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> how is this any different from the offshoring or outsourcing There really is none, and what people are failing to realize is that if a SF-based company was p

> how is this any different from the offshoring or outsourcing There really is none, and what people are failing to realize is that if a SF-based company was paying you $300k, and the market rate for the same level of skill in North Dakota is $100k, there is nothing stopping them from hiring a lot of ND based developers and slowly winding down SF-based devs. It won't be a "we're firing you because you are making SF-based pay", it will be for other reasons that don't directly link the two, until the entire work force is paid less. Next, you can swap out North Dakota pay for pay in other countries, and you can see where this is going. Developers will claim the "off-shore" talent is sub-par, but eventually this becomes a level playing field, with highly many skilled developers spread across the globe. Then what?

oceanplexian 4y ago
> what people are failing to realize is that if a SF-based company was paying you $300k, and the market rate for the same level of skill in North Dakota is $100k, there is nothing stopping them from hiring a lot of ND based developers and slowly winding down SF-based devs. As someone who has been remote, even pre-COVID, I can tell you this is not at all how it works. Trust me, a dev based in North Dakota who has Google, Lyft, Stripe, etc. on their resume will have no problem making within 10-20% of the same pay as someone based in San Francisco. The issue is people want to claim that someone who works at Bob's IT Shop in North Dakota or a new grad from North Carolina is the market equivalent of an SF dev who's deeply embedded in the industry, and that's false. The first thing is conflating skill with experience. Being a good coder doesn't necessarily make you qualified to work on production systems for a large company.
- EMM_386 4y ago
  > As someone who has been remote, even pre-COVID, I can tell you this is not at all how it works. Trust me, a dev based in North Dakota who has Google, Lyft, Stripe, etc. on their resume will have no problem making within 10-20% of the same pay as someone based in San Francisco. I've been remote also for 10 years pre-Covid. How did those people originally get Google, Lyft, etc on their resume? They were smart and skilled. There is no reason someone can't land those positions in an area where the CoL is 500% less than what it is in San Francisco. If we expand this globally, they could live like a king on $50k USD locally. Stretching out the timeline, there is no reason companies will continue to pay SF salaries for these positions when they don't have to. If you move to Thailand, but the local developer in the unit next door is more skilled than you, you have to prepare for the invitable. > Being a good coder doesn't necessarily make you qualified to work on production systems for a large company. It will once you are onboarded and learn the ropes. How else do you get that experience? What you are suggesting is a temporary gap in knowledge. This gap can be rapidly closed moving forward.
  - sverhagen 4y ago
    >there is no reason companies will continue to pay SF salaries for these positions when they don't have to. Doesn't that depend on the extent to which companies are going to demand folks come back into the office? The flexibility that Airbnb just announced is great, but it seems that Apple is still making Cupertino a place for high wages.

oceanplexian 4y ago

> what people are failing to realize is that if a SF-based company was paying you $300k, and the market rate for the same level of skill in North Dakota is $100k, there is nothing stopping them from hiring a lot of ND based developers and slowly winding down SF-based devs. As someone who has been remote, even pre-COVID, I can tell you this is not at all how it works. Trust me, a dev based in North Dakota who has Google, Lyft, Stripe, etc. on their resume will have no problem making within 10-20% of the same pay as someone based in San Francisco. The issue is people want to claim that someone who works at Bob's IT Shop in North Dakota or a new grad from North Carolina is the market equivalent of an SF dev who's deeply embedded in the industry, and that's false. The first thing is conflating skill with experience. Being a good coder doesn't necessarily make you qualified to work on production systems for a large company.

EMM_386 4y ago
> As someone who has been remote, even pre-COVID, I can tell you this is not at all how it works. Trust me, a dev based in North Dakota who has Google, Lyft, Stripe, etc. on their resume will have no problem making within 10-20% of the same pay as someone based in San Francisco. I've been remote also for 10 years pre-Covid. How did those people originally get Google, Lyft, etc on their resume? They were smart and skilled. There is no reason someone can't land those positions in an area where the CoL is 500% less than what it is in San Francisco. If we expand this globally, they could live like a king on $50k USD locally. Stretching out the timeline, there is no reason companies will continue to pay SF salaries for these positions when they don't have to. If you move to Thailand, but the local developer in the unit next door is more skilled than you, you have to prepare for the invitable. > Being a good coder doesn't necessarily make you qualified to work on production systems for a large company. It will once you are onboarded and learn the ropes. How else do you get that experience? What you are suggesting is a temporary gap in knowledge. This gap can be rapidly closed moving forward.
- sverhagen 4y ago
  >there is no reason companies will continue to pay SF salaries for these positions when they don't have to. Doesn't that depend on the extent to which companies are going to demand folks come back into the office? The flexibility that Airbnb just announced is great, but it seems that Apple is still making Cupertino a place for high wages.