[kourt]

As much as I love Boston, SF is not the only other city in the world, and both cities are extremely atypical. The graduates are likely leaving for a place where they can get a $49,500 salary and a $700 apartment.

EDIT: and your percentages are wrong: try 48% of gross for BOS and 60% of gross for SF. Figure 40% for taxes and you have either very little for food, insurance, medical care, transportation, clothing, entertainment or you're already negative. Oh, and I forgot: STUDENT LOANS.

[TTPrograms]

They're not yearly salary to yearly rent - it's yearly salary to monthly rent. It's just to make a comparison - if you want percent of gross for rent you can multiply by 12.

You can also consider that it's comparing median starting income to average 1 BR rent. One wouldn't expect just starting out that you would have an average single bedroom.

[kourt]

The actual ratio of rent to income really does matter. If we were comparing two cities where the ratio was 18% and 22%, then people would "want to spend less" or "pay a little more and enjoy better entertainment, culture, weather, sports franchises, etc."

But if a college graduate has to spend 95% or 105% of their after-tax income just on rent there is ZERO left for student loans and insurance, the conclusion is that both cities are completely unfeasible except for graduates with very wealthy and generous parents.

Your sole point is that "SF is more unaffordable than Boston". So what: living on a moon base would cost even more than SF.

> one would not expect that just starting out that you would have an average single bedroom

I have had a lot of roommates a lot, but I don't even see how that's workable in SF for the vast majority of graduates. And we are talking about college graduates: these are people whose employers expect them to arrive clean and rested, which is difficult to do when sleeping under a bridge, and who didn't grow up expecting to have to wait until they have 10 years of experience and 3 children to finally afford a 1-bedroom apartment.

[TTPrograms]

Of course, I'm just making the point that Boston is at least on par with San Fran. Median and averages are useless for cost of living because you can't get an average rent for recent college grads. All you've demonstrated is that if a fresh out of college grad tried to live an average lifestyle in Boston they wouldn't have enough money. Well, duh. They have another decade to go before they reach average income.

All we can do is make apples to apples comparisons. You're trying to stretch the data to say something it doesn't. For example, as soon as you start looking at 2 or 3 bedrooms split between roommates both cities become more reasonable.

EDIT: I don't think having 2 roommates in a 3 bedroom apartment is quite comparable to sleeping under a bridge. I don't understand why you're being so hyperbolic.