What job should a single 28-year-old take: $80K with low risk or $100K with high risk?

I live in Denver. It's a great city, especially if you ski or board. It's on the upswing. San Diego is great, but the traffic will get to you quickly. Also, you can go only north and east from San Diego and the landscape can be two dimensional. You'll be happy in Colorado.

Go with the low risk, but....Revise your job & life approach:1) Maximize any 401K contributions available2) Become frugal (make your own coffee & bag your lunches)3) Save at least 15% of your gross salary (not including the 401K contributions) in a cash/brokerage savings account4) No bars; no restaurants; no fancy cars; no fancy clothes ...PS. Don't cut everything out, but do this for about 10 years & you'll be rich enough to do whatever you want! ...PPS. If single, don't avoid the advantages of marrying & etc. But watch out for spendthrifts. ... (It takes real work to get a spouse to use coupons & search for sales & etc. but it does work over time.  can attest to this!)PPPS. Set aside a small "mad money" fund for "whatever" ...Finally: Just remember: A Ferrari goes just as fast as a Ford on Hwy169 in heavy traffic!

They both have their advantages, but you are definitely better off with the one you'll enjoy more.

The median home price in San Diego is a half-million dollars.  Take a serious look at the cost of living in both places.  What will gas cost? What will food cost? What will water and electricity cost? What about rent in a neighborhood that isn't in a high-crime area?  The reality of that 100,000/yr could easily translate to you living paycheck to paycheck in a 300 square foot studio apartment.

I seriously wonder if you are writing this as an undergraduate business student posing as an age 28 sales director.  Your title is misleading, you seem to misunderstand the real risks, you state nothing of your family situation, and state nothing of your spending versus saving habits.  I have a hard time believing you are an on the ball guy that got all these quick promotions and lucrative job offers, but if you are, you probably got by on some very good skills despite some big weaknesses that haven't hurt you yet.  One of those weaknesses would be a poor ability to write, and describe the key essentials of the situation. You describe the near term earning potential as a range I describe as 130+-30, or 135+-55.  I just picked the midrange as the first number because I have no idea what the most likely first year earnings are, so I don't know a better description.  Based on this, the Colorado job is actually the better paying, but higher risk, job in the near term, even before one considers Colorado to have a lower cost of living than much of San Diego.  (I note San Diego is a county sized city with widely varying prices for locally upscale real estate, so I can't tell if the real estate cost favors which location over the other.) You left out the biggest near term risk.  Your performance will earn at or near the bottom of the range, in which case you have a high likelihood of being fired with a black mark on your career record, and further loss of income while looking for another job. In the long run, the SD position seems to offer good long term potential, and in the medium run, the CO position seems to promise a promotion now followed by stagnation you don't now accept. In six years, you started as a college grad, received three fast promotions, and are complaining you haven't moved up in two years.  Have you tried comparing that to what most people have done?  You have likely moved up to the point where your knowledge, skill, and performance level were appropriate to your latest assignment, and you don't want be be promoted from within by expanding beyond just sales.  You likely never will do this again, because those early promotions are part of the process of figuring out who is competent and who is not, and you are high up for age 28.  It is true some have moved up faster, but their ability to perform was often harmed by their failure to learn how things really get done by the people who do the work, not just supervise it. Your family situation and financial needs play a huge role.  Do you have a family to support now?  What do you really need?  What are your real financial goals?  If you want to be wealthy, learn how, because your income is not limiting, but your lifestyle is, more likely than not.  I recommend The Millionaire Next Door, by Stanley and Danko, which contains good information about wealth versus lifestyle, and how to educate your kids financially, despite some flaws and that it is over two decades old. I realize my opening lines are critical and  perhaps provocative.  I am somewhat surprised nobody else picked up on most of what I did, after 30 answers.  I hope I have given you some useful things to think about.  BTW, I never did sales, I did engineering and am pushing 60.

When we are young we can take more risks since we have more chances to recover, incase it all goes wrong. when we are young there are two aspects building up. personal life and professional life. You told about the professional life, what about personal life? Have you thought of your personal life, because a screwed up personal life will also damage professional life. Apart from that, I think, 2nd option is better since has more money, learning opportunities. Best of luck.

Go for low risk Work the necessary hours All other extra time go build your assets or passive income business If you commit to this regime In 3 years or so Your passive income business may equate to your 80k salary Then by 35 you will have a choice which is to stay employed or live a free life away for the tyranny of the modern economic slavery that chains us all.

Company B has just been acquired by Koreans. In two years, it will be an absolutely completely different company than what it is today. No one can tell if worse or better, but surely different. Change always bring opportunities. And there would be a lot if opportunities for you to ride.

The one you'll enjoy most.  "The person who loves their job never works a day in their life"