Google juniors are more like £40k in london.
Jobs over £100k are not the norm, even in finance in london.
The awful london housing market (small market, people do NOT sell) starts around £320k for a terrible studio.
Banks nowaways tend to loan around 4-4.5x gross salary. (And you need a good chunk already saved, which is also hard as tax and rent is high)
£100k salary doesn't buy an average 1 bed in london (and you're competing against at least 4 cash buyers)
As someone who recently left london, the story checks out.
Stocks also play a role.
The creator of Redux was making 100k£ (+35k£ in stocks) at FB.
That said, there is a huge disparity in salaries in London.
I was making 100k£ per year as a random full time engineer with 15 years of experience in some unknown company and working (potentially) fully remote before covid.
I know VPs and CTOs making 120-200k£.
I could get a contract for 600£-700£ daily and the top contracts I've heard for senior engineers from my friends are 1k£/1.2k£ per day (generally Java or Angular jobs in banking where things are on fire).
There are plenty of engineers who never go past 50k£.
To add another data point, an FB junior would make around £65k base + ~£27k stock per year (+bonus). So getting over £100k at a FAANG in London seems pretty common to me, I would expect finance to pay even more.
Personally I sympathise a lot with OP. I have a similar "stuck" feeling, I often wonder whether it's all downhill from here (comp-wise) for me. I cannot see myself working for a FAANG forever, so what other choices are there?
Another thing to note is that the income distribution in London seems bimodal. And so if you are earning a good amount, you may still find it a bad idea to assume similar good income in the future and therefore not want to get into a huge mortgage.
So yes, you may technically be able to afford a decent house, but in practice find it a very bad idea to do so. E.g. imagine if the OP got herself into a massive mortgage - she would feel even more trapped than she is now.
For a non-FAANG London salary data point; I did ~5yrs Java development contracting in London/Finance and my day rates fluctuated anywhere from £600 - £950.
Converted to perm in 2020 at £140k base + $40k RSU's working for a consultancy that ships me into London/Finance gigs, effectively doing the same type of work.
Esp with PhD.
Agreed not super clear what's going on.