Definitely my experience; one of the first things that happens after an A-round is all the remote workers get asked to move near HQ, and can’t, so they have to resign with no severance. And the standard startup recruiting playbook is to say “we will consider remote for the right candidate” when inquired, but all their hires seem to come from the same central California town the company founders live in.
I wonder if readers will take this comment seriously, but it very much sums up the reasoning based on my experience. And some CEOs think that too.
I've been part of startups where VCs would stop by to pat on the CEO on the back, take a little tour of the office, happy to see 15-ish bozos banging on the keyboard. Sometimes they would invite some of their buddies to show off their monkeys. I don't know, maybe it was the VC version of a dick fight.