Pay is such a variable thing though. I mean, just being able to move, dealing with everything and ending up liking it long term is such a statistical anomaly that it seems silly to generalize pay (even though there might not necessarily be a correlation between the two). I would at least look into things like working for a US company in Singapore or consulting/freelancing (since the taxes are low?). Often things look quite different on paper than in reality (especially on an individual level).