http://www.plantingourpennies.com/move-to-florida/The article is from 2013 and compares the cost of living for DC vs. Florida. This article really hit home for me because I was offered a job in DC in 2011 and turned it down and ended up moving to Florida instead. Best decision of my life.
The DC offer was my first coming of grad school at $67,500. I turned it down mostly due to the high cost of living. At the time, I had no other offers so everyone thought I was crazy to turn it down during the recession. It was for a non-profit with good work/life balance for an office job.
I ended taking a faculty job in Florida for 40K. I could make $46,500 with a summer course, which I did. I typically taught an on-line class during the summer, so I could still travel during my 3-month summer break.
I currently live in a high cost of living area (Kauai) and recently bought a house for 603K. However, I only made this move after living in low cost of living for 7 years previously.
I would have never moved to Kauai right out of grad school because I would never be able to afford to buy a house. I bought houses in LCOL areas and used the equity to purchase on Kauai.
I think this is a good real for young professionals (22 to 28) that want to move to a HCOL area. Your offer letter will look impressive with such a big number. However, you are unlikely to build wealth because you will be forced into a very expensive rental market.
I am starting to notice quite a few posts along the lines of, "My wife and I make really good money, but we can't afford to buy a house because our local area is very expensive." I would argue that if you can't afford to buy a house your income might not be as good as you think. If you are ok with not buying a house, that's fine. But if you want to buy a house, but can't, because it's too damn expensive, then maybe you should move. It's really that simple. Making 80K in DC isn't really that impressive. I would rather make 50K in Florida.