I've lived in Sacramento for 21 years, just graduated from UC Davis, have lived in Davis, Sacramento, and Emeryville, and I'm pretty satisfied with the region. I travel to LA once every other month for conferences and it's ok, but I'd rather not spend an hour to two in traffic to get anywhere.
I guess it depends on the life style you wish to live, but being in a smaller town atleast give's you the ability to live in a quiet and slow environment and go to the "big" city for entertainment, if you wish while the big city folks drive out of the city, spending hours on the road, to "get away from it all". Every Friday, highway 50 and 80 are congested from the big city folks driving up to the Tahoe area and on Sundays, they congest the same highways coming back.
But, in the end, I'm happy to be living in California because if you ever go to another state, you'll realize there's no comparing. I'd rather live in liberal California than any other state in the union. I could go on, but I'll stop now
