Don't work for them, it's pretty simple.
I don't know what field you work in, but give that this is HN I assume you're a developer, if so you'll probably not see a better job market, don't put up with shit.
I don't know what field you work in, but give that this is HN I assume you're a developer, if so you'll probably not see a better job market, don't put up with shit.
But there are better solutions than that, anyway. Corporate travel policies might only reimburse the cheapest fair, but you can often book a better fair and reimburse the cheapest rate while paying the discrepancy yourself if you wish (which is how you might fly first class).
If you're concerned over uncomfortable travel 'once every year or few years' then you have better things to be worried about. I can't imagine a better example of a 'first world problem'.
Almost all of my travel in grad school was funded through taxpayer money. You ever fly to Okinawa in economy? It's not fun.
Now I don't discuss previous salaries, as I'm sure that has torpedoed several offers. That just leads down a road that is an inverse of the Impostor Syndrome, where they think you're overqualified for the position, and you can tell from the responses and further question. I am seriously wondering about the culture of the game, that it can be so seriously lacking of it's shining feature: distributed collaborative work.
I've gone so far as to offer to commute from central MD to northern VA a couple times a week - no dice. Gotta be onsite every day in their open-office floor plan where 90% of the workday is spent with noise-canceling headphones on and almost all communication is through Slack.
It's maddening how the pendulum keeps swinging away from remote work in this area.
I've literally dropped a quarter of my previous salary during negotiations, well aware of CoL differences, and had them come back at one-third to one-half as what they were thinking. But it's definitely hard to find any places that would offer remote, or even telecommutd options at a reaonable salary.