u/AstroMaiden

Hello! My SO (34M) and I (34F) are life-long Oregonians. I have been living in Portland for several years now. He is from the Portland metro area. We both have moved a little bit, mostly for college or the military, but otherwise have been in Oregon.

We absolutely love Portland. However, now that we have solid careers, we make an upper-middle income, and we are being absolutely crushed by the Oregon state income taxes paired with the additional Multnomah County and Portland City taxes. We make just enough to have to pay the additional high-income-only taxes for the county and city.

We don't have a problem paying our fair share and want our money to be used for the betterment of our community. The problem is that's not reaaaaally what's happening here in Portland (evidenced by a recent tax audit). We feel like we're paying an exorbitant amount for not-enough in return and are considering other options where our tax dollars are used more appropriately, and we can better save for retirement.

We both have established careers in emergency and critical care veterinary medicine, one doctor and one nurse. We do not have concerns about finding work.
We prefer city life, or mid-sized city life. We would buy a home eventually and want to prioritize paying off the rest of our student loans and saving for retirement.

Options we're considering are:

Washington State to keep the PNW but without the state income taxes. We would not want to live in Seattle proper and would like to be in the wet half of the state. The concern with this option is that a lot of Washington has higher COL than Portland, so it could be a wash financially.

Philadelphia: I lived here in my early 20s (2012-2014) and loved it.

Pittsburgh: because it's also PA but seemingly lower COL compared to Philly.

Also open to suggestions!
Thank you for your thoughts!