I have a very hard time believing a real CA salary is being paid to remote workers. For engineering at leading companies, seventeen years of experience would be over 400K TC. However, I could believe someone paying a remote worker on the low end of entry-level compensation of around 120K for remote work.
It's not at all hard to believe some people are receiving CA salaries (and note, your 400k TC line only applies to a relatively small group of companies and senior positions).
On the other hand, I agree it is unlikely for the majority of remote workers. Depends a lot on your skill level and how rare/in-demand it is I suppose.
Ska's spot on here. We're not paying high end CA wages to _everyone_; however, our remote employees are making _much_ higher than the norms in most of their areas. We require a lot of breadth/depth for the main remote position. If you were to look at glassdoor, comparably, or paysa .. they would suggest this position for our company pays on average of 145 to 150k salary (w/o bonus / RSUs .. which would significantly raise that num obvi).
At most places the "talent is your #1 resource" is bullshit. Ours is not and is a key to us being profitable (it's actually rolled into our comp model).
