But for some American born engineer who has family outside of SF/NY/LA, being able to work remote while staying near family/hometown would be awesome for himself, the hometown and ultimately residents of those mega cities too as they would see some relief in ever increasing cost of living.
Google/Facebook/etc have to pay a lot higher salary to keep talented engineers in/near SF because of much higher cost of living.
Those employers probably COULD save $ if they paid lower salary and allowed full remote working. Even if they flew in the engineers on chartered jet every other week and housed them in hotel for regular face-2-face time in HQ, they still probably would end up saving $ in the end. Like instead of paying salary of half a million a year, they could pay $300,000 and use the $200,000 for chartered jets and housing when they are visiting SF.
Cost of living is a small fraction compared to the bay area or west coast cities too.
No, it doesn't. It's hot. And the people are conservative; nothing nice about that.
Granted it is going to have less tech jobs, but it isn't really the middle of nowhere.
The comments coming out people who very likely are Bay Area residents are the most ignorant as well as close-minded. Unless you are killing it in R&D departments of Google, FB, Amazon, Microsoft etc. There is some one doing a similar job you are doing in 10 other metros in 'Murica.
disclaimer: detroit resident
Basically, AFAICT, Detroit sounds like someplace that would be OK if all you wanted was to live in the suburbs and never leave your house, and you have zero interest in outdoor activities, and don't care about going to nice restaurants downtown. The crime downtown is terrible, there's huge stretches of abandoned neighborhoods, the winters are horribly cold; I honestly don't know why anyone would want to live there. The location surely made sense a century ago back when shipping on the Great Lakes was a big thing and the location was sensible for manufacturing and shipping reasons, but those reasons are all gone now.
Moreover, why the hell should I believe some anonymous troll on HN over plenty of journalistic articles?
The Internet so that you can work remotely, and a easy to use airport when you can't work remotely.
I've never been to Cleveland, Ohio, but most of these flyer states in America where housing is cheap are boring. Add to that the chicken-and-egg problem, you're going to have a tough time convincing young single people to move there.
Only practical solution to avoid high cost of living is to embrace remote work and give employees the freedom to work from wherever they want.
The weather is what keeps me in the SF Bay Area despite the traffic congestion and high cost of living. Being able to bike to work nearly every day of the year goes a long way toward making up for heavy traffic.
While the PNW isnt ideal compared to drought ridden california, its vastly nicer weather than what millions of americans put up with every year.
Biking in sub-freezing weather and snow is entirely different.
Does Cleveland even have any bike lanes?
Interesting how you call people who seek practical, comfortable weather "trend seekers", and you seem to think that enduring brutal winters is normal.
Also, the weather is noticeably nicer, plus you're in a city with an international airport hub.
>pays an extra $30,000 a year to live near SFO
>saves $50 on a flight to Asia once a year
rationale checks out
I grew up in a small town far from any airport and traveled internationally regularly. We either drove 50 miles to a small regional airport, which meant we'd have layovers and connections flying almost anywhere (more chances for lost luggage!), or we drove three+ hours to a big airport with expensive parking. Landing after a long international flight and having to get in the car and drive for three hours is a terrible way to end a trip.
These days I live within a 30 minute cab ride of LGA or JFK. The availability of flights and the ease of getting to and from the airport makes a huge difference in how annoying it is to fly. Cheap early morning flights don't require pulling an all nighter, there are direct flights to so many cities, and the wheels-down-to-hot-shower-and-beer-at-home time is so short.
Now I see why my parents like living in Albany!
1. top tech talent in austin is rare and they know they are rare 2. because of (1) they can always work remotely for big valley companies (e.g., the top ten by average eng salary) 3. so if they are working locally, you are mostly going to give the top guys valley-like comp 4. the rest of the talent is cheaper
... which doesn't sound too bad, as far as it goes. But then you run into an issue. There's going to be some specific skill that you need and you simply are not going to be able to hire it locally. So now you're in the position of hiring a remote worker or trying to get someone to move. Depending on your team, your product, team communications skills, how important in-person vs. remote is, etc. to the company, real or imagined, this can basically screw things up.
Such as?
Startups and tech companies should pick a few midwestern or NE cities and open offices there.
Imagine if Cleveland Ohio was a tech hub and "cool" by any vague stretch that a western city is, housing there is practically free by west coast standards.
https://www.zillow.com/homes/cleveland-ohio_rb/
Even cities like Albany or Rochester NY are dirt cheap compared to any city in a western state.
https://www.zillow.com/albany-ny/
But instead everyone piles into San Francisco, bay area, Seattle, Portland, LA, and overpays by small fortunes.