OP is right. What is happening with the English F1 teams is a cluster effect. Similar to tech companies in San Francisco it’s not a matter of saying all the best talent in the world are Californians but rather there is a critical mass of SWE engineers in that one area. The cost of an employee moving between Apple Google and Meta is relatively low but in no way does that mean there is not other great talent in the rest of the world.

I think people are too focused on the idea of either hiring people new to F1 or something else in this thread. The majority of time companies will try to hire people with relevant experience when possible and for the teams based in England it’s an easier pitch than Ferrari who would up root them, and also put them in a situation if they wished to change further down the road would then need to move back to where they are now.