No, I have friends living in London. Yes the prices drop down quickly further out, but if you're doing 14 hour days you don't want to commute for an hour each way.

I have a friend who used to rent a flat pretty much opposite Facebook's office, paid £2800/month for a 1-bed studio. Know someone else who works for a law firm in the City, he pays dead on £3000/month for a flat but he's 2 minutes away from the office and pays for that convenience. And yes, I know someone who lives in Ealing, but a 2-bed flat(not a house) is still £1900/month, and the commute was 45 minutes each way on the tube.

I live in London as well and what you are depicting is more or less correct but a bit distorted in the general view imho: for example, you can live near the West Hampstead area and be in the city (city thameslink or farringdon thameslink stations) in 20 mins, however a good flat with one bedroom would cost you 1400 (even less after covid) and you would be in a quiet street next to lively areas, well connected and with a lot of green spaces at reach. And this is only an example. The 2.6-3k flats in the "center" are fundamentally "laziness-scams" for people who don't want or don't like to search for alternatives and are ok with living next to no real green spaces and with the constant background noises of cranes and construction works; the 3k/mo "luxury flat" costs little more than 2k, plus 90? per month of communiting in a nice area in zone 2, you don't need to go to ealing.

You absolutely can find a 1-bed in super-central London for well under £2000/month, e.g. it took 2 minutes searching to find this one https://ww2.zoopla.co.uk/to-rent/details/57988484/?search_id...

But furthermore, you can find 2-beds in the same location for around £2000/month (I live in one). Suggestions that an analyst at GS or an E3 at FB earning 70-100k isn't actually that well off because rents are high are silly, if they're struggling how is someone on a more normal grad salary of 35k supposed to be coping?

That's not what I'm suggesting at all :-) I just know some people who were on 50k in the North East and moved down to London to be on 80k - well, after the increase in costs it was pretty much a wash, the biggest upside is living in London, but also the biggest downside is living in London. But if you can swing 100k salary in London then yes, you're very well off regardless.

For anyone not familiar with the UK, you can find cheaper but you get exactly what you pay for. And you’ll be commuting. And the tube is not fun.

Our standard of housing is extremely low here. And small.

3 years ago I rented a flat in zone 1 for £1300/month, 10minute cycle to bank. It was small (50m2) but nice