Communications of the ACM
What's the Best City for Software Engineers?
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If you're a software engineer, where should you live to maximize your income?
Moving and storage company SpareFoot sliced what it says was an exclusive batch of data obtained from ZipRecruiter covering the 30 days ended 1 May 2018. SpareFoot offers online tools for booking self-storage facilities—so it keeps its eye on people who are relocating.
The company narrowed the list to the 25 U.S. metropolitan areas with the most opportunities for software engineers, using job data on ZipRecruiter. It then took the median software engineering salary for each area, as determined by Payscale, and adjusted that according to cost of living data from AreaVibes.
Four Texas cities landed in the top 10. Given that SpareFoot hails from Austin, its formula construction may be reflecting a bit of hometown bias.
Best Cities for Software Engineering Jobs
| Rank | Overall | By Adjusted Median Salary | By Opportunity Index |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | San Antonio | Detroit ($91,404) | Baltimore (1.95) |
| 2 | Pittsburgh | San Antonio ($89,621) | Pittsburgh (1.93) |
| 3 | Baltimore | Houston ($84,085) | San Antonio (1.54) |
| 4 | Detroit | Phoenix ($80,213) | Washington (1.51) |
| 5 | Columbus | Dallas ($79,923) | Chicago (1.47) |
| 6 | Phoenix (tie) | St. Louis ($79,911) | Minneapolis (1.34) |
| 7 | St. Louis (tie) | Pittsburgh ($79,385) | Boston (1.13) |
| 8 | Dallas | Columbus ($78,580) | San Jose (1.013) |
| 9 | Houston | Baltimore ($77,322) | Seattle (1.011) |
| 10 | Austin (tie) | Austin ($74,587) | Portland (0.98) |
| 10 | Minneapolis (tie) | Philadelphia ($74,354) | Orlando (0.87) |
From IEEE Spectrum
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