[TuringNYC]

>> Surprised London holds this position given the cost of living. Housing alone eats such a massive chunk of salary that I'd expect talent to gravitate toward cities where their equity/salary goes further. How do early-stage startups compete for engineers when rent is £2k+ for a one-bedroom?

thinking about comparisons, in SF the average 1B is $3300 https://www.zillow.com/rental-manager/market-trends/san-fran...

In NYC it is similar.

SF's challenge is that the business distract is split across 2 areas (SF, SV) 50mi apart, with extremely sparse public transit in SV. Everything is doable, just be prepared for $100 Uber bills as you go between meetings.

In NY the business district is thankfully mostly centralized. However, poor commuter train service outside of Manhattan makes everything more expensive as there is insatiable appetite in central areas to avoid the commuter trains.

[agentcoops]

Yeah, I've lived in London, New York and San Francisco for work and the first had the lowest cost of living in absolute terms. Local developer salaries are, however, shockingly low outside of finance and consulting to US eyes.

The public transportation point is definitely key: London is just so unspeakably large spatially and it's all more or less well-connected that there isn't the same scarcity of commutable apartments as in NYC/SF. It wasn't uncommon for older colleagues to even commute in from Kent or elsewhere in the English countryside -- and often their morning train wasn't much longer than my own.

[short_sells_poo]

The issue is that wages in London are much lower for tech than in SF or NY. If you want to make good money in London, you have to work in finance, and preferably in the investment business.

London is a very expensive city, and the median income is actually very low compared to it. There is a high concentration of people who are very well off, but everyone else is struggling.

[nixass]

> but everyone else is struggling.

I wonder what's you definition of struggling, especially "everyone else"