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I think one thing people aren't considering is how remote work makes people more easily substitutable. Why live in SF if you can live in a small Colorado town?

I think one thing people aren't considering is how remote work makes people more easily substitutable. Why live in SF if you can live in a small Colorado town? Why pay for a remote developer in SF when you could pay for a remote developer in Arizona? Why hire in the U.S when you can get a good dev in South America? There used to be a geographic monopoly on labor, but making remote the norm moves us away from that. Maybe that's a good thing, as it will make NYC affordable, but NYC is also experiencing huge budget shortages from the drop in land value. I suspect these will only get worse over time in all major U.S cities.

tekla 3y ago
This is what programmers wanted right? The right to work from wherever they wanted. Except, that includes cheap areas where salary requirements tend to be much lower and pushes down wages.
- Tade0 3y ago
  As someone hailing from a popular outsourcing destination, the lower the costs of living in a location, the higher IT salaries are in comparison to the median. I moved to a smaller (population 600k vs 1.7mln) city and my salary didn't change much working remotely, while costs, especially real estate, are approximately 30% lower. All my friends who stayed there did so simply because they had someone to finance their housing.
- HWR_14 3y ago
  Not everyone. I'm smart enough to want to limit my competition.
softwaredoug 3y ago
To some degree yes, However living in the same city is only one aspect of substitutability. There’s also specialized skills, organizational tenure, time zone, how easily legally a company can hire in a country, language barrier and many others.
- zeroCalories 3y ago
  I agree that it's only one aspect, but the other ones you mentioned are becoming less of an issue over time. I'm not worried about my job over the next 5 years, but 10? 20? What about my child's first job?
j45 3y ago
It’s why hybrid work might be a better choice for those with competitors globally. Demanding remote only invites remote talent from anywhere not just for existing employees
sgt101 3y ago
Every CEO has, for the last 20 years at least, outsourced and offshored every role that they possibly could. All the bullshit about co-location and productivity is dropped instantaneously when there is a chance of saving a dime. The flat out truth is that the off shored teams are either good enough to do the job (they they have the job already, or would have in short order remote or no) or they aren't. I agree that low cost onshore locations are likely to benefit, and wages will be lower there - this is a good thing for the developed economies though. I am in the UK and there are many cities that have complex and extensive infrastructures that could be a great place to live. These would benefit hugely from even 250 remote working IT people going to the restaurants, sending their kids to the schools, showing up to local events and so on. The IT folks would (and are) benefiting from not sitting on the Tube for 1 1/2 hrs a day and not having to work in the chaos and bullshit of a London office. The trade off is worth it. London will be ok as it was literally bursting before Covid, I think that about 2x the people will have a job "there" in the long term.... showing up for 1 or 2 days a week and then retreating to the NORTH...
akira2501 3y ago
> I think one thing people aren't considering is how remote work makes people more easily substitutable. It depends on the type of business you're in. If you're working for a large multinational that's doing "commodity web" type work, then yes, remote work probably does make you more replaceable. Fortunately this is not the totality of the job market, although, their monopoly status does seem to help make them the majority of it.
ozim 3y ago
I don’t agree. There is much more to hiring even across states let alone from a different country. Mid sized companies don’t really have experience or know how to hire internationally. Big companies have know how and resources yes but your average Joe CEO is going to be terrified of it as he won’t have control over it and he has already enough stuff to do locally to keep company running and he can hire Elaine as HR and Jeff as manager and they will know how to deal with Ashton and Jimmy who live in the same state so our Joe CEO will have less worries - which in turn translates to less money wasted by company even if some devs would be cheaper on monthly salaries.
- softwaredoug 3y ago
  A mid sized company doesn’t have experience directly hiring, but plenty of firms make it easy to employ a remote workforce as contractors.

tekla 3y ago

This is what programmers wanted right? The right to work from wherever they wanted. Except, that includes cheap areas where salary requirements tend to be much lower and pushes down wages.

Tade0 3y ago
As someone hailing from a popular outsourcing destination, the lower the costs of living in a location, the higher IT salaries are in comparison to the median. I moved to a smaller (population 600k vs 1.7mln) city and my salary didn't change much working remotely, while costs, especially real estate, are approximately 30% lower. All my friends who stayed there did so simply because they had someone to finance their housing.
HWR_14 3y ago
Not everyone. I'm smart enough to want to limit my competition.

softwaredoug 3y ago

To some degree yes, However living in the same city is only one aspect of substitutability. There’s also specialized skills, organizational tenure, time zone, how easily legally a company can hire in a country, language barrier and many others.

zeroCalories 3y ago
I agree that it's only one aspect, but the other ones you mentioned are becoming less of an issue over time. I'm not worried about my job over the next 5 years, but 10? 20? What about my child's first job?

j45 3y ago

It’s why hybrid work might be a better choice for those with competitors globally. Demanding remote only invites remote talent from anywhere not just for existing employees

sgt101 3y ago

Every CEO has, for the last 20 years at least, outsourced and offshored every role that they possibly could. All the bullshit about co-location and productivity is dropped instantaneously when there is a chance of saving a dime. The flat out truth is that the off shored teams are either good enough to do the job (they they have the job already, or would have in short order remote or no) or they aren't. I agree that low cost onshore locations are likely to benefit, and wages will be lower there - this is a good thing for the developed economies though. I am in the UK and there are many cities that have complex and extensive infrastructures that could be a great place to live. These would benefit hugely from even 250 remote working IT people going to the restaurants, sending their kids to the schools, showing up to local events and so on. The IT folks would (and are) benefiting from not sitting on the Tube for 1 1/2 hrs a day and not having to work in the chaos and bullshit of a London office. The trade off is worth it. London will be ok as it was literally bursting before Covid, I think that about 2x the people will have a job "there" in the long term.... showing up for 1 or 2 days a week and then retreating to the NORTH...

akira2501 3y ago

> I think one thing people aren't considering is how remote work makes people more easily substitutable. It depends on the type of business you're in. If you're working for a large multinational that's doing "commodity web" type work, then yes, remote work probably does make you more replaceable. Fortunately this is not the totality of the job market, although, their monopoly status does seem to help make them the majority of it.

ozim 3y ago

I don’t agree. There is much more to hiring even across states let alone from a different country. Mid sized companies don’t really have experience or know how to hire internationally. Big companies have know how and resources yes but your average Joe CEO is going to be terrified of it as he won’t have control over it and he has already enough stuff to do locally to keep company running and he can hire Elaine as HR and Jeff as manager and they will know how to deal with Ashton and Jimmy who live in the same state so our Joe CEO will have less worries - which in turn translates to less money wasted by company even if some devs would be cheaper on monthly salaries.

softwaredoug 3y ago
A mid sized company doesn’t have experience directly hiring, but plenty of firms make it easy to employ a remote workforce as contractors.