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Let People Move to Jobs

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Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#291

Post by systematical »

cowsandmilk wrote: post #217
humanrebar wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That just proves that there's a certain class of rich people (diplomats? lawyers?) that have plenty of work in the D.C. area and they've carved some neighborhoods out for themselves. It doesn't prove anything about what life for a DBA in D.C. would be like.

Glassdoor shows the pay for DBAs in the DC area are above the national average. For software developers, the median salaries are below those in SF and Seattle, but if you are a FAANG level engineer, Amazon’s pay scale in NOVA is identical to Seattle and Facebook pays similarly. > carved some neighborhoods out for themselves This is an effort to imply that the suburbs of DC with high median salaries are small enclaves…

COL eats it away, the extra salary is not worth it. I'm sure its the same for SF, NYC, and other similar cities.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#292

Post by 0x445442 »

scottLobster wrote: post #234
0x445442 wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but FAANG companies would have to fundamentally rethink the kind of person they'd like to hire if they want to move out of affluent Urban cores. And yet Apple seemed to have figured out this type of problem quite nicely during the 80's and 90's when they moved their manufacturing from places like Carleton TX, Elk Grove CA and Fountain CO to places like Singapore and Ireland.

Once again, manufacturing. Not design. You can teach anyone with a high school education (even less, see 3rd world factories) how to solder or how to operate machinery efficiently. VLSI, circuit design, operating system development, FPGAs, even app development requires years of specialized training just to be competent at the fundamentals, usually taking the form of a degree. So if you want to hire designers with min…

So I guess you don't buy into "just learn to code"?

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#293

Post by brnt »

pasabagi wrote: post #277
esotericn wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not talking about some sort of scorecard but the fact that a lot of these low CoL areas have crushing poverty. If you want to be the one-eyed man amongst the blind, go for it, but not everyone wants that. Socioeconomic groupings exist in the metro areas too. Senior management hanging out with the workers is relatively rare. Because it's just a pain in the arse to guard yourself in every conversation and not seem…

I don't get it. I have lots of money. I've never had any feeling I had to 'guard' myself in any conversation with people from literally any social demographic. I mean, unless you're some kind of oddball, all you're using money for is buying nicer food, more space, and more time. So nobody's going to get upset because you're eating loads of avocados, even if it did come up in conversation.

He was not talking about you specifically.

If you have never experienced or observed stratification, then you may simply not get around much (in terms of social circles). It's not that strange, I cannot afford it either, I just made some chance acquintances, mostly through my socially far more capabele partner.

Class had become the most useful criterion to distinguish groups to me. It's not about guarding oneself explicitly, or avoiding interaction, but more in happening to frequent different kinds of sports/events, having different types of interest and being able to afford those types of hobbies. You won't see a working class person drive up to the club in his jaguar old timer for a game of golf and going for a Michelin star afterwards with friends, talking over a new investment opportunity. You see what I mean?

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#294

Post by pasabagi »

brnt wrote: post #293
pasabagi wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get it. I have lots of money. I've never had any feeling I had to 'guard' myself in any conversation with people from literally any social demographic. I mean, unless you're some kind of oddball, all you're using money for is buying nicer food, more space, and more time. So nobody's going to get upset because you're eating loads of avocados, even if it did come up in conversation.

He was not talking about you specifically. If you have never experienced or observed stratification, then you may simply not get around much (in terms of social circles). It's not that strange, I cannot afford it either, I just made some chance acquintances, mostly through my socially far more capabele partner. Class had become the most useful criterion to distinguish groups to me. It's not about guarding oneself exp…

I come from the UK, which is pretty strongly stratified in terms of class (to my knowledge, the most stratified, at least historically). My observation was that, as long as you're straightforward and pleasant, people from all backgrounds are unlikely to dislike you if you come from a 'higher' social class. They'll have lots of ideas about who you are or what you're like, but they are mostly positive.

People from richer social classes, on the other hand, typically either dislike poorer classes for a variety of more or less obvious prejudices, or they dislike them because they project their own antagonisms, and thus feel disliked, then become disliked because they act 'guarded'.

My general basis for friendship is common interests and interpersonal chemistry. I think if people assume they have no common interests with people from different backgrounds, or they sabotage interpersonal chemistry by acting guarded, then they're cheating themselves.

Michelin star food is generally not all that much better than other food, golf is no different to mini-golf (aside from being less eco-friendly and less fun), and a jaguar old timer is just a particularly unreliable, unsafe and low mile-per-gallon Honda. Personally, I don't have much in common with people who define themselves by their career success, whether that's shown by fancy sneakers, or fancy cars.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#295

Post by icebraining »

6c696e7578 wrote: post #237
balfirevic wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True for offshoring to (for example) India, but almost negligible for offshoring to many parts of Europe.

I suppose what I'm arguing for is keeping onshore, but allowing people to telecommute. They all speak the same language and understanding. The company doesn't lose anything, probably saves a great deal in real estate and building insurance.

Yeah, but why would they do that, if balfirevic is right (and I think he is)? Once everyone is telecommuting, the question becomes: do I want to pay a 50%-80% premium to get a native speaker, instead of someone who speaks it quite well and might have even worked previously in the UK?

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#296

Post by csomar »

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…

You seem to have no friends/family or attachment to a particular social circle; which makes the physical connections with your co-workers valuable. If you have a very active social circle, you won't probably care that much about joining your co-workers for an after-work.

The point of remote work is that you don't need to move to Silicon Valley to get a good job. And unless you are living in the middle of no-where, small communities still have very wealthy people who are probably wealthier than you'll ever become. Why didn't they move? Because they have roots there.

Living in relatively poor/clean community is and co-working is still a good thing. You can then afford to have a family, something most people don't and you'll be able to buy more services. Then, you are helping the locals out there and reducing inequality.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#297

Post by TheCoelacanth »

asaph wrote: post #238
topkai22 wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

> In the US, roughly 5% of households earn more than $200k. In a town of 70k, you’d expect there to be roughly 27k households and therefore 1300 households earning more than $200k. This assumes uniform distribution of household incomes across cities of different sizes, which I suspect is a shaky assumption. More likely, the high earning households are concentrated in a short list of major population centers.

Even small towns have a decent number of high earning people, mainly small business owners.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#298

Post by humanrebar »

systematical wrote: post #291
cowsandmilk wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Glassdoor shows the pay for DBAs in the DC area are above the national average. For software developers, the median salaries are below those in SF and Seattle, but if you are a FAANG level engineer, Amazon’s pay scale in NOVA is identical to Seattle and Facebook pays similarly. > carved some neighborhoods out for themselves This is an effort to imply that the suburbs of DC with high median salaries are small enclaves…

COL eats it away, the extra salary is not worth it. I'm sure its the same for SF, NYC, and other similar cities.

Outside of subsistence salaries, which are not sustainable long term through illness, emergency, and retirement, rate of growth of net worth is a better metric.

Point being, putting 2X thousand dollars a year in long term savings in NYC is a better financial choice than saving X thousand a year in Townsville but having a nicer neighborhood or something.

Not that the dichotomy works exactly that way, but adjusting gross salary of a senior software engineer by cost of living makes little sense since only part of her pay goes to cost of living.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#299

Post by tehjoker »

war1025 wrote: post #37
tehjoker wrote: post #27

Just... eliminate the private housing market. Unlike companies that produce things, there's zero value add by landlords and banks. Rents and mortgages far exceed the value of construction and allow the richest people to snap them up. Make it more fair, and cheaper by eliminating landlords and private sales of land. The land was all stolen anyway.

Value is absolutely added by both, and suggesting otherwise is pretty naive. Landlords take on the responsibility for long-term ownership and maintenance of a property and give people access to it on a shorter term basis that is much easier to get out of. Banks give access to money that you don't currently have with understanding that you will pay them back a premium over time for that service. If you "eliminated lan…

Have you considered that if people didn't pay rent or mortgages to the bank that it would be trivial for many people to self-finance repairs? Alternatively, we could make the government responsible for ones that individuals can't afford.

Re: Let People Move to Jobs

#300

Post by lonelappde »

NotSammyHagar wrote: post #287
pasabagi wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't get it. I have lots of money. I've never had any feeling I had to 'guard' myself in any conversation with people from literally any social demographic. I mean, unless you're some kind of oddball, all you're using money for is buying nicer food, more space, and more time. So nobody's going to get upset because you're eating loads of avocados, even if it did come up in conversation.

People hating avocado toast eating wealthy millennials is a real thing.

No, it's a fake thing created by corporate crony politicians to misdirect public attention away from their crimes.
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