Notes From the Epicenter: In Search of the True West Coast Tech Capital
One recent morning as I perused the op-ed section of the New York Times, I came across a passage describing a certain upper West Coast city’s differences with Los Angeles. It went something like this: “To the south, the tawdry celluloid behemoth dispensing lowbrow entertainment; to the north the capital of the new economy with its undeserving nouveaux riches and mellow backpackers in Birkenstocks.” As I read this I felt a pang of disbelief. For the northern city it described was clearly San Francisco. Except that it was Seattle.
The op-ed writer was David Guterson, a Seattle native and author of the novel “Snow Falling on Cedars” (a decent book made into what I thought was a horrid little movie). So I suppose it makes sense that he would hold Seattle in high regard. But the capital of the new economy? Now that’s just crazy talk.
What Makes a Capital a Capital?
But then again, Seattle does have Microsoft. And Seattle-ites (as they apparently prefer to be known) did invent the latte (at least the American latte), the fuel of the high tech worker. Could Guterson be right? I decided to look into the matter. Since I’ve only spent about 36 hours in Seattle (compared with six years in San Francisco), I couldn’t rely on my own experience as a guide. Instead I turned to that new media each city claims to be the vanguard of: the Internet.
As far as sheer availability of information, Seattle wins hands down. It took me all of ten minutes to find out, for instance, that the city on Puget Sound is home to 14 museums, 28 historical sites (San Francisco, I found, has 40), 24 community centers, 25 public libraries, 27 performing arts centers, 12 beaches, 50 urban parks, 151 tennis courts, and 10 swimming pools. If I want to know how many swimming pools are in San Francisco, it turns out I have to pull on my bathing suit and go count them myself.
Factoid vs. Factoid
San Francisco’s dearth of organized handy factoids not withstanding, I was able to gather enough information to make a useful comparison between these two suitors to the high tech industry. To begin with, both San Francisco and Seattle possess at least one funny looking building whose purpose is most likely to make that city’s skyline distinctive. In San Francisco there is the pyramidal Trans America building (and, for bonus points, the art deco-ish Coit Tower), and in Seattle there is the Star Trekish Space Needle. Although in the actual Star Trek series the Federation of Planets headquarters is in San Francisco, which gives us a leg up if you ask me.
Seattle’s average yearly rainfall is 36.2 inches, while San Francisco’s is a mere 19.5. Seattle (which according to the 2000 Census is home to 563,374 souls) has a population density of 6,462 people per square mile. San Francisco distributes its 801,377 people (2000 Census again) at 15,746 per square mile. We may be standing closer together, but we’re dryer.
The good people of Seattle are apparently just a tad more clever than us San Franciscans. According to County City Databook statistics for 1994, 87 percent of people over 25 living in Seattle have completed high school and 38 percent hold a BA or higher. In San Francisco, those numbers were 78 percent for high school, and 35 percent for at least four years of higher education.
High Tech Factoids Matter
On to the high-tech business. According to the American Electronics Association, a trade group, at the end of 2000 Seattle had 75,565 high-tech employees. Compare that with San Jose’s 252,900. (I know it’s not San Francisco, but it’s only 45 minutes away and at any rate is part of greater Silicon Valley, which makes it count, in my opinion. Plus, I’m betting a good many of those 252,900 are commuting from San Francisco.) I couldn’t find numbers for San Francisco, but I can tell you that the city by the bay has the second highest high-tech employment growth rate in the country, at 65 percent last year. You can probably attribute that, in part, to the $9 billion of venture capital investments made to San Francisco businesses between 1993 and 1998. Seattle’s share in that same period was a comparatively paltry $1.9 billion.
According to Silicon Valley magazine, San Francisco’s digital-media business accounts for $6 billion in revenue a year. Of course, Seattle has Microsoft. That company, the Seattle area’s third largest (after the aerospace giant Boeing and the bulk foods giant Costco), accounts for $19.7 billion a year. Amazon.com is the area’s thirteenth largest, with $1.6 billion a year (clearly we’re talking revenues, not profits). And, in likely attest to the glut of young new-media types, Starbucks ranks twelfth, with $1.6 billion.
Do Earthquake Stats Matter?
As far as whether each city is an actual epicenter, San Francisco had a 6.9 magnitude earthquake in 1989 (still a popular topic of conversation). Seattle had a 6.8-er in February of this year (also, I understand, still a topic of conversation). They also had a good 5.3 quake in 1996. Of course we had the so-called Great Earthquake in 1906, which was a massive 8.25 and set off the Great Fire, which in many ways was similar to the Great Dot Com Rush of the latter twentieth century. Still, with all these numbers, I’m not sure which metropolis is the true epicenter. Perhaps you can do the math.
This article was last modified on January 6, 2023
This article was first published on April 2, 2001
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