Get paid in pounds, and make sure that you get paid ENOUGH pounds to support you in the english economy. While £20k is mathematically equivalent to about $40k, £20k will not get you very far here at all. if you are making $40k/yr, I would almost not think it unreasonable to expect to make about £40k/yr in the UK.. not if you are living in the UK. It's easy to assume that a product that costs $20 in the US will cost £10 here in the UK, but most things are more like £20 instead. After I'd been here about four months, I stopped converting things back to dollars because I was making myself insane with the idea that I'd just spent about $6 on a 20 minute bus fare or $8 on a milkshake.


Also, depending on how you are paid and where you bank, remember that it can be very costly to get money wired overseas. I used to live in Spain and work for an american company, and to receive my wired paycheck to my american account cost me about $30 each pay period, plus whatever fees I incurred to exchange the money to euros. (I would have demanded to be paid in euros, but I was only staying half a year and they were picking up my rent instead.)