“those remote jobs are available to you as well.”

It didn’t really work this way. I’m a recruiter so I talk to people all day long, and most of the people who moved here during the pandemic came with jobs they held that had gone remote. They make way, way more money than locals do.

For example - we had someone in finance that went on parental leave and decided they didn’t want to come back. I screened someone with less experience that had moved here from the NY area and they wanted 45k more than we had paid before - almost as much as the 2 up manager/director makes.

And the other side of the coin is that from talking with people fully remote roles don’t necessarily come with the Boston/NY salary, and a lot come with the threat of return to office.