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Let People Move to Jobs

jefftk.com

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Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#241

Post by esotericn »

topkai22 wrote: post #231
esotericn wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, and all of those guys are skint and you're not. It works to an extent. Perhaps you don't see the problem because you're theorizing about it rather than having lived experience. As I think most people do. Imagine that essentially everyone you meet in your age group is far poorer than you are. Not most people but everyone. You need some sort of 'app' to find people to speak to who are on your level. Your specific…

As someone who has actually managed to work remotely in a small city while employed by a major tech firm at normal pay rates, I can definitely say your scenario does not match my lived experience. 1) unless you move to a very small town, there are still plenty of people in your economic demographic. In the US, roughly 5% of households earn more than $200k. In a town of 70k, you’d expect there to be roughly 27k househ…

> not being able to socialize with the middle class sounds bizarre.

These are your words, not mine!

If you're working remotely as a software developer then you're pretty much middle class by definition.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#242

Post by esotericn »

clktmr wrote: post #240
esotericn wrote: post #153

The whole idea of remote working to arbitrage cost of living falls apart if you are in any way social. I think that a lot of people banging on about remote work just haven't tried it for an extended period. It works for some, and for those - great. To me, it's just another step down the 'technification' of everything in which people don't speak to the people around them (because they've been 'removed' from their live…

So much wrong with this comment: Remote work doesn't mean home office. You can rent part of a shared office and still have colleagues for lunch. You don't need to move to a place where you will be 'the rich guy'. It's your choice. Even with your big tech salary you won't be better off than the local business owners in a place with around 20k inhabitants.

> Even with your big tech salary you won't be better off than the local business owners

Exactly! But you're not a local business owner.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#243

Post by LockAndLol »

> A major factor is that current employees don't want to move. If Google announced it was moving everything to Pittsburgh, ~80% of the company would quit. People put down roots and get attached to areas, generally more so than to jobs.

That's the wrong argument to make. It's not about moving somewhere, but deciding to build a new center somewhere else (in this case Pittsburgh).

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#244

Post by jefftk »

cheese4242 wrote: post #202
chiph wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All it would take is the teller at the local bank telling her BFF that you're one of the richest people in the county (which she shouldn't, but she did), and suddenly you're being hit up by every hard-luck case for miles around. You'd be their lottery winner next door. edit Not to mention the target of every drug user and petty criminal.

This is a cartoon-like scenario you have cooked up. You really think random people are going to be contacting you for money because of your mid-rate tech salary? Absolutely hilarious.

I think this depends a lot on whether your hometown is in rural Iowa or rural India. Some people here come from very poor areas, where $300k can be 100x what others are making instead of 10x.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#245

Post by dredmorbius »

sgt101 wrote: post #93
dredmorbius wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Carpentry?

Socialism.

That would be an economic or market structure, and may be a possible solution. I'm looking at LVT and land use regulation myself.

My initial quip was to point out that (as I suspect @anonymoushn was alluding) the problem isn't technological. Rather it's one of incentives, politics, and market structure.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#246

Post by esotericn »

ninkendo wrote: post #228
esotericn wrote: post #153

The whole idea of remote working to arbitrage cost of living falls apart if you are in any way social. I think that a lot of people banging on about remote work just haven't tried it for an extended period. It works for some, and for those - great. To me, it's just another step down the 'technification' of everything in which people don't speak to the people around them (because they've been 'removed' from their live…

I think you’re using extremes to support your argument, but it falls apart when the “arbitrage” is even slightly less immense. I moved from the Bay Area where my 1300sqft rental house would have cost me $1.2M, to work remote from a high-income community in Michigan where my 5000sqft house cost me $700k. My neighbors are not poor, the schools are great, people are in a wide variety of professional and educational back…

Completely agree with you here. I think I should have been more clear in the original post as a whole bunch of commenters seem to be talking about situations in which you _could_ have got a local job, it'd just be a bit less well paid.

I'm talking about working remotely to escape a locally depressed job market which is very different (because in that situation you are relatively unique).

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#247

Post by jefftk »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #173
icebraining wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that implies we should centralize in cities, so people don't have to move if they lose their jobs. Getting a few companies to a small town just means that when one fails, workers are more likely to have to move at a later stage in life, when they already have kids and a mortgage and such. Better for them to move to a hub when they're young. Plus their children will already be born in a hub, so they won't have to…

I agree with what you said but how many people can afford to have families in hubs like you assume?

(author)

The main reason it's expensive is because supply restrictions have pushed housing far above the cost of construction. We could fix this by allowing more construction, which is what I'm arguing for in the post.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#248

Post by jefftk »

sien wrote: post #52
duxup wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would be great for Googlers ... kinda horrible for locals in KC who would still be making the same amount, and housing costs skyrocket.... funding sudden needed school expansions ... and so on... The economic and political messes of sudden expansion can be an absolute mess.

Google has heaps of offices around the world : https://about.google/locations/?region=asia-pacific&office=s... Does anyone know what proportion of their workforce is not in California? A question to Googlers and those who have worked there, is it possible to move to say Boulder within Google easily?

> Does anyone know what proportion of their workforce is not in California?

I think it's about half.

> is it possible to move to say Boulder within Google easily?

Reasonably. You need to find a team at the other office that has openings for someone with your skills, but I know many people who have done it (Mountain View -> Cambridge, NYC -> Seattle, Cambridge -> Pittsburgh, Mountain View -> Boulder among others).

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#249

Post by pb7 »

clktmr wrote: post #240
esotericn wrote: post #153

The whole idea of remote working to arbitrage cost of living falls apart if you are in any way social. I think that a lot of people banging on about remote work just haven't tried it for an extended period. It works for some, and for those - great. To me, it's just another step down the 'technification' of everything in which people don't speak to the people around them (because they've been 'removed' from their live…

So much wrong with this comment: Remote work doesn't mean home office. You can rent part of a shared office and still have colleagues for lunch. You don't need to move to a place where you will be 'the rich guy'. It's your choice. Even with your big tech salary you won't be better off than the local business owners in a place with around 20k inhabitants.

How much do you local business owners profit on average?

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#250

Post by jefftk »

anonymoushn wrote: post #121
B-Con wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're qualified to work for a team that's hiring, transfers are pretty easy. I work for GOOG outside CA and know a lot of coworkers who transferred teams within the company from out of state. Lateral mobility is something of a perk.

You have to make sure to join in the bay area though. Offers in my local office are typically for 1/11 the initial equity of offers for the same level in Mountain View, San Francisco, or Sunnyvale, and I was not permitted to speak to any hiring managers in the US after seeing a four-day exploding offer from my local office.

I'm surprised you received an exploding offer; I had thought that was something we didn't do?

Pay depends enormously on the local market for your skills. NYC and Boston pay almost as much as Mountain View, while (ex) London pays much less. People moving between offices are often offered large increases/decreases. A strategy of joining in Mountain View and then transferring to a lower-paying office isn't generally going to give you much higher pay at the new office (though you'll of course have the money you put away while in Mountain View).

(Speaking only for myself)

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