to the main point I brought up a few posts ago. Sure VC and tech investment has increased in Miami, but it's been like that globally. Literally every city on every continent has seen record amounts of VC and tech investments. Miami's focus on bringing talent from SF/NYC is discouraging the local market, and they are leaving at a faster pace to other cities than talent coming in. Combine the numbers from the DDA (which again, all tech jobs created in MDC have been in the DDA boundaries) and the +286 jobs created out of 1.8K (over three years) is further proof that the Miami tech "movement" has been overhyped to death. Of course, add the bonus of low salaries + insane COL, a very conservative government and Miami's corruption/third world infrastructure and it just turns people off. Like I have told people before, don't let the sunshine fool you, cause it will burn you.

Miami is good for hedge funds though, I will say that. But for tech? it's so behind major cities and even medium sized cities that Miami is gonna try growing it faster than demand and then you're back at yet another typical boom/bust Miami cycle.

[silverct9a]

Not able to read Herald articles - not subscribed. Question, what exactly is a "tech" job? Is a business analyst who works in Excel and/or VBA doing relatively advanced functions (Pivot tables, Macros,and creating reports) a tech worker? How about the Data Analyst who works in multiple flavors of SQL databases...MSSQL, MySQL etc and they're doing advanced querying (Joining multiple tables, subqueries, Stored Procedures with good business logic knowledge) or is the title only reserved for the for the startup guy with advanced skills in a full stack (front end, back end along with cloud deployment skills).

The point of my asking is, what's determines these tech jobs? There needs to be a standard criteria so we can determine if and how much the "hype" has been overblown.

Finally, South Florida is certainly no tech epicenter, but even 5 years ago here a guy/gal with decent Excel, SQL, and maybe even some Visual Basic skills could earn a pretty good living and be in "Tech."

Originally Posted by djesus007

As expected (and once again, I was right about Miami overhyping things), the Miami Tech movement was indeed overhyped. The numbers come from a Miami DDA audit on tech jobs.

Herald Article: https://www.miamiherald.com/news/bus...254805932.html

For those not subscribed, here are some tidbits

Miami DDA tech job creation: 1,858 jobs over 3 years
Real job growth in 2021: 286 (yikes!)

This is far different from the Mayor of Miami claiming Miami saw 7,000+ new tech jobs.

Also this quote is very interesting

“virtual-first” — meaning new hires can live anywhere regardless of the location listed on a specific job posting.”
That’s an increasingly common concept — and could mean the jobs promised in the avalanche of announcements the city has seen over the past year could be a ways off from materializing locally.

So again, a company in Miami can say "hey! we created 300 jobs" but if 250 are not in Miami, then Miami only sees a net gain of 50 jobs.

Although VC in Miami has seen a huge increase, so has virtually every single city in North America. However, Miami has done a good job at online marketing and overhyping the city. And as a result, the DDA (which has been in charge of attracting majority, if not, all tech companies and jobs) has seen a ginormous +286 job growth. Even with all the job postings, it does not matter if you cannot attract talent or people to apply due to lack of demand.

So after a year of the Miami Tech moment, the numbers prove that it is not only overhyped, but the numbers are abysmal for 2021.

[CXT2000]

Live in Miami and can’t find that tech job? You’re not alone and here’s why

Tech Trail recently wrote that of the more than 1,800 jobs promised by firms moving to or expanding in Miami, fewer than 300 have materialized — though these companies have three years to fulfill those hiring pledges. But it’s even worse than that, as new local firms appear to be prioritizing established, out-of-state networks for many of the jobs that they do have.

Kevin Amézaga, a young coder with an active Twitter presence, said he has not been able to get a job among any of the new-to-Miami tech firms — and has essentially stopped trying. He said he’s not alone.
“I have not seen anyone get hired recently,” he said, “especially people looking at relatively entry-level work like myself. For people with more experience that can compete it’s OK, but it’s hard to compete for entry-level.”
Those entry-level openings, he noted, often don’t exist in many of the companies moving here.
The hiring situation was summed up by Michaël Ortali, a Miami-based software engineer, on Twitter this week:
“Every Miami founder I talked to is not hiring locally, they’re hiring remote or importing talent,” he wrote.
The implication may be ominous, Ortali said.
“Sounds familiar? A similar situation happened in the Bay Area which over 10 years drastically changed demographics & cost of living. We are trending towards becoming the new SF.”

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/bus...255173282.html

Huge red flag and lots of concerns, not only lack of jobs, but they're exclusively going to out of towners and not benefiting the people of Miami.

On the bright side, this just gives me more motivation to continue to steal local talent and bring them North of the border. Already have more than a dozen meetings set up, they'll definitely find a tech job here quicker.

[pierrekid]

Originally Posted by djesus007

Live in Miami and can’t find that tech job? You’re not alone and here’s why



https://www.miamiherald.com/news/bus...255173282.html

Huge red flag and lots of concerns, not only lack of jobs, but they're exclusively going to out of towners and not benefiting the people of Miami.

On the bright side, this just gives me more motivation to continue to steal local talent and bring them North of the border. Already have more than a dozen meetings set up, they'll definitely find a tech job here quicker.

Live in south Florida, in the tech field and can confirm, LOTS of tech jobs available. Everyone is hiring and lots of firms with plans to come in.

[vacollins]

I think there is a point that is being highly overlooked. Tech jobs are increasingly becoming remote, especially with cloud development. More and more companies are using cloud services in place of physical networks. So while I can agree that Miami proper might have less jobs than say Austin the same cannot be said for other places like Fort Lauderdale, etc. Entry level jobs are always a bit harder to land because your skills are still unproven. The same can be said if one is searching in San Fran.