[timr]

"Say your cost of living is 30k and your salary is 100k in one city. In a 2nd City your cost of living is 60k and 180k. A rational economic decision would be to live in City 2 since it maximizes your savings."

This doesn't actually happen, except in the heads of naïve young dudes who want to justify living in SF right now.

Total REAL compensation for a non-senior engineer in SF is somewhere around $130k right now, with some Magic Stock Bux (probably worthless! maybe not!) thrown in for fun...but those don't buy burritos. Total comp of $110k sounds reasonable for Austin, as well. You can shift the ranges up or down based on seniority, but the spread is about the same, and the range caps out at around $200k in both markets for all but the most exceptional people.

In other words, the salary premium they're talking about here sounds right to me, and a premium of $20k a year is more than consumed by the 3x difference in rent, alone. You can perhaps justify going to SF on other grounds (career growth, networking, etc.), but it's not purely economically rational for most people.

[throwthisawayt]

Ok, your salary estimates for SF are completely off.

Let me level set by saying I went to a bootcamp and have two years experience. I make 165K (25% higher than 130) and my 3 close bootcamp colleagues all make around the same. I don’t work for some hot company like Google - 95% of people reading this haven’t heard of us. And just to be clear this is all liquid compensation (cash, bonus, and public stock equity).

So yes for me and my closest friends with comparable experience SF is by far the best option economically.

Note as others have mentioned; I don’t think that will be the case when I start a family.

[timr]

"Let me level set by saying I went to a bootcamp and have two years experience. I make 165k...(cash, bonus, and public stock equity)."

I lived and worked in SF for nearly a decade until this year. I operated a company for a good portion of that time. I know what the market rates are.

Personal anecdotes doesn't mean much when the aggregate numbers disagree with you. Maybe you're special. Maybe you're lucky. You're probably underestimating what you'd make elsewhere. But I'll say this: if you're truly getting a significant fraction of your salary in liquid RSUs, you are at a public company, and are quite likely being paid above market.

If you are counting illiquid RSUs, you are doing funny math.

[speedplane]

I don't get this thread... both cities are close enough in salary and cost that the exact economics become less of an issue. Other things, like the cities themselves and the people in them become more important.

[throwthisawayt]

Ok maybe I should clarify that I’m originally from Texas and work in sf so I have some pretty direct experience and know that there is a big economic difference and the salary differential is not that small.

I completely agree that there is way more to life than economics, but for the young single engineer the business case for Bay Area (and even more Seattle) is very compelling.

To put it in perspective, when I compare myself to a friend with similar skills my net worth is already 2x greater.

[speedplane]

I'm sure there are folks with similar skills as you that started in Seattle, moved to Texas, and have 2x your own net worth.

Some people choose to make less to lead a different lifestyle, and would happily give up that 2x net worth to do so.

[Cookingboy]

What? Total comp for a non-senior engineer in Austin is somewhere between $75-90k, nowhere near your $110k number, that's senior engineer territory.

Also $250-$400k is the norm for senior engineers in big companies here in the Bay Area.

I graduated from UT Austin and now live in the Bay Area, financially speaking it's the best decision I've ever made since I'm now on track to retire before 35.

[timr]

Total comp for a non-senior engineer in Austin is somewhere between $75-90k, nowhere near your $110k number, that's senior engineer territory."

OK, that's fair. I haven't been a junior engineer in Austin, so I'm estimating from what I see on hiring sites.

$130k is at the top of the SF range for a junior engineer, too, so let's call it a $40k spread. That's still entirely consumed by the difference in rent and taxes.

"Also $250-$400k is the norm for senior engineers in big companies here in the Bay Area."

On this point, you are absolutely full of it. You're talking to a "senior engineer", formerly in the Bay Area. Real-dollar compensation for elite people can get that high, but most people aren't elite. Also, I don't count future value of Magic Stock Bux as salary (nor should you).

Comments about retiring at $some_young_age are treated with the same respect as when they were coming from 20-somethings in 1998: put up actual numbers or shut up. Internet People have been ambiguously bragging about their early retirement scenarios since the internet supported bragging.

[joshuamorton]

A new grad offer from Google comes in at an all in compensation of approximately 150K/year. Facebook is marginally higher (or significantly higher for returning interns).

That's 105-115K base, 25-30K in stock (which is real money in this context), and 15-20K in annual bonuses. Most people also get signing bonuses that can range from 15 up to 100K (no, seriously, Facebook sign-on bonuses for returning interns are ridiculous).

All in that means 160K up to 250K in comp your first year. No, really.

Stock refreshes, laddering, and performance make it much more difficult to calculate overall compensation after that, but just as a point of comparison, the "standard" Google offer for someone graduating in 2015 (or maybe 2014, I can't remember) came with 250 shares of stock vesting over 4 years. Averaged over the past year, that's around 50K in stock. Plus a base salary that should be around over 120K, and an average bonus breaks 200K. And that's assuming no stock refreshes, and no promotions.

Granted, "working at Google" isn't average even for SF, but still.

[loeg]

How much lower are Google's offers in Seattle or other cities? After all, what matters is comparing like-to-like.

[joshuamorton]

Other than Seattle and NYC, there's a notable difference. It's not 50%, but its there. And I'll admit that Seattle is probably the best value place to live.

That said, those jobs at $bigCo also make up a smaller portion of the job market in every other city. In the bay area, something like 1% of everyone (not just SWEs) works as a SWE at Google, Facebook, or a similarly paying company. Seattle is similar, although with Microsoft and Amazon instead. While there are some jobs that pay six figures in Atlanta or Austin, they're fewer and further between.

As a result of this, I know lots of people who make 150K+ all in comp in the bay area and Seattle, and no one who breaks 6 figures in, say, Austin (all at a Junior/New Grad level).

[loeg]

I'll admit Seattle is where I have personal experience, and that it may not be representative of other non-SF cities.

I mean, my earlier analysis (another thread) just used the compensation figures from the fine article. Maybe those figures are an inaccurate comparisons of the two cities. If we can find a better data source, I'd be happy to re-run with those numbers. Ditto on the housing cost numbers.

It's certainly possible that one could put aside slightly more money in SF than Austin off a much bigger comp package for the same role.

Anyway, Google and Facebook are just two employers. Clearly the average junior compensation is somewhere lower. I made a lot less than that as a junior employee, but it was a few years ago, not in SF, and not for Google or Facebook.

[sidlls]

Which end of that range do you consider "that high?"

Anecdote for anecdote: most of the people I know who are in the 3-5 year experience range are earning closer to $200k/year than $140k. In my bracket (>10 years) it's closer to $250k than $200k for average senior developers (in which bucket I place myself).

Also $40k is not consumed by the difference in rent and taxes. At most about 85%-90% of it is (say, $20k for rent, a generous $15k for taxes).

[timr]

The low end of that range starts at the high end for a mid-level engineer, and goes up into VP and director levels.

Again: I count only compensation that is liquid. Magic Stock Bux don't get marked to market, and "bonus" is a number that can fluctuate dramatically from year to year. A mid-level Googler might be making $250k in a good year, all-in, but their base salary is a fraction of that, you won't get nearly as much outside of the big tech giants.

[throwthisawayt]

I went to a bootcamp and myself along with all of my closest friends at the bootcamp hit that 130K number in SF on total REAL comp.

[handbanana]

that 75-90 seems right, but I know several in Austin/Houston that are not senior level (and have just a few years exp) making low six figure salaries. I would think the range for senior is closer to half of your 250-400, though.

However, unless you're making double in SF what you would in Austin/TX in general - I think you wouldn't be doing much better/the same/or maybe slightly worse, comparably.

If you were hired straight from college to work at a big company/one that pays graduates very competitively - then yes, SF or similar will always be better.

[shados]

Yeah, it is a gold rush. It's pretty easy (relatively speaking) to make well over 200k at a public company with some experience if you include stocks. And some people are lured by options of startups (it's a gamble!). It's harder to get that elsewhere. Not everyone (or most) get there, but a lot do, and even more try.

[speedplane]

$200k/year is a great salary, and anyone who has it should be proud. But it's not exactly "gold rush" money. You won't be "rich", nor will you be able to retire at 40.

[csp256]

It is entirely possibly to retire at 40 earning $200k (~ $139k net). If you spend $60k a year (I live in Sunnyvale and spend $30k a year) then you have a savings rate of a bit over 55%. A 55% savings rate has an expected time to financial independence of 14.5 years.

You could easily be a multimillionaire by 40 with those numbers. If you spent as much as me it would take about 6 years.

[speedplane]

I don't disagree with your numbers, many people live on $30k/year by necessity. But if you do so by choice, you'll have to give up quite a bit. You won't be able to engage in much of the social activities that others enjoy in your 20s and 30s. And while it's possible (even easy) to live on $30k/yr in your early 20s, as you get towards your 30s, you'll start feeling quite a bit of social pressure from your peers to conform to a more expensive lifestyle.

So if you're willing to buck society and sacrifice some of the best years of your life, just to sit on a million dollars at the age of 40, then go ahead. But if you are willing to buck society and sacrifice so many luxuries, why do you care about money at all?

[shados]

I said "well over 200k", not 200k, as a few of the other comments used it as a data point.

[babaganoosh89]

This, 200k+ is easy to get to in the Bay Area.

[timr]

No, it is not "easy" to get that. Most Bay Area jobs are not senior engineers at Google. Like I said before, a mid-level salary in SF is somewhere around $130k. The numbers are well-documented.

If you win the stock lottery, or stay in the industry for a while and become one of the top 10% of earners, you can do upwards of $200k. But that excludes the bottom 90% of jobs, which is what most people actually have.

As a PSA to all junior engineers: if you actually believe you can "easily" earn over $200k in the bay area, I strongly encourage you to take some phone screens before acting on your notions. Tell companies your salary expectations in advance.

[sjg007]

I agree with you and don't believe the high salaries reported here. The best reference set is the H1B salary data which trends with the glassdoor self reported data.

https://www.foreignlaborcert.doleta.gov/performancedata.cfm

The folks making closest to 200k or higher are largely Computer and Information Systems Managers in Santa Clara county at levels 3 and 4. I imagine these are Senior Directors or VPs.

http://www.flcdatacenter.com/OesQuickResults.aspx?code=11-30...

[joshuamorton]

Look through these:

https://www.reddit.com/r/cscareerquestions/search?q=salary+s...

H1B data doesn't include stock or bonuses.

[sjg007]

The argument is that the expected value of salary + rsu/stock/options is effectively just salary. These reddit posts basically agree with H1B data. Salaries are the bar. A H1B has to be paid more than the prevailing wage for the position and the company has to have documented that they could not find a qualified American for that role. Prevailing wages are set as a function of the H1B + American workers so over time salaries rise.