It really depends on what you want. I’m not trying to shit on your life choices, you may be optimizing for exactly the right things for you. My point on “comin

It really depends on what you want. I’m not trying to shit on your life choices, you may be optimizing for exactly the right things for you. My point on “coming out far ahead” is limited to finances. Yes, you can buy a house in SC and be making $100k once you hit 2-3 years of experience. That’s a great outcome, full stop. Nothing wrong with it. But someone with your equivalent experience working at a big tech company in SV is already making 2-3x as much as you. Cost of living increase eats up some of that, but not even close to all of it. Especially if they live with a roommate or two and avoid buying a new Tesla, they can save $50-100k per year fairly easily. And the difference becomes even more stark in another 5-7 years. You’ll be making $150k in SC but the dev in SV will be making $400k - 600k. They’ll also have 100x as many job options should they desire a change or get laid off, and they’ll have a much easier time raising funds and making key hires if they want to start their own company. Or becoming a key hire at a friend’s company. Or investing in a friend’s company. Etc, etc. Again, there are genuine downsides to living in SV, and you may have made the right choice for you, but I find a lot of devs outside of SV have a really inaccurate view of just what they’re giving up, and that skews their analysis.