You might be able to afford a better lifestyle on a modest paycheck in Sioux City, Iowa, but what happens when that company, the approximately ~1 serious tech employer in town, lays you off? In the Bay Area, you just go across the street.
Lest anyone think I'm a cheerleader, I live in northeast Georgia and have no intention of moving to the Bay Area. :-)
True. We aren't around "900 of the world's top 1000" companies, but in the 20 years I've lived here, I've never found there to be a lack of development jobs.
As a single person, you could easily live comfortably in parts of metro Atlanta making 70K.
I agree that metro Atlanta is not an especially high-cost area, though parts of it certainly are; ITP in general is getting overheated. I lived in Midtown for the better part of ten years and by the end of that, rents seemed on par with Brooklyn and Chicago, though I did have to upgrade from single-person housing on account of a short-lived marriage.
Nowadays, I've moved back to Athens. Where are you?
Salary.com is seems pretty much in line with my experience.
Benefits may be better at a larger company but salaries are about the same.
Even so, don't complain that you can't live off of 100K. They are purposefully making lifestyle choices that the median household making 70K a year can't make.
I agree!