I'm curious what the effect of a global market and the ability for, say, a software engineer, to work 100% remote have on the "car mechanic" argument. If car mechanics could universally work on my car from anywhere in the world, it seems to me they'd all be charging the same.
So yeah, either they'd all charge whatever the dude in SF is charging, or the dude in SF couldn't compete with the woman in hanoi's rate (she's happy to cut her rate cause her bread is cheaper at the market), and thus moves out of SF.
Which I also think is ok. Perhaps that would result in a lower cost of living for places like SF? Perhaps that would lead to a greater distribution of people across the planet?
(I'll take a stab at this, but my knowledge is rather limited on this one so take it with a grain of salt).
Markets are a mix of locality. Some markets have more global reach than others.
The car mechanic example is a mostly local one, with the car parts being shipped from somewhere else, maybe in the same country or outside, which might take some influence on the price. Operation cost is local (rent, labor, other supplies) and customers are local, so the prices on mechanic services are stable and location based.
Software engineering has more global reach. It can be done remotely, but the labor is a mix of local and global (learning online, but also local universities, conferences, meetups), which justifies the pay gap between a local to the company (excluding timezone and culture differences, which makes the process and supply size smaller). It's also hard to evaluate the quality of work (see difficulties in hiring, analyzing performance).
The strongest argument I see is the cost of comfort (made somewhere else on this thread). Wages are largely decided on what other companies are paying and remote is a fairly new thing, so it's still highly unstable.
Pricing on products are also notoriously difficult. Some apps have prices adjusted by region.
I'm curious what the effect of a global market and the ability for, say, a software engineer, to work 100% remote have on the "car mechanic" argument. If car mechanics could universally work on my car from anywhere in the world, it seems to me they'd all be charging the same.
So yeah, either they'd all charge whatever the dude in SF is charging, or the dude in SF couldn't compete with the woman in hanoi's rate (she's happy to cut her rate cause her bread is cheaper at the market), and thus moves out of SF.
Which I also think is ok. Perhaps that would result in a lower cost of living for places like SF? Perhaps that would lead to a greater distribution of people across the planet?