All of those places are certainly expensive, but for instance in Seattle, 1BRs rent for a bit over half what they rent in SF. There's a ton of wiggle room in "expensive".
Instead join an up and coming city and have rent (and cost of living) be the least of your worries. I pay 1$ per square foot and have a 15 minute commute. How much would you need to earn to have that same commute (subtracting housing costs) in SF?
- Boston? Super expensive.
- LA? Super expensive.
- Seattle? Super expensive.
- New York? Super expensive.
Etc. You can just settle for a long commute to mitigate the problem, but then it comes back to pick 2.