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Kacey Gavin “decided” to stay in the Seattle area, where she grew up before enrolling at Washington State University. Then, a series of internships took her across the country.
Her first move to Dakota of the Norte. Su moment in Boise, Idaho, where she interned at semiconductor company Micron in 2023. The city was “fun” and “lively” and the people were friendly, Gavin says. Plus, housing is cheap: She says she moved into a furnished, subsidized apartment for only about $250 a month. But most of all, Gavin enjoyed his work. ” I think Boise is too far away,” he says, but after a positive experience, “I’m much more open to it than I was before. “
Gavin isn’t alone. Young people are increasingly exploring roles inland in the US, leaving behind bigger coastal cities while shifting the types of jobs they seek, according to a new report from Handshake, a career site geared toward students and recent grads in the US. Applications on Handshake are up 116 percent year-over-year for roles in Boise, the company’s data shows. That increase is second only to Columbia, Maryland, which sits between Baltimore and Washington, DC. Handshake’s report also found that students are moving away from traditionally popular roles like internet and software companies, and increasingly applying to roles in government, hardware, semiconductor companies, and manufacturing.
One of the most isolated cities in the United States, Boise is just five hours from Salt Lake City and seven hours from Portland, Oregon, but it is home to a developing tech boom over the past decade. Micron is building a $15 billion investment. production facility there expected to open in 2025, and two local corporations have been acquired through big names: Kount through Equifax in 2021 and TSheets through Intuit in 2017. Boise’s population grew to 235,000, 30,000 more since then. 2010. A 2022 report found that Idaho had the second-highest growth in tech jobs among all U. S. states. With a more affordable cost of living, Boise attracts tech workers seeking a mix of nature, urban living, and balance between work and personal life, as well as stability and opportunities.
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Last year saw an overhaul of the U. S. tech jobs sector. This radically changed the career paths of recent graduates. When they chose careers like computer science 4 years ago, they hoped to stick to their predecessors in a lucrative market with profits in big tech corporations like Meta. , Amazon, and others. But instead, they’ve faced hiring freezes and massive layoffs across the industry that have forced changes. These tweaks will be felt well into 2024. Twitch, Discord, Duolingo, Amazon, and Google all announced discounts last week. Some hopeful tech staff members have spent countless hours applying for jobs without success, and others are looking for more tech work in government, looking for meaningful and reliable jobs.
There are so many opportunities in Boise because the region’s growing pool of skills hasn’t been able to keep up with the demands of the tech industry, says Nick Crabbs, spouse and networking director at software company Vynyl and a local to Boise’s tech scene, who in the past attended Boise Startup. This has led to immigration, but the city’s unusually friendly character and small industry also help boost young careers, Crabbs says. “If you come to Boise, you can temporarily embark on career developments. “
After some 400,000 layoffs in the tech sector between 2022 and 2023, young people are looking for new types of jobs. More than 40% of programs submitted through technology careers in Handshake were for web and software corporations in 2021, but that figure dropped to 25% in September 2023. At the same time, government jobs programs have doubled. Handshake also found that women working in technology-related fields are more likely than men to apply for positions in finance, management, consulting, government, education, and healthcare. and studio corporations, while men are more likely to apply for web and software corporations.
Part of Boise’s boom will continue to be driven through Micron, which employs about 5,400 more people in Boise. Its expansion is expected to create 17,000 jobs, adding 2,000 at Micron, by 2030, says Scott Gatzemeier, the company’s vice president in the United States. Finish the expansion. The company gave full-time jobs to about 200 of its interns last year and plans to hire about 370 more interns at the company this year.
But there’s also a culture of startups and entrepreneurship that drives growth. Boise looks like Nashville or Austin today 20 or 3 decades ago, says Clark Krause, executive director of the Boise Valley Economic Partnership, a regional business organization. A Boise chef won a James Beard Award in 2023, the city hosts an annual music festival featuring dozens of contemporary artists, and there are ski and hiking trails nearby. A one-bedroom apartment rents for an average of $1,300 per month. “Here, you can easily have the lifestyle you dream of,” Krause says.
But as the tech industry simmers, the city is feeling the strain. “We’ve had all the benefits of growth, but also all the challenges of growth,” Krause says. Housing prices in Boise have jumped by more than 50 percent since 2019. The city is investing $340 million to make its downtown more walkable, and also announced plans to redevelop hundreds of affordable housing units last year. But it will need to build around 2,700 new housing units each year to keep up with demand, a 2021 analysis from the city found. Construction in Boise fell some 4,000 units behind that goal over a three-year period preceding the report.
Labor experts say the dust of layoffs in the tech sector is starting to calm down. But Gen Z is focused on stability, says Christine Cruzvergara, Handshake’s director of education strategy. “When you think about stability and then you see the headlines about layoffs, as long as housing continues to skyrocket in some of the big cities, some of those secondary cities, a little bit smaller, a little bit more manageable, they’re going to continue to see a slight increase in the number of young professionals who are willing to spend there.
WIRED has partnered with Jobbio to create WIRED Hired, a professional marketplace engaged with WIRED readers. Companies that need to promote their jobs can stop at WIRED Hired to post open positions, while anyone can search and apply for thousands of career opportunities. Jobbio is not involved in this story or any editorial content.
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