Seattle ranks No. 1 on a list measuring migration patterns of recent graduates in tech.
A new CBRE study detailing talent migration trends found that from February 2022 to February 2023, Seattle led all U.S. cities with a 15.2% “in-migration rate” for tech workers with 0-to-3 years of experience. That was well above second-place Austin, at 9.7%, and third-place San Francisco, at 9.1%.
Seattle was the No. 2 inbound market for tech talent growth across all experience levels, CBRE said.
The report, which analyzed LinkedIn data, adds some scrutiny to the pandemic-driven narrative that tech and finance workers are ditching high-cost major markets.
Some big cities such as San Francisco and Chicago experienced a minor outflow of talent during the pandemic, and cities like Austin and Nashville saw sizable in-migration. But the high-cost markets still have an “undeniable talent pool size advantage,” CBRE noted. And more recently, the trend of talent migration out of high-cost markets is slowing.
Seattle saw positive net migration for tech and finance talent from both 2021 to 2022 and 2022 to 2023.
A separate “Scoring Tech Talent” report from CBRE last month ranked Seattle second for tech talent in North America, trailing only the Bay Area.
Despite thousands of layoffs over the past year hitting hometown tech giants Microsoft and Amazon, as well as hundreds of Seattle-area startups, the city’s tech ecosystem still appears robust relative to other metros.
A new study from the Washington Technology Industry Association found that tech “remains a key driver of Washington’s economy, with the net increase in tech sector employment and tax revenue generation still far exceeding growth among other major sectors in the state’s economy.”
The WTIA report found that the state’s information and communication technology sector added 89,000 jobs from 2019 and 2022, a 33% increase.
The tech industry accounts for nearly 30% of the local economy in the Seattle metro area, the Seattle Times reported in May.
But a recent budget report from the City of Seattle warned that Seattle faces stronger economic headwinds compared to the rest of the country due in part to its reliance on the technology industry.
“Our regional dependence on the technology sector was a strength for many years, but that is shifting as the sector cools,” the report said. “In addition, the longer-term implications of work-from-home are expected to ripple through other local sectors, with perhaps the construction sector most directly impacted.”
