Bay Area tech salaries are already the highest in the nation; you could make the pitch to an employer, but I think you'd be hard pressed to get a higher salary for living in the midwest (considering the much lower cost of living). Midwest workers (tech workers anywhere outside of the Bay Area really) would be thrilled to get SFBA salaries where they live.
> Menlo Park, Calif.-based Facebook is negotiating to lease more than 200,000 square feet in a recently constructed office tower at 151 N. Franklin St. in the Loop, according to sources.
> Meanwhile, sources said, Google plans to add more than 100,000 square feet of office space in the city’s Fulton Market district, where the company already has a large Midwest headquarters.
> The new Facebook space alone would be large enough to accommodate more than 1,000 employees.
[1] http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/columnists/ori/ct-biz...
Not just the lower cost of living. Being compensated for living through winters is a novel idea, but if you're thinking about the soft factors that don't directly involve salary and cost of living, not having to deal with the bay area commutes is pretty strong compensation in and of itself.
Having to take a pay cut and live through a season you get to ignore in CA could be kind of a bummer for some people. Getting as much as 20% of your waking life back in time spent not commuting can be a pretty strong compensation for it, though.
edit: please do comment in addition to downvoting, if you see a problem with the logic here
Edit: toomuchtodo brings up a good point. I was thinking more in terms of a higher pay after adjusting for cost of living (e.g. being payed the same amount as an engineer in SF while living in Cleveland). Otherwise it seems like I would be taking both a pay cut and a cost of living cut.