Why would your remote location with a lower cost of living(I'm assuming, at least for housing) mean you should make more?

The more remote the location, the higher the cost of non-housing things are. Shipping in groceries to Yellow Knife costs more than shipping groceries to Toronto, even though Toronto's housing prices are significantly more.

Generally people would rather live in a city, so companies offer higher pay and possibly other benefits like 2 weeks on/2 weeks off.

It's because you live in Canada. Canadian devs get paid a lot less. $80k/yr CAD is typical for a sr dev there. I moved down to the USA for the big raise.

Was it worth it with the huge increase in cost of living?

I'm from BC, so it was actually a decrease in the cost of living. Seattle had cheaper consumer goods, cheaper gas, less taxes and cheaper housing. SF is a bit more expensive, but houses cost about the same as Vancouver while rent is higher.

Thank you for sharing, Mahyarm!

Vancouver is a bit of an anomaly with its low salaries and astronomical housing costs.

Unless Silicon Valley or NYC it is going to be cheaper to live. More take home pay after all expenses (including medical, mortgage).

I moved to a "remote" place in Canada from Chicago and took a significant pay cut. 5 yrs later I'm finally making about as much as I was when I left. And I'm still making an awesome living where I am.

And it was totally worth it given cost of living change & everything else. Salary isn't everything!

A lot of this is Silicon Valley. It probably translates to a lower standard of living than what you have.