Relative to what you make, is that a lot, compared to what you'd make/pay in Kansas City?
Do you realize that the AQI is terrible for literally a third of the US right now?
If climate change is going to ruin CA, then it will also ruin a LOT of other places. Relatively speaking, the Bay Area will be nicer still, albeit much more expensive, than other places.
The bay areas has never been nice in the last 5 years. I can live in a more comfortable house where I don’t have to work 3ft from where I sleep in almost any other city.
How many years worth of a cut salary would the bonus be? I might be missing something (if you are factoring the tax differences I get it).
Who gives a shit? You’re still making good money. What’s your life worth?
Similar story for Orlando, but with a 10% cut. 10% pay cut and saving 9.3% in income and ~1.3% sales tax. Housing would be about $500/mo cheaper ($6k/yr) and way more comfortable to work from.
Sigh. I guess the grass is always greener on the other side
With remote work, it's not even close. I'd take COLA pay cut and still have more after taxes.
But even ignoring remote work, let's compare two cities: San Francisco and Salt Lake City.
Median HH Income in SF: 108K (source: https://www.deptofnumbers.com/income/california/san-francisc...)
Median House Price in SF: 1.4 Million (source: https://www.zillow.com/san-francisco-ca/home-values/)
SF Price to Income ratio: 13
Median HH Income Salt Lake City: 74K (source: https://www.deptofnumbers.com/income/utah/salt-lake-city/)
Median House Price: 420K (source: https://www.zillow.com/salt-lake-city-ut/home-values/)
Salt Lake City Price to Income ratio: 5.7
Of course SLC has worse average AQI than a coastal city like SF. If you are inland and have a large population, you will have worse particulates. So let's look at coastal cities all of which have air quality as good or better than SF and have the bonus of warm water so you can swim at the beach:
Jacksonville, FL:
median HH income: 47K
median house price: 196K
Price to Income: 4.2
Charleston, SC:
median household income: 64K
median house price: 337K
median price to income: 5.3
Wilmington, NC:
median household income: 53K
median house price: 300K
price to income: 5.7
Do you see a pattern?
And none of these cities have streets filled with feces and homeless encampments, a 16% state income tax with high income surcharge, or refuse to prosecute property crime.
Even a single filer making $500k/year will only hit a top rate of 11.3%, and effective rate of 9.4%. For surcharges to kick in requires > $1M/year, and only affects the amount over that.
I do find it weird that CA has some of the worst taxes for new residents. I can’t imagine a place that is more difficult to break into and then settle in. (High property values, outrageously high property taxes, high sales tax, high income tax, etc...) It’s setup to only let the rich get in and stay. Not a very inclusive place.
The income tax scale in CA is steeply progressive, a 50k earner pays only 3.8%, less than almost all states that have flat income tax. For a median earner, CA is in the upper half but not exceptionally high: https://wallethub.com/edu/states-with-highest-lowest-tax-bur...
Having been in very high income brackets myself, lived in both low and high col areas/states, and run this calculation often, I think taxes is largely a red herring. The difference made by tax is just peanuts compared to the impact of housing cost, which truly is very high in CA. For low income brackets, CA is frequently lower tax burden than elsewhere, but housing cost will destroy you. For very high income brackets you do start to see the difference in marginal tax rate, but your absolute income is so much higher that you aren't spending a significant % on sales tax, and those marginal differences aren't driving your decision making anymore.