Sometimes lower cost of living absolutely does make up for a lower salary. Ultimately it comes down to disposable income after your expenses are paid. If your cost of living is significantly lower despite your income decreasing, then your disposable income increases despite your salary decreasing.

It’s also why multinational services will often have regional pricing.

This phenomena might not be present in the US (I haven’t lived in enough American cities to make a generalisation here) but it’s absolutely true in Europe.

> SV vs elsewhere in the US is becoming less and less relevant with remote work.

Remote work will be what levels the playing field but we aren’t there yet. Most companies aren’t fully remote. Further more, as weird as it might sound to some on HN, some people do actually enjoy working with colleagues in an office.

So it’s very premature to handwave the cost of living with arguments like “because remote work”