They're really getting paid well in SF. Their living costs are maybe the highest in the US, but not in the world. I live in Stavanger ,Norway and have a salary

They're really getting paid well in SF. Their living costs are maybe the highest in the US, but not in the world. I live in Stavanger ,Norway and have a salary around 75-80K USD, 40% of it goes to paying taxes. This is slightly above the average salary here for a software developer. My biggest living costs here is my apartment, and my car. My car (Rusty Mercedes C Class) from 1997 costs me around $8000 per year in gas, toll road, insurance, reparations/service. My small apartment, about 600 sqft in size costs today around 350 000 USD, I bought it two years ago for about 290 000 USD. Standard is good, but you have no chance finding anything around this size for less than 300 000 USD, if you're not willing to move hours with car away from Stavanger. Food and beer is also a lot more expensive. I may have free health care/insurance and 5 weeks with holiday, and cheap air tickets to London :) But that's about it. Every time I visit the US, I go shopping like a woman who just got her credit card. Clothes, shoes, sports wear & equipment costs only a third of what it costs in Norway. But I'm not complaining, because I'm doing fine here, though I would love to have sunnier and warmer weather. For me it sounds like the extremely high salaries in SF is becoming a bubble. Much like the oil industry here.