Also these companies may not want to work remotely in the long term. If they thought remote working was just as effective, presumably they would have done it b

Also these companies may not want to work remotely in the long term. If they thought remote working was just as effective, presumably they would have done it before. If employees move away, and the company calls everyone back into the office at some point, a good portion of the workers that have moved will quit. In a sense, paying them the SF rate even though they're remote is sort of paying them to be "on reserve."