[hiAndrewQuinn]

You might be right, if we assume that everyone who takes these high paying remote jobs also makes sure to never ever spend the money they earn locally, either.

However, if I was earning an order of magnitude more money than I currently am, I might want to pay a little extra to go to the really good barber, or to eat at the really nice restaurant at the riverbank. Or, hell, I might just employ a cleaning service every week, to save myself a few hours' time vacuuming my apartment. These necessarily local services will also see their revenues rise. To me that seems to be a more important effect on the local economy at large.

[bobby_table]

But how would you feel about working as a barber, chef or cleaner, when you could earn two orders of magnitude more making Internet thingamajings for people on the other side of the world?

[pavlov]

New York never has a critical shortage of barbers, chefs or cleaners even though for many decades it’s been possible to earn 100x as a Wall Street bond trader or quant.

A healthy growth economy can tolerate income differences. But the balance is certainly precarious, as the example of New York or London shows. It’s constantly on the edge of driving out the remaining barbers and chefs because they can’t afford rents.

[__float]

They could build more apartments.