The issue with this is that the best IT jobs are in places like San Francisco / New York / London which are very expensive. So yes you make 200k (before taxes)

The issue with this is that the best IT jobs are in places like San Francisco / New York / London which are very expensive. So yes you make 200k (before taxes) but you spend 35-40k per year on rent plus bills (water, electricity, council tax, internet etc). Throw in some social life and drinks once or twice a week, car plus insurance, supporting family financially. So let's say after all that you end up saving 40k per year net. Times 5 is 200k. That is not enough to retire. Now do the math with 1 million salary (the lowest possible 7 figure). Same living standard. After 5 years you can save let's say 1.5-2 million (I didn't do the math so if I am way off please correct me). Now that is an amount you can retire on: 1) Buy two properties for 500k (live in one, rent the other one) 2) Invest 1 million in blue chip equities, this will pay you around 35k per year in dividends 3) You still have a nice sum of cash left on top of that So you can see that 90k per year is definitely not a sweet spot. There are still massive improvements if you can make 200k, 400k, 800k and so on. Yes perhaps going from 35k to 90k will improve your living standard much more drastically than going from 90k to 200k. So you could argue that there are diminishing returns. But you are ignoring the fact that the higher you go the sooner you gain complete financial freedom when you can retire and live completely free.