Doesn’t WFH just move the cheese from downtown to where people live? Restaurants downtown might be hurt, but have restaurants in other areas seen an uptick in business with so many people working from home? WFH might be bad for some areas and good for others, right?
I’m sure working from the office is better for the particular businesses located in an area with a lot of offices but I’m not so sure how much it matters overall. Sure, no one is likely to drive downtown just to have lunch/dinner - but some will buy just as many meals at a restaurant as they ever did , just closer to home. And the ones who don’t will spend more at the supermarket.
When I worked in the office, I frequently went out to lunch, dinner, and to happy hours during the week. Over the past few years I’ve been working at home, I do almost none of that anymore. I get pretty much all my meals from my kitchen now. I didn’t shift my dining to neighborhood restaurants near me. It’s similar for shopping for stuff during the week. When I was in the office, it was easy to swing by a store when I was getting lunch or during my commute. But when I’m WFH, I just order stuff from Amazon. The grocery store and Amazon are doing better with me WFH, but lots of local restaurants and stores have lost my business simply because they are so far away from me now.
It only creates value through commercial real estate if commercial real estate (that is to say, warehousing workers in giant glass boxes to do their work) has value. And I think any “benefit” is more than offset by the increased time and energy required to shuffle millions of people back and forth to work needlessly.
I don’t know if the rest of your theory tracks either.
Most places in the USA aren’t New York City. Most of the time, people live in a single family home in some suburban community and commute to some office park in another community (hopefully less than an hour away). Any restaurants or dining usually consists of chain restaurants in a strip mall complex somewhere off the highway that connects the two.
Even in Manhattan, most of the good restaurants, stores, coffee shops and whatnot aren’t consolidated around the main business districts (Wall Street / WFC, and Midtown). They are in the surrounding residential neighborhoods.
What I think more WFH enables communities to do is create more of a “town center” structure that isn’t dependent on people converging on a central business district of office towers miles away. Instead you just go down the street to your neighborhood restaurant or coffee shop.
Not to sound insensitive, but by and large I don’t care if something “hurts businesses” if some fundamental technology or societal change makes those businesses no longer economically viable. WFH has a measurable benefit in giving people time and reducing costs, energy use and infrastructure wear and tear associated with commuting to work. I don’t think we should roll that back so some hedge funds realize a return on their commercial leases or Chopt and Starbucks can open a few more local franchises.
I’m not disputing that that’s the case for some people - of course it is. But when I worked I had breakfast at home every day , had a coffee maker at work , brought my lunch to work almost every day and never ate dinner in that neighborhood for a number of reasons including the fact that most actual restaurants weren’t even open for dinner. I either shopped in my neighborhood on my way home from work or ordered from Amazon or shopped on the weekend. I rarely bought anything in the neighborhood where I worked except for things I would actually use at work.
Nothing changed when I stopped working - and it wouldn’t have changed if I was working from home. I still buy lunch a couple of times a month, I still have dinner at the same places and with the same frequency I did before (which were nowhere near my office) and my shopping habits are the same. My sister’s work from home habits are exactly the same as when she worked in an office - she still buys coffee every morning and lunch every day just like she did then , just from different places. .
The thing is , it’s almost impossible to tell what the effects are because although it might be easy to see that the stores/restaurants in the neighborhood where I worked have been hurt , it’s going to be impossible to compare that to the the restaurants /stores that benefited over the entire very large area where people commuted from. If 1000 people started working from home, they might all still be buying their coffee every day but from 500 or more different places.
How many farriers and shade tree veterinarians did the automobile put out of business? I feel the same principle applies here.
Excellent point! I haven’t taken a “sick day” since COVID.
OK, when I actually HAD the 'rona, I took a few hours on each of several days, but never a whole day. The only time I take a full day is when I have certain procedures scheduled, and that’s about once a year.
Aside from COVID, nobody in this house has been sick for well over 4 years.
I’d vented about hotelling (where you don’t have an assigned desk, and have to request one every single day in the office), and a couple of other people did as well. WFH is SO fricking much easier. All my stuff is set up exactly the way I like it. I do not have to pack it up and either lug it home, or lock it in a hotelling drawer (big file drawer in a bank of such things), set up specifically for people to not have to lug EVERYTHING home every day - but you still have to pack it up at 5 PM. At home, I get up, go into my office (or before my daughter moved out, go to the rolling table in the family room), and I was ready to work.
The crap associated with hotelling adds 15 minutes, easily, at each end of the work day. And then you have to lug the computer etc. home, which isn’t a big deal if you drive to work, but if you take transit, it’s a huge hassle. Not to mention, I found that somehow my computer bag gained 15 pounds over the course of the day. Haven’t quite figured out the physics of that, as I’d never added anything to it, but I swear the damn thing felt heavier in the evening.
At least from a standpoint of convenience, some places do it slightly better; our client had huge rooms with rows of tables; 3 people would sit along each side of the table which wasn’t lovely but at least they had docking stations with large monitors and external keyboards available. At my company’s office, you’d get a cubicle which was a little nicer (but you still couldn’t spread out because, hotelling); and no external monitor that I recall.
Oh, and I have two computers. One for the client, one for my employer. If I were going to a client site, I’d have to lug their computer, then do admin stuff after I got home, on my employer computer (or I’d have to drag that along).
Here at home, I have everything on a shelving unit, with a KVM switch so they can share my huge external monitor, and my noisy mechanical keyboard that would get me gutted by colleagues in an office. And my feet are propped up on a stool, which isn’t just frivolity.
And from a daily living standpoint: I can get whatever food I want, whenever I want it, by walking downstairs (well, whatever food we have in the house). If I need to go to the bathroom, I can just walk 20 feet - not 200, and no need to deal with badges or door codes.
I would need to take South Eastern Pennsylvania Transit Authority to work. I can pretty much count on seeing people smoking marijuana and crack and shooting up with (I’m not sure. I just see them using syringes and getting high) on every El ride. I do not feel safe taking any more material possessions on SEPTA than absolutely necessary. I still feel the risk of a violent mugging is low. The risk of a snatch and run is high.
And how did or did not WFH change that?
Yeah, my wife still works in the office (we work for the same company) brought something home. It did not turn out to be COVID. But she took 2 days off, while I worked… from home.
Hoteling is not something I would accept. I think we have some ‘hot’ cubes that anyone can grab for a bit is all. Don’t know for sure. Don’t intend to find out.
Pretty much all of us have the work from home option. Doesn’t work quite as well for my wife’s office (they still have some stuff on paper 
). But she can work some stuff from home. She is one that would rather go into work for the most part. To each their own. She sees the benefit though. I’ll buy the hardware, no problem.
I’m taking care of my mothers estate (it’s not a mansion, it’s a small house). I bought hardware for that. So if it is best I stay there while things get sorted out, no problem. Yeah, It cost me some money, but saves a lot in the long run. All I travel with back and forth is a paper notebook. Ya have to look at the long game.
And we do sometimes get incredible snow storms up at altitude. My Wife stayed home after the last dump of snow. There was no option. I worked, and then plowed our drive during ‘lunch’.
My cousin prepares peoples taxes. The company is quite computer savvy. But the problem is that clients bring in a shoe box of receipts or whatever. She cannot move that paper work out of the office. It would be a security problem.
Another perk is that I’m salaried, so I make the same amount whether I’m sitting in the office doing nothing or at home cleaning my house, getting groceries or even better doing something I like. Also, my commute is only 15 minutes one way. I would be able to do most of my work from home but it’s easier to do it at my office.
Yeah, but in corporate dummy logic, you are only “productive” if you are seen busy doing “something” for as many hours as possible. Even if that something is useless busy work.
I had coffee with a colleague from work yesterday. We are in the process of ramping up on a new client project and our manager is on vacation so we’re kind of idle as we wait for the paperwork to process. Ironically we were supposed to meet in the office the day before but she cancelled at the last minute, resulting me being in the office for no real reason.
Anyhow, we were having the same discussion on remote vs on site. She was more pro “on site” than me. Case in point, why do we both need to travel to Manhattan when we live 5 blocks from each other in NJ?
She’s a lot younger than me and this is her first job at a consulting firm. So I was basically just like “relax, enjoy the downtime before our new project starts, and be happy it’s not 20 years ago where we had to live out of a suitcase at the client site 4 days a week collecting frequent flyer miles.”
One disadvantage of working from home is that at least in my case, my activity level is MUCH lower than if I’m commuting. All the steps involved in getting showered, getting dressed in work-appropriate clothing, getting out to the car / bus, getting into the office, computer setup / takedown, and walking around the office - they’ve all been replaced by a few steps to my home office, the occasional shower, a trip downstairs for lunch, and so on. The Fitbit is my witness.
I’ve never been able to listen to music while I work. For a while when I worked with my buddy we had the TV or music in the background but for the past 20 years it’s been dead silent for me.
However, one of the HUGE DRAWBACKS of working from home, when your home is in a little suburban neighborhood, is that lawnmowing, roadwork, roofing and leaf blowing happen during the day. Ok maybe this is a huge drawback to WFH in silence. But I swear, one of my neighbors takes off work once a week in the fall to blow leaves. It makes me want to scratch my ears out. And roofing? I have personally experienced the re-roofing of every single home in my neighborhood.
Normal work day = 6000 steps
Normal day working at home < 1000 steps (I don’t carry my phone with me at home.)
After the first few months of working from home, we started taking a walking break in the afternoon. Just 30 minutes would help a lot. But we’d be lazy if the weather was too hot/cold/wet, etc.
We’ve been at 100% office for one year, and my average steps per month reflects this, as it’s higher than when we were working 60% in the office.
Since there’s construction across the street from my home, being in the office is better for concentration. It’s also better for my health, because I don’t snack when I’m in the office.
Fortunately we do have the possibility of working from home if there’s a need, such as meeting the plumber, etc. This was the rule before COVID, and supposedly this is the rule now.
Imagine if it’s the roof on YOUR house! This was my experience, in late 2020.
Or having other major carpentry work (we had hardwood put in several rooms, a couple weeks ago).
Noise-cancelling headphones are your friend when this happens.
I think it depends on what type of worker you are. If you are a worker drone, with limited desire to advance into leadership at the company you are with, then WFH is probably more ideal. If you are an ambitious striver, seeking to move into leadership, ultimately to be part of the C-Suite, then working in the office is more ideal for you (Bain & Co. estimates that about 20% of the workforce fits into this category).
- It is difficult to understand and find connection with a corporate culture if you WFH.
- People that primarily WFH are promoted less often than people that work in the office.
- Creativity and innovation is more prevalent in face to face working. The question is by how much. Studies vary.
- WFH people feel less burn-out.
I think for many of the reasons expressed in this thread, hybrid forms of work are where many companies are landing. We have a hybrid model, I however am in the office everyday, except when traveling for work.
Given that most people’s chances of reaching the C-suite are vanishingly small. coming to the office every day to show everyone how you are such a hard worker doesn’t seem like such a great deal.
I wonder if Bain or Mckinsey or BCG ever did a study on the corporate art of bullshitery. That is to say, all the meetings, and CC’ed emails, and being seen pretending to work at your desk at all hours that serve as a sort of “virtue signaling” to show you are “working hard”.
I can sort of see both sides though.
In my younger days, sure, it felt like there was a big advantage to going to the office every day. Most places I worked, there was an energy that just came from having everyone there working and collaborating, eating lunch together, maybe hanging out after work.
I haven’t really felt that in years, even before COVID. These days, office buildings feel mostly empty and quiet and often the people who are there working are all working on completely different things with completely different people in other locations.
When I was having coffee with my colleague, one thing that was completely foreign to her was the concept that as a consultant, we often used to travel every week for months at a time. That’s become a thing of the past as well.
Plus another thing that was cool was actually seeing shit get done. Like being able to visit a factory where ball point pens are made or a hanger where aircraft are repaired or some investment bank’s trading floor. Now I mostly just see people on Zoom calls.
So as a middle-aged family man, I do like the flexibility. But if I were a single 20 or 30 something early in my career, I would want to be more connected to my place of employment.
Then again, it’s easy to say all that if you work for Bain in their fancy Bryant Park Midtown office.