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Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

economist.com

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Re: Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

#31

Post by spaetzleesser »

EMM_386 wrote: post #19

Everyone should keep in mind that water seeks its own level. And think of this on a global scale. I've been working remotely for almost a decade as a senior software engineer. Now, post-Covid, almost everyone realizes they can do the same. Salaries are going to drop in the "rich world", and it's not just because people are now fleeing places like SF/SV to lower cost of living areas. We are also beginning to compete g…

I think time zones and tax laws may slow this a little. I find it a real pain to work with people whose time zones are 10 hours away from the company timezone. When things need to get done quickly or a problem can only be resolved by talking directly somebody has to work late in the evening or night. I guess the companies don't care but it's very hard for the workers in the long term.

In my company it's also very difficult to hire a full time employee in another country due to all kinds of regulations and the overhead they entail.

My prediction is that in the long run a lot of companies will still prefer people who are close. Managing remote people effectively is very difficult. A lot of managers will fail doing so. And a lot of people are also not cut out for remote work and need interaction at the office.

I remember when offshoring became popular in the 90s it looked all work would go to India but this didn't happen either.

Re: Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

#32

Post by EMM_386 »

icelancer wrote: post #24
EMM_386 wrote: post #19

Everyone should keep in mind that water seeks its own level. And think of this on a global scale. I've been working remotely for almost a decade as a senior software engineer. Now, post-Covid, almost everyone realizes they can do the same. Salaries are going to drop in the "rich world", and it's not just because people are now fleeing places like SF/SV to lower cost of living areas. We are also beginning to compete g…

>> We are also beginning to compete globally, far more than ever before with the ease of remote work. Qualified engineers can be found for 1/10th of the price with "near shore" companies in the "rich world". Yep. I've said it many times here and basically anywhere I can: Clamoring for remote-only work, maximum-introvert, never fly somewhere, don't value in-person communication/meetings/etc is a dangerous game to be p…

> Yep. I've said it many times here and basically anywhere I can: Clamoring for remote-only work, maximum-introvert, never fly somewhere, don't value in-person communication/meetings/etc is a dangerous game to be playing.

What's interesting is that I flew in for a meeting with my company recently, the first I've had since I've been hired.

This took hours upon hours of my time. Time I could have spent working.

We spent it between a conference room and at restaurants, and much of the time was spent discussing things with the larger team that were not relevant to me. So I spent that time on my laptop fixing bugs, in the conference room.

There was zero benefit to any of this outside of a solid handshake and getting to "meet people in person".

However, I have 3 meetings a week with the entire team on HD video, so I already knew exactly who I was meeting and what their mannerisms and personalities were.

That included walking through an office where people jumped out of the cubicles and offices when they saw me and said "hey! Great to finally see you in person!" without a second thought. They knew exactly who I was without having ever met me.

Is this really necessary? This was a huge waste of company money that I could have spent working.

Re: Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

#33

Post by spaetzleesser »

fartcannon wrote: post #25
EMM_386 wrote: post #19

Everyone should keep in mind that water seeks its own level. And think of this on a global scale. I've been working remotely for almost a decade as a senior software engineer. Now, post-Covid, almost everyone realizes they can do the same. Salaries are going to drop in the "rich world", and it's not just because people are now fleeing places like SF/SV to lower cost of living areas. We are also beginning to compete g…

Same for tech giants. No need to rent an office to compete anymore. Global small teams can form overnight, grow and shrink dynamically. Entrepreneurs paradise.

"Global small teams can form overnight, grow and shrink dynamically. "

This is freakishly hard to manage effectively. Sounds good in theory but most will fail trying.

Re: Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

#34

Post by MisterBastahrd »

EMM_386 wrote: post #19

Everyone should keep in mind that water seeks its own level. And think of this on a global scale. I've been working remotely for almost a decade as a senior software engineer. Now, post-Covid, almost everyone realizes they can do the same. Salaries are going to drop in the "rich world", and it's not just because people are now fleeing places like SF/SV to lower cost of living areas. We are also beginning to compete g…

Probably not.

Communication is still a gigantic issue to overcome. So is managing teams and availability during the work day.

If anything, it might push more really smart people to start their own companies instead of working for someone else to achieve a lesser level of prosperity.

Re: Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

#35

Post by spaetzleesser »

taf2 wrote: post #10
throwaway894345 wrote: post #4

I wonder if the inconvenience posed to corporate America by shitty consumer ISPs will force the latter to improve.

I think it’s not just shitty ISPs it’s also pretty bad corporate VPN or “security” features that really just break the internet for home working people… we encounter one network that is like a proxy of sorts… it times out all connections after like 4 minutes- a really shitty feature for voice applications

I definitely noticed that during COVID my company's IT department has upped its game a lot.

Re: Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

#36

Post by notadoc »

Now the developed world will compete with the developing world to lower wages in the developed world. The high salaries and perks for many USA tech jobs may not last much longer.

No need for companies to pay more for premium locations / perk offices.

No need for companies to deal with the hassle of H1B visas.

From a company perspective, why pay someone in the USA $165k/year to work from home in Trendyville when an Indian engineer is $35k/year in Bangalore?

Re: Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

#37

Post by hogFeast »

closeparen wrote: post #22
ramesh31 wrote: post #8

Just got approved for permanate remote last week. The thought of going back to a multi-hour commute and having my physical location dictated by a job just sounds absurd at this point. Never again.

Multi hour commute is, truly, insane. But that’s more a comment about our collective housing and transportation choices than something inherent to showing up at work.

Most cities used to have all the industry located in the centre. It led to huge slums (because there was insufficient supply and massive demand) and everyone leaving the city when the slums got cleared.

Even if you have great transportation (Tokyo, London, New York), the commute is still pretty brutal.

The only real "solution" that was ever presented to this problem was to create smaller garden cities that would have their own industries...this never worked out because everyone had to be in the city (perhaps coincident with more service-based economies, manufacturing did move out of big cities).

It is an extremely hard problem (and to be blunt, the solution of most planners has been: make me emperor, I will allocate the resources...it is a huge political/social/everything problem) but remote working is a very legitimate solution...although the response of any company towards better conditions for workers is always suspicion (if the workers are happier, don't we lose...somehow?).

(An extremely nerdy comparison is with proto-industry in the early stages of the Industrial Revolution...a lot of the intermediate production in textiles was done in homes by, what we would call today, independent contractors...as the capital intensity of the textile industry increased and new technology was developed so...to put it bluntly...that you could employ children to do the work then you saw industry move into city centres and slums appear. But before this time, you had people working in their own homes and on their own machines, and it was far more decentralised...although these people were often localised geographically as there was a whole supply chain. Definitely indicates that things don't really need to be the way they are.)

Re: Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

#38

Post by mberning »

version_five wrote: post #2

This is really about "at home first" work rather than remote work. The prevailing model seems to be "don't come to the office unless we want you there" as opposed to "work from anywhere". I understand the reasons for why companies want you at home but local rather than remote, just saying it's very different that real remote working.

I just spoke to somebody today and their strategy is to hire within a geographic region. Everybody will be default remote but they will be getting the team together 4-6 times a year on site for planning and social stuff. I could see this being the strategy for a lot of small and mid size companies.

Re: Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

#39

Post by notadoc »

EMM_386 wrote: post #19

Everyone should keep in mind that water seeks its own level. And think of this on a global scale. I've been working remotely for almost a decade as a senior software engineer. Now, post-Covid, almost everyone realizes they can do the same. Salaries are going to drop in the "rich world", and it's not just because people are now fleeing places like SF/SV to lower cost of living areas. We are also beginning to compete g…

Yes, people who don't see this coming are in for a potentially rude awakening.

The US tech worker is about to get NAFTA'd.

Re: Remote-first work is taking over the rich world – research hints at why

#40

Post by jodrellblank »

icelancer wrote: post #24
EMM_386 wrote: post #19

Everyone should keep in mind that water seeks its own level. And think of this on a global scale. I've been working remotely for almost a decade as a senior software engineer. Now, post-Covid, almost everyone realizes they can do the same. Salaries are going to drop in the "rich world", and it's not just because people are now fleeing places like SF/SV to lower cost of living areas. We are also beginning to compete g…

>> We are also beginning to compete globally, far more than ever before with the ease of remote work. Qualified engineers can be found for 1/10th of the price with "near shore" companies in the "rich world". Yep. I've said it many times here and basically anywhere I can: Clamoring for remote-only work, maximum-introvert, never fly somewhere, don't value in-person communication/meetings/etc is a dangerous game to be p…

> "[0] Huge salaries to them being a high-five figure salary."

CheckSalary.co.uk puts the average salary for "a programmer" in the UK at £43K, Reed.co.uk says £41k, Glassdoor says £35K, Payscale says £31K... maybe devs here should upskill in English?

https://www.glassdoor.co.uk/Salaries/programmer-salary-SRCH_...

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