Right, but I wasn't making bay area salaries, I was making Irish salaries at first, then a split between Irish and US when I was working remote. This means €65k instead of $165k. On top of that, I had one lucky break (Okta bought Auth0) and while the stock was nice, it was all taxed at 52%. The upshot of all this is that over the course of ten years I would almost certainly have made a couple million more (especially if I had invested decently or bought a house) than I did in Ireland, and while I like living in Europe (though not Ireland, I couldn't wait to leave by the end), being able to FIRE by 40 would have been better.