[radpanda]

> Nobody ever cared where anyone worked from

Was it really this way in general or just with some little startups who didn’t mind taking risks? As far as I remember employers always cared where remote workers were for tax and other reasons (sanctions, compliance with local regulations, etc).

[kelipso]

Companies don’t actually keep track of that. You give them an address and they rely on you to update it.

[golergka]

So this relies on employee choosing to lie about his current address and location?

[kelipso]

I believe you only need to work at a particular location for 6 months in a year to be considered a resident for tax purposes. But yeah there’s a certain flexibility with the truth if you go over but it’s not like the biggest deal since you’re paying state taxes either way and not that many people do it anyway.

[klipt]

> resident for tax purposes

Resident just means that country taxes your worldwide income.

Even if non tax resident they have a claim to income earned in that country, which arguably includes remote work while you live there.

Depending on local laws, not legal or tax advice etc

[Scoundreller]

> Depending on local laws

It gets even more complicated when treaties are involved because they’ll supercede the law, have a lot less jurisprudence and are often unreadable gobblygook.

You end up with rules like (paraphrasing):

“If a member of a contracting state contracts in the other contracting state, they will only pay taxes in their other contracting state”

[forgetfreeman]

I vividly recall a coworker skyping into a department all-hands via satphone from the galapagos and we were doing work for the ACLU and Unicef at the time, not exactly a garage band startup.

[bsimpson]

I've been at Google for 10y and include that time in my anecdote.