I find almost everything about working from home nicer than going into an office. I have a larger desk, a more ergonomic workstation, better coffee and more opt

I find almost everything about working from home nicer than going into an office. I have a larger desk, a more ergonomic workstation, better coffee and more options for lunch. I have a spouse who is also home and I live in an apartment building with sometimes noisy neighbors, but it’s still a better work environment for deep focus than sitting in an open office with hundreds of other people. The things you often lose with remote work, like opportunities for spontaneous collaboration and socializing with co-workers can be retained in a distributed team if the team wants to learn and puts in the effort. For all of the benefits of working from home though, it’s really a tertiary concern for me when I prioritize remote work. Much more important are the larger set of opportunities I have not being limited to one particular region, and the greatly improved quality of life I get from not commuting. As someone who lives outside of a tech hub, the value of having access to remote work can’t be understated. There is certainly enough work for a software developer in my city, and some of it pays well enough even if it’s a bit lower than what I can make doing remote work, but none of the companies locally are invested in technology as a business strategy. If I were restricted to local work I’d be stuck working as a cost center at a regressive thinking Big Corp adding features to a decades pile of technical debt. Even if I relocated to a tech hub, I’d be stuck with the startups in that particular city plus the companies large enough to open satellite offices around the world. As it is, working remotely I can stay in a town where I have friends and family and work at jobs that are interesting and let me stretch my skills wherever they happen to be.