More than $150,000 16% Prefer not to respond 11% Rest of the % are all under $150,000.
Good senior engineer/product people make way more than that. I don't think any of those people are leaving. They are the critical-mass who will make/break good technical companies and power the innovation cycle. SV is in no trouble. There is no real scare of brain-drain.
I am interested to hear what other people have to say about this.
In that sense, the distribution of salaries attached to the answers is telling. How do the startups and non-elite companies survive if nobody they can actually afford wants to come or stay? The area can't just be a playground for the elite megacompanies that can pay the salaries you state.
It becomes extremely elitist, with all the costs and benefits of that. The benefit is that everyone who can afford to live there is implicitly vetted by a rich employer or investor, so there could be extremely high serendipity. The costs are massive insularity, risk of the next big thing coming from elsewhere, and hugely inflated costs for basic service labor.
But, if the vetting is good enough, maybe those costs are worth it?
Even the senior folks making bank aren't necessarily all willing to plunk down $2m for a crappy house in Cupertino. Simple economics will disperse at least some of this talent pool.