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So much this. There's companies out there that value output at what you're worth, regardless of where you live at. I'm almost certain that Facebook is one of th

So much this. There's companies out there that value output at what you're worth, regardless of where you live at. I'm almost certain that Facebook is one of those companies — when it comes to high output employees. Negotiate.

bevacqua 6y ago
Think about it from the angle of consulting rates as a remote developer. Would you charge a different rate to companies that operate in the same markets based on where you are at? Why would you accept a different rate as a FTE, then? You charge what you're worth, not where
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
RHSeeger 6y ago
The counter to that is that there's people that live in cheaper areas that are willing to accept less _because_ their cost of living is lower. If a company can hire them instead of someone )with the same productivity) basing their expected salary on what people make in SV, then why wouldn't they? Following that logic, people living SV should start making less while people living in inexpensive areas should start making more; it should even out to some extent.
- Retric 6y ago
  That ignores why SV has a cost premium in the first place. High cost of living is pushed up because of the workforce not the other way around.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    SF, and much of the rest of the Bay Area to a lesser (or greater, on the case of Marin) extent had a notoriously high cost of living before “Silicon Valley” was more than a small part of the South Bay. It's more than tech work that has drawn people to SF, and that combined with supply restrictions that also aren't driven by the tech workforce have kept prices high since before the tech workforce showed up.
    - Retric 6y ago
      Going back to say 1950’s and it was still the workforce pushing up cost of living. Who those people are and what they are doing is a function of the time period, but people want to live there in large part due to the weather etc.
- bevacqua 6y ago
  I don't see that as a counter. Yes, this might be bad long term for people staying in SF, and good long term for people outside of SF/the US. But individually you can look for opportunities in your own local market and get local market rates, or break that paradigm and look at other markets, just like companies are waking up to hiring employees in cheaper markets (beyond hiring consulting firms). Like everything in markets, there's always opportunities for the wise to take advantage of, on both sides
  - Consultant32452 6y ago
    If demand for labor goes down in SF, and wages go down in SF, so will the COL.
- JMTQp8lwXL 6y ago
  The people living in LCOL areas don't hustle. They aren't the type to do 100 hours of leetcode. That doesn't make them bad engineers. But it precludes them from passing the incredibly one-dimensional assessment FANGs apply to engineers. The hiring committees would throw fits if they had to consider hiring even the upper-end of talent in non-competitive markets. These committees could be in for a reckoning if businesses realized they could be just as effective with mid market talent, because truthfully, not every problem that needs to be solved at a FANG needs a top 1% best-of-breed, (for example) 15+years-of-GPU experience engineer. Not every problem demands niche, hard-to-find specialty.
  - war1025 6y ago
    > The people living in LCOL areas don't hustle. They aren't the type to do 100 hours of leetcode I think this hits on a very real signal that is sent by someone being willing to relocate cross-country for work. I know people from college that moved out to the coasts to work for big name tech companies. They were probably "above average", but none of them were terribly noteworthy. The thing they were willing to do that the rest of us weren't was uproot from the midwest and go to the coast. That's a signal that you're willing to tie your self worth to your job in a way that is very valuable (exploitable) to a company.
    - bitcoinmoney 6y ago
      Pretty much described every H1b-er in HN. Except prolly the body shop employees.
  - RHSeeger 6y ago
    > The people living in LCOL areas don't hustle. They aren't the type to do 100 hours of leetcode. > not every problem that needs to be solved at a FANG needs a top 1% best-of-breed, (for example I honestly can't tell if you're joking or not. The wording in the first sentence is that of someone being sarcastic, mocking the people who would actually use such language and/or expect such things. But the second quote sounds like you're being serious. The difference between people living in high COL areas and low COL isn't how much they hustle. Some of the best people I've worked with are living in low COL areas, including one I was praising just recently for being a role model for others. As a side note, if you're doing 100 hours of work a week, you're almost certainly doing a bad job at all of it. With the exception of a small subset of people, it's been shown that work quality decreases drastically when working long hours (for all the work being done, not just the work past the normal hours). Expecting your workers to put in those hours means you're aiming for sub-optimal, low quality work.
esoterica 6y ago
> There's companies out there that value output at what you're worth In any auction the selling price is not the value of the item to the winning bidder, it's the second highest bid plus $1. If you move to a LCOL area the competing offers are all going to be garbage unless you can find a second high-paying company to extend you a remote offer (which may or may not happen, depending on how widespread remote work becomes). Facebook has no reason to unilaterally raise their bids unless you can secure good competing offers as leverage.
war1025 6y ago
The trouble is there are people who are highly paid because they are legitimately good at what they do. And then there are people who are highly paid because they live in an area where high pay is the norm. The former are going to be fine either way. The latter are in for a rude awakening.
- chii 6y ago
  so how do you differentiate if you are good at what you do, or is just highly paid because of where you live and worked?
  - chrischen 6y ago
    Easy! If you live in The Bay Area it probably applies! Many companies have a hiring restriction that requires candidates to live near their offices so that they can physically appear for work. This of course constrains the labor pool which artificially inflates salaries. This is of course exacerbated by the fact that in The Bay Area housing itself is also constrained, which multiplies the cost increase on local talent.

bevacqua 6y ago

Think about it from the angle of consulting rates as a remote developer. Would you charge a different rate to companies that operate in the same markets based on where you are at? Why would you accept a different rate as a FTE, then? You charge what you're worth, not where

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

RHSeeger 6y ago

The counter to that is that there's people that live in cheaper areas that are willing to accept less _because_ their cost of living is lower. If a company can hire them instead of someone )with the same productivity) basing their expected salary on what people make in SV, then why wouldn't they? Following that logic, people living SV should start making less while people living in inexpensive areas should start making more; it should even out to some extent.

Retric 6y ago
That ignores why SV has a cost premium in the first place. High cost of living is pushed up because of the workforce not the other way around.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  SF, and much of the rest of the Bay Area to a lesser (or greater, on the case of Marin) extent had a notoriously high cost of living before “Silicon Valley” was more than a small part of the South Bay. It's more than tech work that has drawn people to SF, and that combined with supply restrictions that also aren't driven by the tech workforce have kept prices high since before the tech workforce showed up.
  - Retric 6y ago
    Going back to say 1950’s and it was still the workforce pushing up cost of living. Who those people are and what they are doing is a function of the time period, but people want to live there in large part due to the weather etc.
bevacqua 6y ago
I don't see that as a counter. Yes, this might be bad long term for people staying in SF, and good long term for people outside of SF/the US. But individually you can look for opportunities in your own local market and get local market rates, or break that paradigm and look at other markets, just like companies are waking up to hiring employees in cheaper markets (beyond hiring consulting firms). Like everything in markets, there's always opportunities for the wise to take advantage of, on both sides
- Consultant32452 6y ago
  If demand for labor goes down in SF, and wages go down in SF, so will the COL.
JMTQp8lwXL 6y ago
The people living in LCOL areas don't hustle. They aren't the type to do 100 hours of leetcode. That doesn't make them bad engineers. But it precludes them from passing the incredibly one-dimensional assessment FANGs apply to engineers. The hiring committees would throw fits if they had to consider hiring even the upper-end of talent in non-competitive markets. These committees could be in for a reckoning if businesses realized they could be just as effective with mid market talent, because truthfully, not every problem that needs to be solved at a FANG needs a top 1% best-of-breed, (for example) 15+years-of-GPU experience engineer. Not every problem demands niche, hard-to-find specialty.
- war1025 6y ago
  > The people living in LCOL areas don't hustle. They aren't the type to do 100 hours of leetcode I think this hits on a very real signal that is sent by someone being willing to relocate cross-country for work. I know people from college that moved out to the coasts to work for big name tech companies. They were probably "above average", but none of them were terribly noteworthy. The thing they were willing to do that the rest of us weren't was uproot from the midwest and go to the coast. That's a signal that you're willing to tie your self worth to your job in a way that is very valuable (exploitable) to a company.
  - bitcoinmoney 6y ago
    Pretty much described every H1b-er in HN. Except prolly the body shop employees.
- RHSeeger 6y ago
  > The people living in LCOL areas don't hustle. They aren't the type to do 100 hours of leetcode. > not every problem that needs to be solved at a FANG needs a top 1% best-of-breed, (for example I honestly can't tell if you're joking or not. The wording in the first sentence is that of someone being sarcastic, mocking the people who would actually use such language and/or expect such things. But the second quote sounds like you're being serious. The difference between people living in high COL areas and low COL isn't how much they hustle. Some of the best people I've worked with are living in low COL areas, including one I was praising just recently for being a role model for others. As a side note, if you're doing 100 hours of work a week, you're almost certainly doing a bad job at all of it. With the exception of a small subset of people, it's been shown that work quality decreases drastically when working long hours (for all the work being done, not just the work past the normal hours). Expecting your workers to put in those hours means you're aiming for sub-optimal, low quality work.

esoterica 6y ago

> There's companies out there that value output at what you're worth In any auction the selling price is not the value of the item to the winning bidder, it's the second highest bid plus $1. If you move to a LCOL area the competing offers are all going to be garbage unless you can find a second high-paying company to extend you a remote offer (which may or may not happen, depending on how widespread remote work becomes). Facebook has no reason to unilaterally raise their bids unless you can secure good competing offers as leverage.

war1025 6y ago

The trouble is there are people who are highly paid because they are legitimately good at what they do. And then there are people who are highly paid because they live in an area where high pay is the norm. The former are going to be fine either way. The latter are in for a rude awakening.

chii 6y ago
so how do you differentiate if you are good at what you do, or is just highly paid because of where you live and worked?
- chrischen 6y ago
  Easy! If you live in The Bay Area it probably applies! Many companies have a hiring restriction that requires candidates to live near their offices so that they can physically appear for work. This of course constrains the labor pool which artificially inflates salaries. This is of course exacerbated by the fact that in The Bay Area housing itself is also constrained, which multiplies the cost increase on local talent.