Exodus Of Wealthy From Bay Area Leads To Drop In Median Income

SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA, CA — The median income in the Bay Area has decreased as wealthy residents leave the area, a new report by the United States Census Bureau revealed. The report also showed current residents at all income levels are more likely to relocate than in any other major population area.

The median household income in the San Francisco metro area, which includes San Francisco, Alameda, Contra Costa, San Mateo and Marin counties, fell by 4.6 percent from 2019 to 2021 to $116,005 a year, according to the report released earlier this month.

At $116,005, the area's median income remained the highest in the nation in 2021, according to the Census Bureau report.

Other metropolitan areas throughout the state, such as the Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario and the San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad, metro areas saw increases in the median income of 2.4 and 2.2 percent, respectively.

According to the article, "Bay Area exodus: Median income drops as wealthy residents move out" published by the East Bay Times, the decline was likely in large part due to the trend toward remote work and high-paid Bay Area tech industry workers moving to less expensive areas, "offering a different lifestyle, like hotspots Sacramento and Boise, Idaho."

"Once (tech workers) didn’t have to work here or live here, it makes sense they would move and take their incomes with them," said Steve Levy, director of the Center for Continuing Study of the California Economy in Palo Alto.

The new census report on income data did not indicate where wealthy Bay Area residents might have moved, the East Bay Times said, but the information did show that median incomes "soared in many popular pandemic destinations throughout the South and Southwest."

San Jose was not included in the report.

Read More at the East Bay Times.