[michaelpinto]

But think about the long run: Roommates are great until you hit age 30 or so and settle down and get married and maybe have kids (no pressure here Sean!). At that point Manhattan becomes painful unless you are married into money. Now you could move out to Brooklyn or your startup can avoid older employees (which is illegal), but if you grow your company to over ten people you can hit those issues pretty quickly. Also it's a spectrum -- Manhattan on $60 can work while being in NYC on $25k is a nightmare.

[jonathanjaeger]

Yup. But they were talking about starting salaries on the Fog Creek thing. $75K right out of college for a young adult opens a lot of doors. But I definitely agree that being 30 with a kid, rather than 22-24, would be a lot harder on $75K.