> All this will do is drive up the cost of housing as remote workers compete for it

when you stop competing for the same strip of land, 10 miles from the pacific ocean, it turns out there's a sort of stupendous amount of land.

while, yes, there will technically be some competition, in the areas under discussion i don't think it will meaningfully effect housing prices.

(i could divide the amount of land in rural america by the number of possible work-from-home employees and we could figure out what it'll do to the average population density. but, hell, i've lived in these areas, i don't need to.)