I agree, I was in talks to move from Amsterdam to NY, including a substantial (think 50%+) pay increase, and realized that after paying 2-3x for housing, 5-10x for healthcare, and substantially higher cost for education of the kids, quality of living would actually go down, even though net income would double.

Numbers for comparison: - full year tuition at a Dutch university is ~2000 euro (and they are all considered about equally good, something that is difficult to explain to people used to the US/UK system) - annual payment for healthcare is about ~1300 euro - living in a good apartment in a nice part of amsterdam will cost you between 1200-1800 euro/month (600sq.ft, 2 beds, yes our buildings are smaller)