[allday]

> Save on compensation due to hiring in lower cost regions

Pay people what they're worth regardless of where they live. If you have a developer in Nigeria or Ukraine or Vietnam that is as equally capable as a developer in the Bay Area, they should be paid the same.

Doing otherwise, at best, perpetuates Western hegemony, and at worst is simply racism.

[sushisource]

This is a bit ridiculous. It's not hegemony or racism. It's how markets work. People in those markets have fewer opportunities for highly paid employment. As a result, employers have more leverage in negotiations. It's as simple as that.

[jasonkester]

It's how markets work.

Markets work by paying for value created. I’ve tested extensively, and found that I’m equally capable of writing code on a beach in Thailand as in a felt cube in California.

I’ll grant that there is a Cost of Living difference between those places, but I would prefer that difference to be captured by me rather than somebody else’s company. It’s me doing the work and creating the value, so that seems reasonable. If you want to purchase my services, you get to pay my market rate. End of story.

Never drop your rate when working remote. That should probably be written in the article we’re discussing.

[Nimitz14]

> Markets work by paying for value created.

That is not completely true. Market pay also depends on demand and supply. When I was 19 I got 20 Euro an hour (tax free!) doing some CAD work not because of my skills (they were pathetic), but because a large project of a small company depended on some CAD work being done and he (the boss) couldn't find anyone to do it (part-time, for half a year only, very simple work on a shitty laptop were some reasons why I can imagine he had problems). As a test I was asked to draw a line and give it a specific colour in AutoCAD, that was it!

[AstralStorm]

Unfortunately, you will get outpriced by people doing "the same" work for less. Since you cannot know the global prices, you cannot even meet them, much less compete. Lowest bidder often wins.

[jasonkester]

I know, right? I've lost track of all the money I've lost from clients going with the lowest bidder over the years. I must be literally hundreds of dollars by now.

A bit of advice: Those cheap guys are not your competition, and those bargain hunter clients are not the ones you're trying to land. Let them all race to the bottom all they want. Maybe one of them will find a dev who doesn't know his value yet, but the rest will get their money's worth. It doesn't concern you.

There is only one of you, and your rate is the same whether you're onsite in the Bay Area or working remote from anywhere else you choose to be.

That mindset has served me well over the years. I'd recommend taking it on board.

[kgodey]

People in those markets usually aren't comparing their offer with local competition, the job market for remote workers is worldwide. Many companies do pay remote employees based on the value they bring to the company regardless of where they live so they are the competition.

[AstralStorm]

The problem with this is that a remote worker will have problems finding opportunities or getting found, especially because the competition is so huge. It is like the problems contractors face taken to some non small power.

[ludston]

His is a moralistic argument. I expect he understands the mechanism at play here.

[52-6F-62]

This is correct.

Simplified, the counter argument appears to be:

"If a company has the leverage in any capacity to exercise its dominance over a potential employee—to extract as much value from them at the lowest possible financial liability—it should in any case attempt to do so. It would be absurd to do otherwise."

Personally, I can't abide by that—especially when the only basis is locale—and no matter if they bring the same value to the company as a local six-figure-salary employee.

[ryan-allen]

That's pretty much a company's MO no matter where you go. It's always about leverage and market forces. If an employer could pay you 75% less to do the same work they'd do it in a heartbeat.

It's better to know the rules of the game otherwise you'll just end up being played.

[52-6F-62]

Yes and no, I think. Like some other commenters implied, I think it's short sighted. The outcome of working employees like that can end up being of lower quality, so the product suffers, and loses market traction.

I've been witness to this first-hand. Of course, it's only anecdotal, but just the same it's informed my opinions.

Though you're right about your last point absolutely— it's often pretty safe to assume they're (especially larger companies) operating under the pretense we're both referring to.

[tom_mellior]

> It's how markets work.

The "labor market" is a pretty good example of how markets don't work. Workers are pretty much forced to participate in the "market" because they have to eat. This alone is a ridiculous distortion of market mechanisms. There are also huge information asymmetries regarding salary levels.

[pennaMan]

What if you are a nomad, changing locations month after month? What is your employment market? Is getting hired while in a high income place then moving to a low income place immediately after regarded as a good move in this game?

A remote only company playing the local income game is a major red flag for me. It's basically an employee caste system at that point, with second class employees based solely on their physical location.

[ehnto]

Ah yes, the ever ethical and humanist market. I don't think it's wise to look for cues on how to be ethical from the market.

You're right about the mechanisms at play though.

[jameslk]

I guess we'll have to throw purchasing power out the window to discuss this one. So pay the developer $20k per year or pay them $100k? If the former, I guess those US developers are just screwed and will probably make more money flipping burgers. If the latter, or anywhere between, then we'll just see developers move to the cheapest, lowest tax countries to arbitrage the artificial market inefficiency. Or are you suggesting we force developers to stay where they are too?

[tom_mellior]

> So pay the developer $20k per year or pay them $100k?

If they bring you $20k worth of value, pay them $20k. If they bring you $100k worth of value, pay them $100k.

Would it suck to be a developer in San Francisco on the same salary as your colleague in India? Sure, but nobody forces you to live in San Francisco.

> If the latter, or anywhere between, then we'll just see developers move to the cheapest, lowest tax countries to arbitrage the artificial market inefficiency.

So? What does that have to do with your company? Does it have a moral obligation to contribute to global inequality?

Wouldn't it be better for the world if good hard money for taxes and locally sourced goods and services were flowing into less developed countries?

[AstralStorm]

> Nobody forces you to live in San Francisco

Spoken like a person without a family or property who is fine with moving to India in a heartbeat.

Do you even know Indian culture? Languages? How to actually acquire a decent living place in there?

It is an existential risk. A pretty big one. You could end up on street or worse. Alleviating this risk takes negligible resources and quite a lot of time.

[tom_mellior]

Sigh. Just because I mentioned San Francisco and India in the same post, that doesn't mean that I believe that those are the only two places on Earth. Get out a map, find a place you like, figure out if there is one that is not San Francisco but might still be acceptable to you. There isn't? Not even elsewhere in the southern US? OK, stay in San Francisco. You have my permission, which apparently you need.

But if you're interested, I do have experience migrating to new places where I had to learn new languages.

[closeparen]

Paying someone the value they create is a whole lot more trouble than the equally unprofitable option of not employing them at all.

[tom_mellior]

Maybe, depending on what you mean. Do you mean it's hard to measure individual developers' contributions in monetary terms? I agree. But they average out. If you can afford to pay two people sitting in your office equal amounts on the assumption that they contribute equally, you can also afford the same if one of them sits elsewhere instead.

[mkl]

I'm not saying I disagree with you, but why exactly would it be bad if people moved to places with cheaper cost of living or less tax?

[jameslk]

Nothing wrong with it per se. As a developer, I would love to move somewhere cheap and still be paid a Bay Area salary, so I could come back to the US and buy several houses after saving up a truckload of money. But I don't think that was the OP's goal.

[alter_eco123]

> Pay people what they're worth regardless of where they live.

Note that people are fine with getting a lower salary in exchange for being able to work remotely.

You could turn it around and say remote employees are "paying their employer what working remotely is worth".

[yosito]

Personally, if a company uses remote work as an excuse to pay less, that's a red flag for me. Pay should represent the value you offer to the company, period.

[alter_eco123]

> Pay should represent the value you offer to the company, period.

Sure, but value works both ways.

"Your salary should represent the value working remotely offers to you"

If it's reasonable for you to think that way, why wouldn't it be reasonable for companies too?

[toomanybeersies]

Salary should be scaled in part by cost of living, otherwise it's unfair to people in high COL countries.

Gitlab does this when calculating salary [1] for their employees. It seems only fair to me.

[1] https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/people-operations/global-c...

[jaggederest]

Why is it fair to subsidize people to live in high cost of living locations?

[scalesolved]

Probably best to rent a postal box in the Vatican City, collect that sweet super high pay check and actually live somewhere cheaper :)

[toomanybeersies]

Because otherwise, after COL, you might only save $10k per year in a developed country, and $30k per year in a developing country.

That would be just as lopsided and unfair to your remote workers as paying them all market rate, so that your employees in developed countries get paid $80k per year and your employees in India get paid $8k per year.

Or do you expect your developers in America to relocate to India?

[jaggederest]

Why not subsidize everyone's lifestyle so they all save the same amount of money, regardless of spending?

Would you pay more money for the exact same product made in a different city? How is hiring developers different?

[rodw]

If you've identified the "best" candidate for a position and want to hire or retain that person, you're now competing with the other offers available to that candidate (which include CoL-adjusted offers), not with the salaries you're paying other employees.

[toomanybeersies]

Well, I think the idea is meant to be that you get the best developers possible, regardless of where they are, while still trying to keep expenses minimal.

[detaro]

Gotta say, cutting pay just because someone moves feels icky.

[bufferoverflow]

It's not racism, it's simple market forces. Supply and demand and the local cost of living. Someone living in Ukraine will do just fine on 10% of what a Bay Area dev gets paid.