The average person making $180k in SF is not much better off than someone making $100k in Dallas.
In Dallas, you'd be called upper middle class. In SF, people lecture you that you're "rich".
Post-tax, the difference is only ~$45k. Your rent is going to be an extra ~$20k. Your cost of living is going to be an extra ~$10k.
Okay, so you've got an extra ~$15k, maybe 20% more purchasing power. But this only works if you're single.
If you have kids or a dependent, you're going to lose all of that to rent and expenses (and probably more).
And, until this year, it's not like you could just take your $180k job to somewhere cheaper. If you got a job somewhere cheaper, you'd get paid less to where it wouldn't make much of a difference financially.
Really - the only benefit is how regressive the 401k system is. You can dodge taxes on your high marginal tax rate in SF. So you're much more likely to contribute to your 401k - which will almost certainly work out for you in the long run.
In the short run, you're likely to pay for it significantly with a reduction to your quality of life.
In Dallas, you'd be called upper middle class. In SF, people lecture you that you're "rich".
Post-tax, the difference is only ~$45k. Your rent is going to be an extra ~$20k. Your cost of living is going to be an extra ~$10k.
Okay, so you've got an extra ~$15k, maybe 20% more purchasing power. But this only works if you're single.
If you have kids or a dependent, you're going to lose all of that to rent and expenses (and probably more).
And, until this year, it's not like you could just take your $180k job to somewhere cheaper. If you got a job somewhere cheaper, you'd get paid less to where it wouldn't make much of a difference financially.
Really - the only benefit is how regressive the 401k system is. You can dodge taxes on your high marginal tax rate in SF. So you're much more likely to contribute to your 401k - which will almost certainly work out for you in the long run.
In the short run, you're likely to pay for it significantly with a reduction to your quality of life.