NY and WA have a three hour time difference, so at least five hours of overlap in a work day. Employees in Europe or Asia would have bigger differences. But my

NY and WA have a three hour time difference, so at least five hours of overlap in a work day. Employees in Europe or Asia would have bigger differences. But my main point is that hiring people from another country does present a novel situation to many employers. Whether their concerns have any basis or solutions is beside the point. If someone has a fear of flying you can't make them feel better with facts about safety. Plenty of employers believe foreign employees, or American employees working from abroad, create complicated tax and legal problems for the employer. Sometimes that's true, sometimes not, and usually they could find a solution if sufficiently motivated. But even so it's a lot to ask an employer, to create a special case or do the research, when they think they can just as easily get someone without those possible problems. Ask your employer to pay you through PayPal or in Bitcoin and you'll see what I mean -- it's not a matter of possibility or legality, just that you create a bureaucratic exception that someone has to handle. So based on some real, some imaginary, and mostly solvable problems that nonetheless look like risk, hassle, and exceptions to standard process, employers choose what looks like the easy and safe route.