San Francisco has highest rate of million-dollar jobs in US: Report

[JACK AYLMER]

Where are the most million dollar jobs in the U.S.? Not New York, not Los Angeles, but San Francisco and the surrounding Bay Area.

The Bay Area leads in offering the biggest share of high-salary jobs, offering the largest percentage of jobs of any city making $500,000 or more per year, $1 million or more per year, *and* $2 million or more per year. That’s according to new data from the payroll company A-D-P.

About 1 in every 185 jobs in the San Francisco Bay Area – just over one-half of one percent – pay $1 million or more. That’s a ways ahead of second-place Naples, Florida, where the rate is 1 in every 313 jobs.

Both are well above the national average. Across America, 1 in every 455 jobs pays $1 million or more each year.

So … why San Francisco? The short answer is… tech.

The Bay Area is both heavily reliant on tech jobs and the biggest global hub for both tech’s top employees and its largest companies.

The report notes that tech employees, particularly engineers and executives, can command really high salaries from companies. And that unlike other high-paying jobs like doctors and lawyers, tech employees don’t have their income limited to how many patients or clients they see.

Beyond the tech industry’s dominance, researchers found two other factors at play. And both relate to the city’s cost of living.

Part of why high earners make up such a large share of the population and San Francisco is a major spike in the cost of living there in recent decades. 

Home prices in San Francisco itself have more than doubled since 2012, with the average going from about $700,000 to $1.65 million, growing at a considerably higher rate than home prices nationwide.

Both that and the rise of remote work have pushed lower- and middle-income people elsewhere.

It’s created a big gap between the rental market and the housing market. Data from Zillow and Apartment List shows that in both the San Francisco Bay Area and neighboring San Jose, it’s now roughly twice as expensive to buy a home at the median home price than it is to rent for 20 years. Nationwide on average, those two options cost about the same.

And with few lower-income people moving in, it’s made it so that million-dollar earners are a bigger chunk of the population.

For Straight Arrow News, I’m Jack Aylmer.

And for all the latest updates on this and other top stories, download the Straight Arrow News app.