10 ms·

I (American) interviewed a Gitlab while earning "SF money" from Argentina. During the phone screen, they told me if I chose to live in SF, they would pay me $1

by itake 9y ago

I (American) interviewed a Gitlab while earning "SF money" from Argentina. During the phone screen, they told me if I chose to live in SF, they would pay me $121k, but if I wanted to continue to live in Argentina, I would take a massive pay cut $70k. Not to mention, ARG is have massive currency inflation, so each month I would work there, my pay would drop 1-2%. For remote workers, the job market is actually pretty small. Many of the "remote only" companies (Buffer, Gitlab, RainforestQA, etc) pay based on how expensive of a lifestyle the employee chooses to have. One remote company I interviewed at mentioned how one of their SF employees moved in with their parents and how they talked about cutting his salary significantly because of his cheaper lifestyle.

dominotw 9y ago
how do they verify where you actually live? do you have to provide them proof of residence everytime you move?
- itake 9y ago
  I would not feel right lying to them about my location. I currently changed countries every 1-2 months so maybe I could of worked something out for them to pay me in USD, but they also said they wanted to pay me in local currency.
  - GFischer 9y ago
    Ok, getting paid in local currency sucks. I work for an U.S. company from Uruguay and I get paid in USD.
GFischer 9y ago
I live in Uruguay and I don't earn "SF money", a 70k paycheck would be huge here (and in Argentina as well). And to avoid the currency inflation you should of course choose to earn in U.S. dollars, or negotiate to be tied to the regular - currently bi-annual in Uruguay - pay increases in countries with inflation (which usually lag inflation and are a bad deal, but offer some buffer to it).
- itake 9y ago
  My $0.02 your pay should not be based on how much you spend. If your co-worker chooses to buy an expensive car or live in an expensive city, then they should not get paid more than the guy that lives with his parents because he wants to save money.
  - GFischer 9y ago
    Unfortunately that's how it works for companies today - they know they can pay less depending on where you live (even within the same country, like SF vs Midwest US).
    - ukd1 9y ago
      It's because it's a market; there is less demand in non-hub / smaller places. Think about the same thing for houses - should you pay SF house prices living in the midwest?
      - itake 9y ago
        but that logic breaks down when if you factor in competition from other remote companies. The moment one remote company offers an SF rate compensation outside of SF, then the job candidate's market rate is an SF rate. I totally understand if a company doesn't have the budget for talent and looks to exclusively hire in non-hub / smaller places in order to keep costs low. But I hate when a company says: we understand you have an SF rate offer and we would normally compete with that if you lived in SF, but, sorry, our excel spreadsheet says we can only lowball you.
ukd1 9y ago
Rainforest QA co-founder here; We actually now pay percentile of local equivalent, which is fairer if you want to compare apples-to-apples when looking for work without moving. We found that places like LA, with our previous structure, we just couldn't hire - LA actually has a better $ / living cost ratio for developers than SF! Meanwhile in other places, we'd be 95-100% percentile. Anyway; compensation is really hard to get right and keep everyone happy, you do your best, but haters-gonna-hate. p.s. also we're not remote only - we have some great SF engineers - but 90% of our eng is remote; we just want the best people regardless of location :)
- phonon 9y ago
  > -100% percentile not likely :-)
  - ukd1 9y ago
    haha, wasn't supposed to be 100% accurate ;), so maybe, but in a small enough market I buy this.
- itake 9y ago
  I think everyone's financial situation is different. I agree with you that if you try to cater compensation by a hire's lifestyle choices, then it does get really hard to keep everyone happy. IMHO, living in SF is a choice, especially at a remote company. Just like buying a Tesla or choosing to live in your car instead of renting an apartment is also a choice. I don't think companies should pay one employee less because they choose to have a cheaper lifestyle than the employees that buy Teslas or live in San Francisco.
  - ukd1 9y ago
    I think employees should be paid fairly (which works both ways) based on where they live; if we can pay you above the local average for your role and you don't want to move, then we're an attractive offer.
    - 9y ago

by itake 9y ago

dominotw 9y ago

how do they verify where you actually live? do you have to provide them proof of residence everytime you move?

itake 9y ago
I would not feel right lying to them about my location. I currently changed countries every 1-2 months so maybe I could of worked something out for them to pay me in USD, but they also said they wanted to pay me in local currency.
- GFischer 9y ago
  Ok, getting paid in local currency sucks. I work for an U.S. company from Uruguay and I get paid in USD.

GFischer 9y ago

I live in Uruguay and I don't earn "SF money", a 70k paycheck would be huge here (and in Argentina as well). And to avoid the currency inflation you should of course choose to earn in U.S. dollars, or negotiate to be tied to the regular - currently bi-annual in Uruguay - pay increases in countries with inflation (which usually lag inflation and are a bad deal, but offer some buffer to it).

itake 9y ago
My $0.02 your pay should not be based on how much you spend. If your co-worker chooses to buy an expensive car or live in an expensive city, then they should not get paid more than the guy that lives with his parents because he wants to save money.
- GFischer 9y ago
  Unfortunately that's how it works for companies today - they know they can pay less depending on where you live (even within the same country, like SF vs Midwest US).
  - ukd1 9y ago
    It's because it's a market; there is less demand in non-hub / smaller places. Think about the same thing for houses - should you pay SF house prices living in the midwest?
    - itake 9y ago
      but that logic breaks down when if you factor in competition from other remote companies. The moment one remote company offers an SF rate compensation outside of SF, then the job candidate's market rate is an SF rate. I totally understand if a company doesn't have the budget for talent and looks to exclusively hire in non-hub / smaller places in order to keep costs low. But I hate when a company says: we understand you have an SF rate offer and we would normally compete with that if you lived in SF, but, sorry, our excel spreadsheet says we can only lowball you.

ukd1 9y ago

Rainforest QA co-founder here; We actually now pay percentile of local equivalent, which is fairer if you want to compare apples-to-apples when looking for work without moving. We found that places like LA, with our previous structure, we just couldn't hire - LA actually has a better $ / living cost ratio for developers than SF! Meanwhile in other places, we'd be 95-100% percentile. Anyway; compensation is really hard to get right and keep everyone happy, you do your best, but haters-gonna-hate. p.s. also we're not remote only - we have some great SF engineers - but 90% of our eng is remote; we just want the best people regardless of location :)

phonon 9y ago
> -100% percentile not likely :-)
- ukd1 9y ago
  haha, wasn't supposed to be 100% accurate ;), so maybe, but in a small enough market I buy this.
itake 9y ago
I think everyone's financial situation is different. I agree with you that if you try to cater compensation by a hire's lifestyle choices, then it does get really hard to keep everyone happy. IMHO, living in SF is a choice, especially at a remote company. Just like buying a Tesla or choosing to live in your car instead of renting an apartment is also a choice. I don't think companies should pay one employee less because they choose to have a cheaper lifestyle than the employees that buy Teslas or live in San Francisco.
- ukd1 9y ago
  I think employees should be paid fairly (which works both ways) based on where they live; if we can pay you above the local average for your role and you don't want to move, then we're an attractive offer.
  - 9y ago