[scarface74]

Never been interested in being at the “director” level, but most major metropolitan cities have your standard corporate IT jobs in development, project management, etc.

For instance in Atlanta, you may not make $300K a year, but you can buy a 2500 square foot house for $400K - $600K in one of the most affluent areas in the country (measured by median household income) - John’s Creek. If you go a little further up north to Forsyth - one of the most affluent counties in the US, you can get a 3000 square foot house, brand new build with all of the niceties for less than $350K.

Also the “tech scene” is not all it’s cracked up to be during a recession when non profitable companies are dependent on VC funding. There were plenty of tech jobs in profitable corporate companies during both the 2000 dot com bust and the 2008 recession.

Edit: personal anecdote:

I had just been working three years when the dotcom bust happened. The company I worked for didn’t blink. They gave almost everyone $10K raises that year and 20% bonuses because the local market was still thriving.

2008 was slightly harder, developers could find contract work but a lot of companies weren’t hiring permanent employees. Middle management and project managers were hit hard.