During a pandemic? No tech companies are working from a studio in person, and if they are, they aren't in the US and certainly not in California. Thus they can get away with paying someone $75k+ to stay in Buttfuck, Kentucky that may have a CS degree to work on their games without having to give up their culture and safety. Plus all Amazon tech jobs have a 150k signing bonus right now.
Why not SD? Look outside. Tell me how many people have masks on. In a part of the US like Pennsylvania that has COVID under control more than California, there's still like 80% of the idiots around this suburban town I am in not wearing masks despite 100+ cases of COVID per day. Now imagine California, which has a shit ton more people condensed in one city like San Diego / Los Angeles.
Then tell me it's safe to have people come into an office and do a job they can do from anywhere in the world at 85% efficiency but half the cost of a San Diego salary.
You might get some 9-5 person that works in San Diego or California due to having no choice in the matter by owning property there that no one would want to buy or rent, or talent from all across the US that costs less and is actually interested in working and loves games. It's a no brainer to me to get the latter than the former.
I'd say this is why Daybreak can't find talent to work for them, in the same respect - they assume that after COVID that people will actually want to work for them in person, and remote working is a 'temporary restriction'. Anyone who cares about their personal safety would not work at a company like that.
Don't get me started on the dumbass people that live in California in high amounts. It's quoted by conservatives as a 'liberal paradise' - yet they have gender reveal parties there that take out a few hundred acres of land.
If anything, this pandemic has taught me that some people are stupid, some have always been purposefully stupid, and when you ask them to use their brains during a pandemic they cannot. So moving to California, for me personally, is out of the question. I imagine anyone in the games industry who still wants to endanger themselves by being in California is desperate for work, let alone moving there to get new work when companies like Amazon let you live like kings in Shitfuck, Montana and live way beyond your means.
Remote work is here to say for at least another year or two, and I hope the trend of remote work lasts past the pandemic.
If this pandemic is any indication, it doesn't matter who you are.
Nor what field of work you are in, or what your income is like, or what sexuality/gender/race/political affiliation/zodiac sign/nationality/culture/religion you are.
None of that matters if you're a fucking moron and unfortunately the world is full of smart people that act like morons.
