This is just wrong. You may prefer the Bay Area, and I don't think anyone here is going to argue you shouldn't, but to say that the quality of life is better is just wrong.

San Francisco is more than 3x more expensive than the metro I live in now. I'd need to earn $350k a year just to break even financially before taxes. I'd pay a lot more in federal income tax, and my state income tax is flat and in the low single digits. Call it $375k to break even on take home pay after paying for everything (rent, retirement, etc). How likely am I to make almost $400k a year? That's top 1% income nationally. That's IB money, not writing a CRUD app in JavaScript.

Not to mention I go home for lunch and I have a 10-minute, 4-mile commute. And speaking of home, a constant pain point I hear from Bay Area programmers on HN is that they'll never be able to buy a home. San Francisco housing is over 1,200% (percent) more expensive than my area. My home cost a few thousand dollars more than I earn in a year.

No thank you.

What are you spending money on that you need to earn $350k to break even?

Assuming you find a modest home in SF for $1mil your 30 year mortgage would be ~$57k a year. Property tax is ~$7k. Insurance will be <$5k. So to have a home you only need <70k. Assuming no deductions filing as a single you will pay ~$140k in taxes on $350k. This leaves you with (350-140-70) $140k a year in disposable income.

So I repeat, what are you spending money on that you need to make $140k in disposable income to break even?

It's a cost of living calculation. I earn $x,000 in my current low-COL area. To maintain an identical standard of living that comes out to $350k before factoring in California's high tax environment, and the increased federal taxes.

Don't try to spin San Francisco being the most expensive place to live in the country into me being bad with my money - I'm not. But when you make a high income in a low COL area, it means moving to any high COL area means you either take an effective pay cut in standard of living, or you need to earn an amount that is very unlikely.

You have to be very modest for that $1 mil. You would probably get a 900 sqft home :D

You can find several.

https://www.redfin.com/city/17151/CA/San-Francisco/filter/ma...

> After 30 years, on and off, in the valley I agree the QoL here isn't great (when compared to Germany, France, Australia...) but way way better than anywhere else in the US.

No, it simply isn't. By any stretch of the imagination.

By what definition? I've lived most of my life in California (split between the bay area and LA). I can't even begin to imagine being happier outside of California. Aside from rent, I see nothing at all that is better in other states I visit.

Probably similar to yours: mostly subjective ones. I was born and raised in California and love it here. My older brother was born and raised in California, hated it, and loves it in North Carolina.