Thanks for the feedback. :)

I wrote this article as a follow-up to another article I wrote that I also linked. It took on a life of its own after that, so I realize it doesn’t function perfectly as a standalone piece. To answer your questions:

• 2.5 years in the industry
• I’m an iOS-focused software engineer
• I don’t know who it’s useful to! I figured putting my experience would help people out in whatever way people could individually find.
• Definitely not your typical scenario. I hope the article didn’t come off as “here’s how to do exactly what I did to get the exact same end result”. I mostly wanted it to be “here’s what I went through, take from it what you will (and here’s some stuff I wish I knew along the way)”.
• That’s tough to say. There are cost of living calculations, but it seems that all of them make pretty dramatic assumptions, and they seem to undersell the value of the increased paycheck. $180k in Des Moines would be leagues ahead of $180k here, though. ;)