And they're not actually rating by how much of your salary proportionally is going to rent, but how much of your salary is left over after rent, in absolute dollars. So in College Station, TX, you're paying about 20% of your salary in rent, which is not really a terrible burden, but it's no. 1 on their list.

Furthermore, those looking for a 2br are very likely to be dual-income, at which point high cost areas begin to make a lot of sense even if the rent is insane.

Likely true, but I would point out that there are significant advantages to having a 2BR if you work from home at all. I use the smaller BR at my place as the bedroom and the larger one as my office, and it's fantastic.

It may be almost unthinkable in high cost of living areas but it's pretty common for even fairly young people to rent a 2BR and use the spare room as an office/hobby room/etc. I know I did after grad school.

It's another problem with this type of comparison though. What's a "typical" apartment for a young professional to rent in a relatively low cost suburb or small city is likely going to be very different from what the same young professional would rent in Manhattan--even if they're paid more in the latter.

This might skew the data in terms of "How much money will you actually have left after paying rent" but personally I feel it's still a decent analysis on cost of living. I assume (with no evidence to back it up, granted) that you can find the approximate price of a 1br apartment by taking some percentage from the 2 bedroom.

Do you see skew in some other way?