I guess I just find it a bit weird that your value to the company is so dependent on location that it can vary from 100% down to ~20% of the base SF salary. People living in SF _chose_ to live there despite the absurd rents, and it's not like that changes anything for a remote company.
(edit: moving for reasons unrelated to employment with the San Francisco company)
But if they know you're committed to remote work, this wouldn't seem to be a consideration. And presumably the possibility of taking a remote position at a company in a high-cost area exists no matter where you live, so by the same logic you'd think that a boss would want to always pay a rate that's competitive in expensive markets.
I guess the reality is that physical location is still enough of a determiner of job options that it influences what a boss understands your realistic pay range to be. But I wonder how this will change as more tech work becomes remote.
Exactly. So why should a boss want to pay you less because you live somewhere cheap.
Why should you get paid less for doing the same amount of work? What does it matter to the employer?
The question is, how much will it cost your employer to replace you? Presumably, they will be hiring your replacement locally so your salary should be compared to local wages.
The trick, is to make yourself indispensable (or at least very, very expensive to do so). Focus on being the sole owner of crucial products and knowledge (we are after all, knowledge workers). If you find yourself in a position where redundancy is being put in place (i.e hiring someone to shadow you, etc. then it's time to move up the knowledge chain or to a different product).
So is most companies' unwillingness to allow full-time remote work. If it is possible to alter the mindset about the latter, it should certainly be so about the former.