[notacoward]

Don't move the goalposts or shift the burden. You said have to. Now you say most and demand that others prove the contrary. Please stick to your original claim and prove it yourself. That's how honest discussion is done.

The real question here is not whether developers can get the exact same salary working somewhere other than SF/SV. For one thing, the story wasn't just about our industry. The original story posited three possible causes for between-firm inequality. Before we obsess over the winner-take-all factor and how it relates to being or not being in the Center Of The Universe (ha), we need to consider how those other two factors play out across the entire economy.

Even among tech companies, subject to the exact same cost-of-living issues, there are significant differences in pay scales. Believe me, I know, because I'm taking advantage of that right now as I transition between jobs. The richer companies are very successfully capturing a disproportionate share of the high-end labor market, either by direct hiring or by acquisition. That enables them to compound their original advantage, in a feedback loop that IMO must be attenuated unless we want to live in a true monoculture. The idea that developers must move to high-cost areas is crap, but the problem of developers going to work (often remotely) for the richest companies is very real.

[AnthonyMouse]

> You said have to.

It's a fact that they do. If they didn't have to then why would they leave the money on the table?

> Now you say most and demand that others prove the contrary.

It's most because if most of the developers in silicon valley moved to other places then the cost of living there would fall to parity with the other places as a result of decreased scarcity of housing and other resources, before all of them did. And because not everyone has the same utility function -- some people have to live there more than other people, e.g. because their spouse also works there and they can't find two equally-paying jobs in the same other city at the same time.

> Please stick to your original claim and prove it yourself. That's how honest discussion is done.

"People behave rationally" is a basic assumption. It isn't always true, but if you're going to contend that it isn't in a particular case then you're the one who needs to show that.

> The real question here is not whether developers can get the exact same salary working somewhere other than SF/SV. For one thing, the story wasn't just about our industry.

You're changing the subject. The story, and the protests, refer to "highly paid" tech workers at SV companies like Google and Apple. But it remains true that those people are not significantly wealthier on a PPP basis than people making median US wages but living in a city with a lower cost of living.

> Even among tech companies, subject to the exact same cost-of-living issues, there are significant differences in pay scales.

Better developers obviously get paid more than worse developers. But the same is true in Texas. They both get paid less and pay less for housing but the better developer still makes more than the worse developer. And that isn't new either -- "better talent costs more" is as old as money.

> That enables them to compound their original advantage, in a feedback loop that IMO must be attenuated unless we want to live in a true monoculture.

There are two kinds of markets. One is natural monopolies, like local roads or last mile telecommunications, where the fixed cost is the essentially whole cost, barriers to entry are high, monopoly is inevitable, and they should be operated by the local government. The other is "real" markets that, left alone, would have competition.

We keep screwing up the second ones and forcing them into monopolies anyway, by making it harder for small entities to compete. The situation with software patents is a prime example.

Having money to pay talent is an advantage, but it isn't an insurmountable advantage. The only way to use it to stay on top is to be efficient. Serve every possible niche so well that nobody else can come in and carve one out for themselves. And if a company is doing that, nobody objects.

The problem isn't that, it's that we've set things up so that little companies have prohibitively high costs, so a startup that should be five people in a garage using money borrowed from parents instead has to take a million dollars in VC funding to hire lawyers and file paperwork. And then, if they succeed, megacorp shows up with a buyout against the threat of a lawsuit if you refuse to take the money to make the competition go away, which is what the VCs wanted all along anyway, so everybody gets paid but nobody competes.

The problem isn't that they have too much money, it's that they have too much leverage. If was only the money and regulatory barriers to entry were lower then there would be too many startups to buy them all and more of them would become independent competitors.

[notacoward]

> But it remains true that those people are not significantly wealthier on a PPP basis than people making median US wages but living in a city with a lower cost of living.

No, it remains your unfounded - and untrue - assertion. A lot of people have salaries very close to those in Silicon Valley, in housing markets significantly cheaper than Silicon Valley. Haven't you heard of remote work? A lot of us at the high end are able to do it, but maybe you haven't reached that point yourself. For people like me and quite a few of my friends/colleagues, we're winning the PPP game by not living in SV.

> Better developers obviously get paid more than worse developers.

Now who's changing the subject? We're not talking about better or worse developers. We're talking about developers at the same level, often the same people as they move from job to job. Rich companies can and do pay higher salaries regardless of the worker's location. That creates a feedback loop, distorting both labor and capital markets, turning temporary advantages into permanent ones and stifling competition.

I've worked at a lot of startups, and learned a lot about their advantages and disadvantages relative to larger competitors. Over-regulation was never one of those problems, and nobody responsible for setting strategy was ever so ideologically blind that they tried to pretend otherwise. I'm guessing that's not a recipe for startup success, in Silicon Valley or anywhere else.

[AnthonyMouse]

> No, it remains your unfounded - and untrue - assertion.

Which part do you assert is untrue, that there are developers actually living in SV, or that making more money there is equivalent to making less money somewhere with a lower cost of living?

> A lot of people have salaries very close to those in Silicon Valley, in housing markets significantly cheaper than Silicon Valley. Haven't you heard of remote work?

Everybody wants remote work at SV salaries. That doesn't mean everybody can get it.

It's obviously true tautologically that people who don't live in SV don't have to live there, but those are also not the people bidding up area rents or riding a shuttle with people protesting outside it.

You still haven't offered any explanation for why the people living in SV continue to do so if it was actually possible for them to do the same thing you're doing.

> We're not talking about better or worse developers. We're talking about developers at the same level, often the same people as they move from job to job.

We are talking about better or worse developers, or what is your argument? When one person goes from making less money to more money, all it shows is that they were previously under-compensated (or are now over-compensated) for their skill level. Or that their skill level has changed. If big companies were paying higher salaries to the same developers then how would that create any advantage for them?

> Rich companies can and do pay higher salaries regardless of the worker's location. That creates a feedback loop, distorting both labor and capital markets, turning temporary advantages into permanent ones and stifling competition.

Rich tech companies don't have a monopoly on capital. If all it took is to pay developers a lot of money then it would be Wall St rather than tech companies doing the paying and collecting the yields.

> I've worked at a lot of startups, and learned a lot about their advantages and disadvantages relative to larger competitors. Over-regulation was never one of those problems, and nobody responsible for setting strategy was ever so ideologically blind that they tried to pretend otherwise.

Over-regulation isn't a problem for the startups that actually exist -- VCs don't fund the ones the regulations make prohibitive and provide the money to pay the cost for the others. But the result is fewer startups, so rich companies can afford to buy every one of them that poses a threat to them.

Let me give an example of bad regulation. DMCA 1201 (or software patents, or the CFAA, or whatever they use this year), which Apple et al use to lock smaller entities out of their platforms unless they pay 30% and just outright prohibit people from making apps they don't like. Are you taking the position that that sort of a veto doesn't prevent startups that would otherwise compete with Apple's apps from getting off the ground?

[notacoward]

> Which part do you assert is untrue,

Neither of your strawmen. I am not making my own assertion at all. I am challenging your assertion that maintaining a high standard of living requires moving to the Center Of The Universe for all or nearly all developers. You seem to base this assertion on a premise that the difference in salaries outweighs the difference in cost of living, but have provided no evidence to support that. I know it's not true for me, but at least I don't assume that my experience is universal.

> Everybody wants remote work at SV salaries. That doesn't mean everybody can get it.

True. You have to be pretty good at what you do.

> We are talking about better or worse developers, or what is your argument?

Again, it's not my argument. It's yours, and it's ridiculous. It's only about good vs. bad developers if one assumes that a good developer lives in Silicon Valley and a bad developer is one who lives anywhere else. If one accepts that there are good and bad developers everywhere, or that some people measure value differently than you do, then it makes absolutely no sense.

> If big companies were paying higher salaries to the same developers then how would that create any advantage for them?

Have you heard abou this little thing called network effects? The theory is that, by bringing good developers together, synergy creates value that doesn't exist with them separate. It's an idea I could argue from either side, but the important thing is that it doesn't require physical proximity to work. It can be well worth paying a premium to bring good developers into logical or virtual proximity with one another, and the big rich companies are taking advantage of that.

> Rich tech companies don't have a monopoly on capital. If all it took is to pay developers a lot of money then it would be Wall St rather than tech companies doing the paying and collecting the yields.

It doesn't require a monopoly. All it requires is a significant asymmetry. Also, Wall Street very much has been playing this game too, with effects and remedies that would be just as worthy of debate if we could get past the facile attempts to deny the reality of it happening.

[AnthonyMouse]

> Neither of your strawmen. I am not making my own assertion at all. I am challenging your assertion that maintaining a high standard of living requires moving to the Center Of The Universe for all or nearly all developers.

You seem to be challenging your own straw man.

> You seem to base this assertion on a premise that the difference in salaries outweighs the difference in cost of living, but have provided no evidence to support that.

The evidence is all of the developers who choose to live and work in SV despite the high cost of living.

> I know it's not true for me, but at least I don't assume that my experience is universal.

That is the straw man -- I never claimed it was universal. It's true of the people who live there, or why do they?

> True. You have to be pretty good at what you do.

That doesn't seem to have much to do with it. Plenty of call center workers are allowed (or required) to work from home, because it saves the company from having to pay for office space for them, but that doesn't make them particularly highly skilled or highly paid.

> Again, it's not my argument. It's yours, and it's ridiculous.

Here's you from before:

> Rich companies can and do pay higher salaries regardless of the worker's location. That creates a feedback loop, distorting both labor and capital markets, turning temporary advantages into permanent ones and stifling competition.

If the higher salaries aren't paying for better work then how do the companies get any advantage out of it?

> Have you heard abou this little thing called network effects? The theory is that, by bringing good developers together, synergy creates value that doesn't exist with them separate.

That isn't what "network effects" means.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect

"Big" isn't an advantage here. It means bureaucracy and politics and Mythical Man Month problems. These companies succeed despite these things, not because of them.

> It can be well worth paying a premium to bring good developers into logical or virtual proximity with one another, and the big rich companies are taking advantage of that.

What do you suppose is stopping the same people from coming together on their own and just keeping the money their work generates?

> It doesn't require a monopoly. All it requires is a significant asymmetry.

Asymmetric capital? How is Apple's billion dollars better than any random capitalist's billion dollars?

> Also, Wall Street very much has been playing this game too, with effects and remedies that would be just as worthy of debate if we could get past the facile attempts to deny the reality of it happening.

What game? "Money makes money" has been the basis of Wall St since day zero. The method by which this doesn't lead to permanent massive consolidation of power is that new entities come into existence and displace old ones, but are owned by new people. The problem is the thwarting of that process by requiring the permission of incumbents to make new things.

[notacoward]

> The evidence is all of the developers who choose to live and work in SV despite the high cost of living.

...ignoring all those who do not make that choice. Nice cherry-picking.

> Plenty of call center workers are allowed (or required) to work from home

Changing the subject again. We were talking specifically about people who were making Silicon Valley salaries, not call center workers. You need leverage to do that. The fact that you don't even know anyone with that kind of leverage tells me that you don't even know what you're talking about, and your constant employment of sleazy rhetorical tactics tells me that you're not even trying to learn.

> That isn't what "network effects" means.

OK, so it's not exactly network effects, but it's still synergy. Two good people together can often do things that neither could do alone. You got the point, so stop being obnoxious about terms.

> "Big" isn't an advantage here. It means bureaucracy and politics and Mythical Man Month problems.

Such a jaundiced view at such a young age. At least I assume you're young, based on not being senior enough to negotiate - or know anyone else who negotiates - better working conditions. Better than assuming you're old but barely competent. In any case yes, bigger companies can have their problems. So can smaller ones. They can each have their advantages. For example, at a startup there will inevitably be some specialized areas of knowledge where coverage is thin. That can be great for creating opportunities to learn, but not for solving an immediate problem in minimal time. At a larger company, especially a larger rich company which is what we're talking about, there might well be a world-class expert on staff for even the most obscure specialty. There might be specialized hardware (or teams to develop it), partner relationships, etc. Big companies can be mismanaged and small companies can be mismanaged. That's why nine out of ten startups fail. Counting only the hits for one side and only the misses for the other is not how rational people approach a problem, or how honest people discuss one.

> What do you suppose is stopping the same people from coming together on their own and just keeping the money their work generates?

There could be many reasons, from simple risk aversion to lack of skill (or interest) in the non-technical aspects of running a business to the need for leads and contacts. You do realize that most people don't work for startups, right? There's a whole world outside that bubble.

> How is Apple's billion dollars better than any random capitalist's billion dollars?

Wrong question. What matters is how Apple's budget for technical hires compares to others' budgets for hiring in those same specialties. That's where the competition occurs. The VC money, fragmented across many companies pulling in many directions and each having to carry their own business infrastructure, would have to be much more than a single focused company's investment in that area of overlap. One of the big five can spend a million dollars each for a dozen hires in a particular area. A startup would be hard pressed to justify that to their investors, precisely because those investors would rather have that money to make other bets entirely. It's a bit of a collective action problem, which I would have thought anyone spouting so much pseudo-economics would know about.