It seems as long as they can regurgitate grad level algorithms, most other things are non issues.
The brightest are people who look at quality of __life__ (that thing you only get one of) & decide that a life where you can actually __live__ (nice* home in nice* area/< 40 min commute/~40hr work week) and then choose to live that life.
There absolutely are very bright people there who make 7 figures a year and can do all those nice things. But that's a tiny minority.
barring the weather argument, i don't get why people choose SV. Great, you can work with "scale" but that's about it. Unless you're looking for massive funding, why bother?
the novelty of moving fast & not mastering a technology so somebody else might get rich loses it's appeal after ~5 years.