Struggling to live in an expensive area is a measure of one’s access to the average opportunities available to others.
Merchants able to transport wealth are an ancient tradition. Many have profited greatly from the endeavor. Many have also died along the journey or been forced to establish a new living standard for themselves in a place of lesser opportunity when they are confronted with an unexpected challenge and can not return. The journey down is easy, but mobility is not symmetrical.
I see arguments like this for why everyone has to go live in cities where a single family home is a million bucks.
It’s categorically wrong. Of course if you go to live somewhere with a cheaper cost of living, there’s going to be a cheaper cost of living. The data does not bear out the idea that a high cost of living also necessarily means a commensurate wage.
Cost of living is not magical. It is created by the opportunities available. If people can pay more for the house or rent, the market will adjust to it. The regulating factor is simply the opportunities available. All other factors are peripheral.
If you can export money by working remotely, you’re floating on a rare exception to the rule. If everyone could do the same, the cost of living would adjust to compensate. You are essentially taking the same risk as an ancient merchant on a ship. When the circumstances change, you can easily find yourself stuck in a place without any opportunities.
The fallacy is looking at cost of living as some kind of magical random generated number. It is not. It is a direct measure of the opportunities available to the average person. It doesn’t matter where you live, how poor or how rich the area seems, the average person is encountering the exact same pressure and stress about simply staying afloat. The grass is not greener on either side of the fence. The only difference is the availability of opportunities for the average person in an area.