But it's more hassle, and it would mean giving up your current friend network, may be a burden on your family, like if you have kids, or your spouse already has a good job. Someone already in London doesn't have to deal with that. Ergo, they have more leverage.
I get a small flatshare and do the Mon-Fri working thing. (Loads of people do this for on prem jobs because homes in London are small and/or pricey. You get the train in on Mon, stay till Fri, and go home to your big country house).
Then I stop doing the commute because it's a remote job and this is obviously silly.
Basically it seems like this whole thing rests on arbitrary rules set for no reason.
I can't figure out how working for GitLab in a northern English town would work at all and why anyone would apply when they could rent a postbox (or even an entire flat) in London and come out way ahead.
If the differences were a few grand it'd be different. It's more like half the money for living a couple hours north on a train.
I can just move to London.
Pay differences across visa barriers might make some sense. Within a country it's just odd.
It's effectively saying 'go and live in London, or we'll pay you less'.
The barrier of entry to 'live in London' is about 6k a year for a flat share. Way less than GitLab's pay differential.
(It's actually kind of funny that a hack would be to subsidise someone living in London, have that registered as your address, and live in a place with a lower cost of living in a nice house.)
Well, guess I'm never working at GitLab now. Oops. :P