Still have trouble seeing how this comes out ahead. Say you're at Google or Microsoft where it's 50% up to contribution limit, and you get $10K in match. That puts you down $12.8K vs. your hypothetical. If you're getting paid $45K more at the FANG, you pay 35% taxes on it, which puts you $30K ahead after-tax, and then you invest that in an after-tax 401k (or even just a normal investment account), after which you're in exactly the same situation but about $17K ahead each year.