[davidf560]

My point is there is no such thing as a "$500K engineer" anywhere but SV (and maybe Seattle), and thus no such market exists elsewhere. Honestly even writing "$500K engineer" sounds so absurd to me because it's so far away from "normal"... I doubt anyone who lives within 500 miles of me doing software development as an individual contributor makes even half that. Maybe I'm badly misinformed though.

Believe it or not, there's plenty of smart, even brilliant people who do not live (and choose not to live) in California. I myself may not be FAANG-caliber, but I've known known a number of people who used to work where I do and now work for Amazon, Facebook, and Google. They moved to the west coast, but obviously prior to taking those jobs they were just as good and living in the Midwest working for a Midwest salary.

It's honestly rather shocking to me that people seemingly genuinely believe that there can't possibly exist smart engineers who live somewhere other than SV.

[908B64B197]

I don't think people are doubting their existence, but rather if they could staff a whole floor with engineers of that caliber anywhere but in these cities.

Partly because, as you said it yourself, a lot of great engineers simply move there.