> Also: I'd quite like to see what the distribution of carreer-levels is, when comparing Silicon Valley to non-Silicon Valley locations for these companies. I'd be willing to bet that non-Silicon Valley locations have predominantly more junior people, and that certain promotions are harder to get and will come with the necessity to move to the valley.

As a tech worker in Atlanta, I find that quite the opposite is true. People tend to career-(s)hop out in the valley and don't stay at the same company for long.

In Atlanta people tend to stay with the same company for years and grow their role and influence. As such, the SF headquarters tends to put its most important pieces in its remote offices.

I also think SF sees a lot of products spun up as promotion vehicles, whereas remote offices tend to think long term with long time horizons.