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By this logic pay would be lowest in for example San Francisco because there are tons of engineers with diverse skill sets there they can hire. Obviously not th

By this logic pay would be lowest in for example San Francisco because there are tons of engineers with diverse skill sets there they can hire. Obviously not the case.

Bakary 4y ago
Companies still want to hire local, non-remote talents for all sorts of reasons, from timezones to regulations to just internal/external culture. This will take a long time to change, if it ever does. Technically, a company could chose to hire only foreigners in cheaper countries, and I'm not talking about unreliable hires from developing nations but other competent Westerners whose biggest QoL mistake was not being born with a US visa. If you are an American who wants to be a nomad, the company will rarely fire you on the spot in favor of a more manageable new employee of your country of residence, because it already has a relationship with you and hiring is expensive and lengthy. What they can do however, is decrease your salary because they are no longer beholden to American anchor prices. You are no longer part of the contingent of local talent that they hire for various reasons, and will concede the decrease because the company still offers you the perspective of being a highly paid nomad. Think of it another way: how come it is nearly universally the case that junior American devs are paid salaries that are equal or higher to that of non-American devs working outside of America but within the same company?
- chrisseaton 4y ago
  > What they can do however, is decrease your salary because they are no longer beholden to American anchor prices. They pay you as much as they need to to get you or someone of equivalent skill as you (encompassing all things including communication skills) to work for them. 'Anchor prices' isn't a thing. > how come it is nearly universally the case that junior American devs are paid salaries that are equal or higher to that of non-American devs working outside of America but within the same company Because that's how much it takes to get them to work for the company. That's the only answer to any question of 'why is someone paid this much' (in a functioning market.)
  - Bakary 4y ago
    Well that's exactly my point. There is great educational infrastructure in America, so all else being equal Americans have astounding opportunities to become highly paid knowledge workers and the American society will produce many of these individuals. However, that does not make the typical competent American dev that much smarter than the mass of competent employees elsewhere. What will cause the discrepancy in salary is that there is much more money swirling into America per capita, and that immigrating to the US is very difficult. This becomes obvious if you consider the salary difference between Canadians and Americans, despite them being nearly identical in many relevant respects other than the amount of capital involved in their respective countries. If you combine that with the multiple reasons that might lead an American company in hiring American talent or at least talent based in America, you end up in a situation where you want a portion of America-based employees even though you have to pay them more, but if any individual employee leaves the territory the reason to pay them American market rates erodes away, even if they have the American nationality. They no longer meet the need that led the company to paying those prices in the first place. Keep in mind that if that need didn't exist, and salary was the sole consideration, they would have more than enough great devs around the world to never have to hire in America to begin with. The nomadic employee has fewer cards in hand because they want to live in a different country and also have a near American salary, which leads to a compromise where their salary is decreased. If they start to make too much trouble to the point where starting the hiring process anew is worth it, they can be replaced by an equally intelligent and capable local dev who will quietly accept the salary in question.
    - chrisseaton 4y ago
      > but if any individual employee leaves the territory the reason to pay them American market rates erodes away, even if they have the American nationality. They no longer meet the need that led the company to paying those prices in the first place. This doesn't make sense to me. If my company employs me because it wants me to write a Ruby compiler, and there are only so many people in the world who can or want to write Ruby compilers and can communicate effectively about it, then exactly which 'reasons to pay them American market rates' do you think have gone if I move? They weren't paying for that in the first place. They were paying to get something done. It's still getting done no matter where I am. Me moving doesn't mean that someone else suddenly becomes able to do my job for less money if they weren't before. Companies pay to get things done. If the find the best people to do that is people who happen to be in the US then they hire there.

By this logic pay would be lowest in for example San Francisco because there are tons of engineers with diverse skill sets there they can hire. Obviously not the case.

Bakary 4y ago

Companies still want to hire local, non-remote talents for all sorts of reasons, from timezones to regulations to just internal/external culture. This will take a long time to change, if it ever does. Technically, a company could chose to hire only foreigners in cheaper countries, and I'm not talking about unreliable hires from developing nations but other competent Westerners whose biggest QoL mistake was not being born with a US visa. If you are an American who wants to be a nomad, the company will rarely fire you on the spot in favor of a more manageable new employee of your country of residence, because it already has a relationship with you and hiring is expensive and lengthy. What they can do however, is decrease your salary because they are no longer beholden to American anchor prices. You are no longer part of the contingent of local talent that they hire for various reasons, and will concede the decrease because the company still offers you the perspective of being a highly paid nomad. Think of it another way: how come it is nearly universally the case that junior American devs are paid salaries that are equal or higher to that of non-American devs working outside of America but within the same company?

chrisseaton 4y ago
> What they can do however, is decrease your salary because they are no longer beholden to American anchor prices. They pay you as much as they need to to get you or someone of equivalent skill as you (encompassing all things including communication skills) to work for them. 'Anchor prices' isn't a thing. > how come it is nearly universally the case that junior American devs are paid salaries that are equal or higher to that of non-American devs working outside of America but within the same company Because that's how much it takes to get them to work for the company. That's the only answer to any question of 'why is someone paid this much' (in a functioning market.)
- Bakary 4y ago
  Well that's exactly my point. There is great educational infrastructure in America, so all else being equal Americans have astounding opportunities to become highly paid knowledge workers and the American society will produce many of these individuals. However, that does not make the typical competent American dev that much smarter than the mass of competent employees elsewhere. What will cause the discrepancy in salary is that there is much more money swirling into America per capita, and that immigrating to the US is very difficult. This becomes obvious if you consider the salary difference between Canadians and Americans, despite them being nearly identical in many relevant respects other than the amount of capital involved in their respective countries. If you combine that with the multiple reasons that might lead an American company in hiring American talent or at least talent based in America, you end up in a situation where you want a portion of America-based employees even though you have to pay them more, but if any individual employee leaves the territory the reason to pay them American market rates erodes away, even if they have the American nationality. They no longer meet the need that led the company to paying those prices in the first place. Keep in mind that if that need didn't exist, and salary was the sole consideration, they would have more than enough great devs around the world to never have to hire in America to begin with. The nomadic employee has fewer cards in hand because they want to live in a different country and also have a near American salary, which leads to a compromise where their salary is decreased. If they start to make too much trouble to the point where starting the hiring process anew is worth it, they can be replaced by an equally intelligent and capable local dev who will quietly accept the salary in question.
  - chrisseaton 4y ago
    > but if any individual employee leaves the territory the reason to pay them American market rates erodes away, even if they have the American nationality. They no longer meet the need that led the company to paying those prices in the first place. This doesn't make sense to me. If my company employs me because it wants me to write a Ruby compiler, and there are only so many people in the world who can or want to write Ruby compilers and can communicate effectively about it, then exactly which 'reasons to pay them American market rates' do you think have gone if I move? They weren't paying for that in the first place. They were paying to get something done. It's still getting done no matter where I am. Me moving doesn't mean that someone else suddenly becomes able to do my job for less money if they weren't before. Companies pay to get things done. If the find the best people to do that is people who happen to be in the US then they hire there.