San Francisco will never be the same as before. The busy streets filled with tech workers, few people in circle in deep discussion, few people revolving with their cycles, few workers having hot tea amidst cold temperature – all are missing over the past one year due to the deadly Chinese pandemic COVID-19. According to a survey conducted by Blind, nearly 39% of tech professionals are of the opinion that San Francisco is never coming back.
The speculations are high because Salesforce, one of San Francisco’s largest private employers, has reportedly decided to permanently allow workers to stay home for two or more days a week depending upon their health situation. Those employees who suffer from ailments like Diabetes will be allowed to work from home because of the risky nature of the virus. This will have serious implications for San Francisco’s downtown’s economic recovery, which will extend beyond the pandemic.
The Blind survey conducted with over 1850 professionals between February 7 to 10 revealed that over 59% of salesforce professionals think SF is never coming back. Moreover, 43% of professionals think SF will recover in over a year. While 45% of Google employees feel that SF will recover in a year, 18% of professionals think SF will recover in less than a year. When asked, nearly 15% of Microsoft professionals are of the opinion that SF will recover in less than a year.
According to a Google professional, the year 2021 will be complaining about traffic and dirtiness of BART over a cup of hot chocolate at ghirardelli’s. He expressed hope that good times will be back. Meanwhile, another user revealed that remote work and Cali shenanigans mean the future of tech will be in Miami.
Commenting on the situation, an Airbnb user added that Bay Area native here and SF will come back. The situation won’t be the same and might not be the traditional tech hub. However, SF has seen dramatic booms and busts including cultural shifts. The place is a hub for innovation and change.
With popular technology companies like Facebook, Twitter, Dropbox, Yelp advocating remote work programs beyond the COVID-19 pandemic, the urban economic vitality of the popular technology hub is facing serious existence issues. We hope the COVID-19 will be under control within the next 4-5 months and companies will return back to normalcy.
