Spotify is letting employees work from anywhere while paying SF and NY salaries
I find it absurd that wealthy Tech people are making decisions on where to live based on the financial value proposition.<p>People in Tech are rich enough to comfortably live anywhere. Surely, the lifestyle and character of a town/city/country plays a much larger role in where you choose to stay. Life in cheaper cities in the interior is very different from that in massive cities like SF/NY/London/etc. No amount of money can fix life in the wrong location.<p>On HN, the Remote vs Local argument often ignores critical advantages of a local setup. Over 1 year of remote work, I haven't been able to replicate the magic of physical work a single time. This is while having an social workplace that has really tried to make people feel included.<p>This may sound like heresy to some but, if I am going to be spending 50% of my waking time with a dozen people, then I would want to be good friends with them, and remote work certainly doesn't make that easy.<p>____________<p>I also don't buy the flexibility argument of remote work. It requires a lot of discipline and deliberate action. All of my acquaintances (all single, wealthy and in tech) have increased their working hours during Covid, due to unclear expectations around remote work. None have used this freedom to travel or fulfill their 'live in a cabin' or 'digital nomad' dreams. (ofc, it is challenging to fulfill these during covid).<p>Now let be clear. I love the idea of companies letting their employees choose what's best from themselves. But, there is a feeling in the air that remote work will be the norm for effective teams after Covid. I have feeling these people will be in for a rude awakening.<p>Offices are most effectively leveraged by the 90-99th. Those who are doing productive work that needs focus, but not deliberately effective enough to make in the '1' Percentile. (don't read too strongly into the numbers). The structures lent by the office are most useful to these people. Those who are smart enough to use structures to improve, but not smart enough  to not need them at all. The bottom 0-90 percentile are often in jobs that 'require' a physical presence (chefs) or ones that are mundane enough to be done from any location. (excel table filling)