[uncensoredjrk]

Hopefully the 20 YOE isn't scaring anyone off. I truly see it as a benefit and would say that I'm in the prime of my capabilities so far.

I'm looking for a FT remote position (as I'm based in central PA). I've previously worked in the NYC area for about 10 years and prior to that was a traveling consultant at IBM.

Some of the positions have received quite a few resumes. Others have not or were applied to outside of LinkedIn/Indeed. LinkedIn has listed me as being in the Top 10% or Top 25% of applicants for some of the positions. So far this seems to be the toughest job market that I have been searching in.

[the_only_law]

At this point, I’m convinced remote is a dying fad, and will fade into something that’s more of a rare perk (I worked remote prior to the the whole Covid debacle, but only ever once).

When I go to look at jobs, and I put on the remote filter, it significantly decreases options. For example at the current moment if I look at jobs on LinkedIn with the search I’ve been using that have been posted within the last day, I get a little over 500 results. However I used uBlock to cut out “promoted” positions which are often stale and irrelevant to my search, so there’s probably less than that. What remains are mix of weird niche positions, low quality agency spam, a bit of non-dev or otherwise irrelevant listings, and a minority of jobs that I actually look qualified for worth applying to.

Comparatively, when I switch to filter for only on-site or hybrid positions with the same search, I get over 3000 results, with many more jobs relevant to my resume.

I really, really, really do not want to move right now, and I’m not sure if in the end I’d rather just settle for an on site position that will force me into a costly move, or just cut my losses and try to start my life over from scratch while I still have the chance.

[arp242]

I also did remote long before the whole COVID business, and I think you're half right.

I do think remote was a "fad" to some degree, people were ushering in a "new era of work that will forever change things", and that clearly wasn't going to happen. While I do really like remote work, it's not without its downsides, both for employees and employers. I think almost everyone who worked remote before COVID realized this.

That said, certainly for software development, I don't think remote work is going away. It existed before COVID and will exist after COVID, and in that sense it's not a "fad". I also think software dev is the best example of where remote works well because fundamentally it's an individual activity, and it's also an activity where I feel text communication often works better than verbal communication (although verbal still has value, of course).