> A Facebook software engineer’s average starting salary is about $150,000 a year. That may sound like a lot. But outside of San Francisco, it’s probably equiva

> A Facebook software engineer’s average starting salary is about $150,000 a year. That may sound like a lot. But outside of San Francisco, it’s probably equivalent to around $50,000 a year. It’s not. A 1 bedroom in say Austin is $1,500 these days. In SF it may be $3,500. That’s 24k a year. Other costs are comparable. Taxes are another 10%. Added together it may be 100k vs. 150k. These engineers aren’t living like they earn 50k a year in SF.