> You'd bet that take-home pay for the same work after taxes and rent is higher in Dallas than in San Jose. I think Facebook is demonstrating this like now.

It's not, though. Median rent in Mountain View (significantly pricier than San Jose) is now $2390/month [1]. L4 total comp at Google, or E4 salaries at Facebook, is about $260K/year [2]. Average rent for a 1BR in Dallas is $1250/month [3]. Average total comp for a software engineer in Dallas is $110K/year. [4]

After taxes and rent, the Facebook/Google L4 is making $260K * (1 - 0.37 [5]) - 2390 * 12 = $135920/year. The Dallas SWE is making $110K * (1 - 0.16 [6]) - 1250 * 12 = $68939/year. Even with the $4K/month rents from 2019, the Facebook engineer is still putting away $116K/year, more than the total gross of the Dallas engineer.

People tend to underestimate the effect of the top-line on finances and savings. Eric Schmidt had a saying: "More revenue solves all known problems". It applies as much to households as to giant companies.

[1] https://www.zumper.com/rent-research/mountain-view-ca

[2] https://www.levels.fyi/#

[3] https://www.zumper.com/rent-research/dallas-tx

[4] https://www.indeed.com/career/software-engineer/salaries/Dal...

[5] https://smartasset.com/taxes/california-tax-calculator#vyY8q...

[6] https://smartasset.com/taxes/texas-tax-calculator#s0LEbwxtAs

>> L4 total comp at Google, or E4 salaries at Facebook, is about $260K/year ... Average total comp for a software engineer in Dallas is $110K/year

You're using average (median I hope) salary for Dallas vs. high end salaries for San Jose.

You used indeed.com for the Dallas salaries, if you use them for San Jose you get an average of 150K. Too lazy to run the numbers but obviously that would change the calculation quite a bit.

The comment I'm replying to specifically mentioned Facebook, hence I'm using (low-end) Facebook salaries.

The comment mentioned Facebook but that doesn't mean you should compare Facebook salaries in San Jose to non-Facebook salaries in Dallas.

Compare Facebook salaries in San Jose to Facebook salaries in Dallas, that would be a fair comparison. Compare median salaries in San Jose to median salaries in Dallas, that would be a fair comparison.

Compare Facebook salaries in San Jose to median salaries in Dallas, that is not a fair comparison and you know that, you are wasting my time by making me type it out for you, you know full well that that is not a fair comparison.

$260k is a low end salary

According to the resource that was used for Dallas salaries, 150K is the average San Jose salary.

This is a good summary of one of my biggest issues with location adjusted salaries. It often seems to be adjusted as if you will be living in that location (and retiring) in that location, which is rarely the case. Yes, in your example both engineers _may_ end up being equally-prepared for retirement, and be in a similar financial situation presuming that 1, all life costs scale proportionally (which is not true, college tuition for children is a great example, regular vacations are another), and 2, they will live in that location always. This is rarely the case, and just leaves the Bay area engineer _miles_ ahead when they relocate 10 years down the line.