[NeverFade]

> And we might be in a hacker news bubble with our wish to stay remote.

You really think that outside of our "hacker news bubble", everyone is *dying* to go back to their offices in SF, to the rat race of getting raises every year to barely keep up with rising housing and general living costs, and never having a hope of buying a house or raising a family, even as senior engineers?

Do you really think the average person prefers that to living in a quiet, zero-crime suburb, in a nice big home, and spending all day every day in the comfort of their home with their family and pets?

[ck425]

You're comparing a terrible commuting scenario to a great remote scenario. You're also looking at this from the perspective of someone with an established family. Of course remote looks better!

There are more commuting scenarios that living in the SF (or London or NYC or insert major city here) with a long commute and crazy house prices. I live and work(ed) in a medium size city where a mid-level engineer can afford a decent flat 10-25min walk into the city centre with lots of walkable local community areas and green space. Moving out to a suburbs gives me a bit more space but not much else. It also comes at the expense of being further away from everything and having to drive everywhere. There's a lot of room between everyone in the same dense massive urban areas and everyone going full remote from the suburbs.

Additionally not everyone is settled down with a family. Many of us are still at the stage in life where we're (in normal times) going out, dating, going for drinks, going to events etc. For those of us at this stage the idea of moving to the suburbs is hellish. Sure an extra room would be nice but otherwise it's boring as hell.

What I've not heard discussed enough is the middle ground. If remote and distributed teams start to work better why not distribute teams across more offices in medium sized cities where we can get a trade off between both worlds. Or change the office concept to something where lots of folk work from shared offices. I'd love to go work for a FANG but I'd hate to move to London. If there was an option to work for FANG from my local WeWork office and there was a critical mass of other tech professionals doing the same that might be a good trade off.

[NeverFade]

> Moving out to a suburbs gives me a bit more space but not much else. It also comes at the expense of being further away from everything and having to drive everywhere. There's a lot of room between everyone in the same dense massive urban areas and everyone going full remote from the suburbs.

Remote works lets you choose where you want to live and work. You can stay in the city if that's your thing, or move to the suburbs.

I don't understand comments that pretend as if remote work is going to force everyone to "work from the suburbs". Remote work is about more choice.

Incidentally, remote work will also make cities more affordable, so folks like you who enjoy them will benefit tremendously.

Remote work doesn't limit your choices, that's what office work does.

Remote work greatly expands your range of options.

> Many of us are still at the stage in life where we're (in normal times) going out, dating, going for drinks, going to events etc.

Areas that are very dense in tech aren't ideal for dating. Tech is male-dominated, so if your preferred partner is female, you will find dating in Silicon Valley quite challenging.

With remote work, you could choose a city that offers better dating prospects.

Yet another win for remote work.

Literally any particular thing you'd like to optimize for: dating, meeting new people, staying near existing family and friends, raising a family of your own - remote work gives you far better and more numerous options.

[ck425]

> I don't understand comments that pretend as if remote work is going to force everyone to "work from the suburbs".

I mentioned the suburbs because the comparison you setup was suburbs vs expensive city life. I was critiquing the flawed comparison.

> Areas that are very dense in tech aren't ideal for dating. Tech is male-dominated, so if your preferred partner is female, you will find dating in Silicon Valley quite challenging.

I was making the point about expensive cities more generally. Other similar areas such as London and NYC don't have that issue.

There's also the advantages of actually being in an office. Having structure enforced by a physical separation, the social aspect of being in an office etc. Those aren't valuable to everyone but to many they're incredibly valuable.

[doteka]

The vast majority of even the developed world is nothing like SF. In particular, for most people outside major capitals buying a house and raising a family is very doable.

> spending all day every day in the comfort of their home

This may sound good to you, it definitely doesn’t sound good to an extrovert. If that was my prospects for the rest of my life, I’d likely shoot myself.

[NeverFade]

> The vast majority of even the developed world is nothing like SF.

For American workers, most tech hubs are SF or very similar to it, in terms of CoL. SF, LA, Seattle, Manhattan, etc.

> it definitely doesn’t sound good to an extrovert

Engineers tend to be introverted.

[saiya-jin]

America (as in US) is cca 5% of the world population. Engineers can be introverted, their managers (and their) not so much.

[goatinaboat]

> You really think that outside of our "hacker news bubble", everyone is dying to go back to their offices in SF

In the real world, once a company becomes self-sustaining no one with real decision-making power cares about productivity, they care about amassing more power, even at the detriment of the organisation. Those games are infinitely better played in person. I don’t like it any more than you do but that won’t change these facts.

[joshuamorton]

Put simply: yes. I know a lot of people who enjoy socialization provided at the office, and I know a lot of people who get a productivity boost due to the dynamics of from-office work. Heck, there at even people who like SF and city life on its own merits.

There are also lots of people working from 1br apartments who can't wait to work from a space that isn't also their bedroom.

[NeverFade]

> Put simply: yes. I know a lot of people who enjoy socialization provided at the office

Find a co-working space.

> Heck, there at even people who like SF and city life on its own merits.

Remote work gives you the freedom to work from anywhere. That includes other cities. You can still live in SF if you want, or choose any of the other dozens of cities that provide more benefits for far cheaper costs.

[joshuamorton]

> Find a co-working space.

Alternatively, they can work for an employer who has an office and then they don't need to pay for access to a co-working space. Their choice to do so doesn't harm you, they simply value certain aspects of the job differently, much as people value vacation vs raw salary differently.

> That includes other cities. You can still live in SF if you want, or choose any of the other dozens of cities that provide more benefits for far cheaper costs.

Yes, but for the same reason as above, there are enough people who explicitly value the "conventional" office interaction that companies will continue to cater to it. It's often cheaper and more efficient for employees to do so.

I'll also as an aside mention that

> Engineers tend to be introverted.

Is in my experience false. The hn bubble is far more introverted, on average, than my coworkers at a major tech company are. If you are introverted, you may not spend a great amount of time with those people, but i don't think it's controversial to say that the majority of currently employed software engineers don't want to stay in their homes forever.

[NeverFade]

I believe you express an opinion that is shared by many people who are simply comforted and reassured by the status-quo. Additionally, you work for Google, which has been quite stringent about keeping all work on-site. You'd like to keep your job, so cognitive dissonance induces you to conclude - without much evidence - that this status quo is The Best of All Worlds.

Working full-time from the office is a condition that was created due to certain historical preconditions. In particular, it was a good fit for industrial work, and indeed the modern urban office environment is rooted in the industrial revolution.

It is not at all necessary in our modern world. If you want to live in a big city and commute to a shared workspace every day, you can do so. However, there are so many other options available, and I dare suggest you shouldn't declare them all inferior before trying them.

Overall, onsite office work binds you to exactly one option, remote work allows you a huge freedom of choice - and that is categorically a positive thing.

[joshuamorton]

> You'd like to keep your job, so cognitive dissonance induces you to conclude - without much evidence - that this status quo is The Best of All Worlds.

No, I'm just unhappy working from home, and greatly miss the office. You don't need to invent a conspiracy theory.

> It is not at all necessary in our modern world

I never said it was. I said that many employees find it preferable. I agree some do not. But you're solution seems to be to ban offices.

> Overall, onsite office work binds you to exactly one option, remote work allows you a huge freedom of choice - and that is categorically a positive thing.

But you're proposing not the option of remote work, but remote only. That does remove choice, the choice to work from my company's office in proximity to my coworkers. I value that.

> However, there are so many other options available, and I dare suggest you shouldn't declare them all inferior before trying them.

I don't think I have. Please stop putting words in my mouth and getting defensive about other people's preferences.

[NeverFade]

Your entire counter-argument against me rests on the strawman that I proposed "banning offices", and is therefore invalid.

I never suggested "banning offices" (how would that be achieved, exactly?). In fact I specifically presented a model in which voluntary offices / co-working spaces exist for those who want them.

[schwartzworld]

As someone who spends all day at home in the suburbs with family and pets, I do think a lot of people will want to go back.

The suburbs only make sense if you're commuting. Who would want to live there otherwise? Not remote enough to be cheap or have real land, not city enough to be a fun place to live. Who would willingly spend all there time in the suburbs?

I do live in the suburbs because it used to offer a convenient commute and have me close enough to still go into town for bars, museums, concerts, etc. But with all that stuff out of the picture, what is the point of this place?

[stoilt]

Do you think if everyone works remotely and companies can hire from all over the country (or the globe for that matter) you will still get a salary that you'd get in SF? I'm pretty sure this will push down the salaries, so you probably won't end up in a "quiet, zero-crime suburb, in a nice big home", but a quiet, medium-crime suburb, in a decent home maybe.

[NeverFade]

Companies are already hiring nation-wide. How many SFBay employees were born there, and how many relocated from all other parts of the country for a job?

As for global: global competition has been upon us for decades now. Most big tech companies have foreign offices in countries like India.

Finally, you are mistaken if you believe pay will drop so much. Maybe you won't make the $300k you used to make in SF, but $200k gives you a damn big home and high quality-of-life in most of suburban Texas - especially since you won't have to pay crazy California income taxes.

You also won't have to deal with crime if you can go literally anywhere in the country. There are thousands of small towns and suburbs that have effectively zero crime while not being very expensive. In general, most serious QoL problems disappear once you can choose to live anywhere.

[stoilt]

> Companies are already hiring nation-wide. How many SFBay employees were born there, and how many relocated from all other parts of the country for a job?

Yes, but employees had to relocate to the Bay Area so companies had to pay that level of salaries. But if people can work from whatever cheap location then why would any company keep paying that much?

> As for global: global competition has been upon us for decades now. Most big tech companies have foreign offices in countries like India.

Sure, and they get paid on Indian levels. I am also not from the US, I work and live in Europe but both my current and previous employers are big American tech companies with HQs in the Bay Area, and guess what they pay here? Standard European salaries that any other local company does. Maybe a couple of percent more, but nothing outstanding, definitely not close to Bay Area level salaries. And that is exactly the point I'm trying to make here: companies adjust the salaries considering the cost of living of the area their employees live in. If you move to a cheaper place, that will definitely have an impact on your salary.

> Finally, you are mistaken if you believe pay will drop so much.

Well, time will tell. I hope you'll be right there.