You can win on the fact that food is so much cheaper in Germany. I mean, French, Durch, Austrian, and Swiss people shop in Germany on weekends, if they live on

You can win on the fact that food is so much cheaper in Germany. I mean, French, Durch, Austrian, and Swiss people shop in Germany on weekends, if they live on the border and have a family to feed etc. Zurich is not particularly on the border, but I have to go there anyway for various reasons once in a while and usually I come back with a suitcase full of food. Also dentists in Germany are bound to fixed prices for certain things like checkups (a checkup in Germany costs like 23 Euro), so that is also massively cheaper and justifies the ride. You don't have the possibility to win on this geographic arbitrage in NYC or the Bay area. Although there "crazy" salaries (>200k USD / year) are probably more common than here.