For the heads-down execution characteristic of a junior role, you’re right, collocation doesn’t matter and focus does. Past entry level we expect engineers to

For the heads-down execution characteristic of a junior role, you’re right, collocation doesn’t matter and focus does. Past entry level we expect engineers to also be working with their colleagues to determine what to build, when, and how. In an emergency, doing this on Zoom beats not trying at all. That’s about the best I can say for it. If you really can’t afford to live closer than an hour to your office as a software engineer, you’re woefully underpaid. More likely that is the point in tradeoff-space that you chose.