15 ms·

How many jobs can be done at home? [pdf]

205 points by erentz 7y ago

Ancalagon 7y ago
I'm a little confused by their definition of "jobs" here. Is this the absolute number of jobs? Or the types of jobs available? Looking at the article, they use wages to get a more firm grasp on this (saying something like 44% of wages could be made from home). If that's the case, what does that statistic say for the unemployment rate in the US, should social-distancing remain long term? Are we going to see >50% unemployment??
- bdcravens 7y ago
  A large number of the remaining 56% are classified as "essential": grocery and certain retail, public servants and first responders, healthcare, education, automotive services, etc. In Houston, for example, many of the energy sector jobs are classified as essential. Stay at home orders don't impact those jobs (though many of them may be operating at partial capacity)
  - jbullock35 7y ago
    > A large number of the remaining 56% are classified as "essential": grocery and certain retail, public servants and first responders, healthcare, education [...] The authors already code 82% of teachers as able to work from home, albeit with difficulty. See the second footnote in the paper.
    - Noos 7y ago
      That's not just working from home if so, that's reassigning an industry from face to face to virtual, and if history is any guide a lot of teachers may lose their jobs as well as secondary jobs becoming lost too. Sort of a pyrrhic victory.
- blendo 7y ago
  I was also unclear about whether they mean "How many workers in the US could work from home", or whether "How many job categories can work from home". But they state "To answer these questions, we classify the feasibility of working at home for all occupations and merge this classi cation with occupational employment counts for the United States." So it looks like they're counting number of workers.
- morgante 7y ago
  > If that's the case, what does that statistic say for the unemployment rate in the US, should social-distancing remain long term? Are we going to see >50% unemployment?? Highly unlikely. The government will abandon social distancing long before tolerating a long-term 50+% unemployment rate.
ravenstine 7y ago
> Our classification implies that 34 percent of U.S. jobs can plausibly be performed at home. If even 25% of jobs could be made remote, that would be huge. The reduction in automobile traffic, the improved happiness of workers(who want to work remote), as well as parents being around more for their kids, would benefit society overall.
- throw1234651234 7y ago
  I have a feeling that a low double-digit percent of jobs will permanently convert to remote or partial remote after this experience. I have been in two companies that went remote, and the bosses don't want to, until they try and realize the convenience.
  - ravenstine 7y ago
    The company I work for already is fully remote, but I heard from a colleague that their company, which was previously hesitant towards remote work, has seen a productivity increase after having been forced to do remote, and now plans to allow 100% remote work after lockdowns are lifted.
    - take_a_breath 7y ago
      ==I heard from a colleague that their company, which was previously hesitant towards remote work, has seen a productivity increase after having been forced to do remote== Could also be that employees, as a whole, are more worried about losing jobs in this environment and are producing more to protect themselves.
  - bachmeier 7y ago
    Convenience is now only a minor part of it. Being a remote company provides crucial insurance. Even part of the company being remote will allow some operations to continue uninterrupted at a time like this.
  - georgeecollins 7y ago
    Anecdote is not data, but I am realizing that I can be more productive at home than I guessed. Also I think my bosses are going to be more comfortable with me working from home after this. However, there is still so much knowledge / creative work that is best done face to face. What I can see happening in my work place is more people might take work at home days. There is no way we will want to keep taking important meetings on Zoom.
xt00 7y ago
Many people have brought this up, but there are definitely things to consider for a job to be done while working from home: 1) worker productivity (does it go up or down for all of these professions) 2) do companies want to pay you as much if you work from home? 3) is it sustainable for large swathes of people vs. small groups of people who self-select to like this work-style 4) will people abuse the system such that it ruins it for everybody else I can see a far more likely implementation of this would be a mixed case -- "work from home wednesdays" or something like that.. not friday or monday because then basically people would assume there is a certain amount of abuse of people working for 1 hour on Friday then starting their weekend early..
- heymijo 7y ago
  > 2) do companies want to pay you as much if you work from home? Is there anyone out there with a good argument for why remote workers should be paid less? Especially interested in hearing from anyone not incentivized by this practice (eg not the CEO or Chief People Officer of an org that practices this) > will people abuse the system such that it ruins it for everybody else An inevitable question and likely consequence. A counter question: are the myriad ways in-office employees game/abuse the system working materially worse than how remote workers might?
  - gowld 7y ago
    > Is there anyone out there with a good argument for why remote workers should be paid less? supply and demand competition. Anything that makes labor easier increases supply, applying downward pressure on prices.
  - Kalium 7y ago
    > Is there anyone out there with a good argument for why remote workers should be paid less? If I don't care where my team members are, why would I want two when I could have four of the same quality? Sounds attractive, I should think.
  - the8472 7y ago
    > Is there anyone out there with a good argument for why remote workers should be paid less? Lower expenses from commuting. Perhaps initially somewhat offset by the need for home office equipment/space.
k__ 7y ago
I had the idea of an remote apprenticeship startup to educate people at home in regulated jobs here in Germany. Well, that was a few years ago, and I guess the market will be flooded now.
somethoughts 7y ago
All remote work is not created equal. I think an aspect of remote work being a more seamless/smoother transition is for the distributed team to be in the same time zone or have less than 1 hour time difference. At my current company, we have conference calls between SF-Portland without much change in work/life. We evan have virtual lunches together. I recall having to do SF-Asia and even SF-Dallas and SF-Europe calls in my previous job and I was burnt out real quick. Just trying to plan a meeting that wasn't already a recurring scheduled meeting took about 2 days. [EDIT] Based on the initial responses I changed it from the same time zone being a key aspect to an aspect which makes the transition seamless/smoother.
- dictum 7y ago
  > I think a key aspect of remote work being successful is for the distributed team to be in the same time zone or have less than 1 hour time difference I think the exact time difference doesn't matter so much as everyone can be at work simultaneously at least 70/80% of the time.
- pedrosorio 7y ago
  SF-NY works fine
  - closeparen 7y ago
    SF-GRU also works really well as a cost of living arbitrage where the time difference doesn't hurt too much.
  - somethoughts 7y ago
    Agreed - SF-NY can work and many companies are doing it. Its more if a CEO/founder is finding sites for a second remote office from scratch all things being equal, SF-Seattle/Portland/LA or even SF-Reno/Sacramento/Santa Cruz/San Diego/Phoenix (if more cost of living arbitrage is desired) will be easier than SF/NY. - Impromptu virtual meetings do not need an additional 1-3 hour buffer at the beginning/end of the day to avoid disrupting the majority of people's daily work patterns. - In person visits can likely be done by driving versus flying. An if flying - a day trip can suffice. - No timezone/jetlag from a coast-coast red eye.
brenden2 7y ago
Keep in mind that those "work from home" jobs depend on people in China labouring away to produce your cheap computer hardware.
- kempbellt 7y ago
  I'd argue that a large majority of people who have "work from home" computer jobs either already have a computer that they can use for work, or their employer does. Or it can be purchased from already existing inventory (used or new). Also, a computer purchase for an employee isn't usually a frequent occurrence. Maybe once during hire, and once a year to stay up to date (if that). Computer manufacturers can probably take a break for a couple of months and the tech industry will survive.
  - brenden2 7y ago
    It's naive to think the whole world can just "work from home" indefinitely. Everything's interconnected, and the vast majority of jobs are still jobs that can't be done without humans labouring in meatspace. If you want to pretend the US is some magic island that doesn't depend on China, go for it.
- Noumenon72 7y ago
  Wow, that's scary. I expect these disruptions to continue for eighteen months. If a developer can't get a replacement computer, what good is our home office then?
  - brenden2 7y ago
    Let's hope it never comes to that.
- umanwizard 7y ago
  It also depends on people in Arizona laboring away to produce lettuce. What's your point? Nobody ever said that every job could be done from home.
ars 7y ago
If you look at these images: https://www.google.com/search?q=piecework%20from%20home&tbm=isch&safe=active&safe=active&tbs=rimg%3ACWqKwee01nVqImAKKespCKpy84Lpx-LFQC12RsF72suB7cM04zLOWQ4y3AmKrrcwnvf4KBFzUFAxIWPibqAZDSdWvoj87jzp_1dqcDDBbP8jpHRU7HSCChPkGhATYtBZgHxbOXtNVWHlXwZsqEgkKKespCKpy8xFOxgvhnHj9VCoSCYLpx-LFQC12EWu1O3CAMWIaKhIJRsF72suB7cMRF8xan6t7XScqEgk04zLOWQ4y3BGxTADB5uCTvSoSCQmKrrcwnvf4ER0hkVsNyUc1KhIJKBFzUFAxIWMRIqvlkUsl1VoqEgnibqAZDSdWvhEnFcBNE5iLuyoSCYj87jzp_1dqcEfaNsu97gqSqKhIJDDBbP8jpHRURmBtDfyEzym8qEgk7HSCChPkGhBHgow1V8De_1DyoSCQTYtBZgHxbOERB9os9bK8rUKhIJXtNVWHlXwZsR49UApPak9C1hZMvRYm7JCpg&hl=en&ved=0CAIQrnZqFwoTCJjc4cvyx-gCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAG&biw=1146&bih=1035 https://www.google.com/search?q=piecework%20from%20home&tbm=... You will see there is a lot more than can be done from home than people realize. Obviously it doesn't all translate over, there's a lot more machinery now. But if people had to work from home, people would get creative and there's more that could be done.
0xFACEFEED 7y ago
As someone who's worked from a lot and also worked from an office, I feel like there's an important component missing when discussing WFH for professions outside of tech. One important issue IMO is just having a workspace. Software engineers are kinda spoiled in this regard because we make the big bucks. We can afford to retrofit areas of our homes to create good working conditions. We can take our laptops to coffee shops in a pinch. I recently upgraded my living situation by moving into a much nicer place, but it's smaller so I ditched the "home office" setup I had before. Now with COVID I'm working in my dining room and on my couch. It's so much worse. It might sound silly but I'm putting a lot more wear/tear on my furniture by being around all day. My take on this is that homes aren't and never were designed for WFH conditions. There are so many details about offices that we take for granted. I found myself having to clean way more often and do way more dishes now that the entire family is stuck in the house together. Then there's a socialization aspect. Tech has a culture of "as long as you can do the job, it doesn't matter how you behave/dress/interact" -- this thinking is applied along a spectrum, some companies are more extreme than others about it. But a lot of professions like sales/legal/etc rely very heavily on close social interaction. Tech is also unique in this regard IMO.
- seanmcdirmid 7y ago
  We are looking to buy a new house soon and have made room for a home office a priority due to the current virus. Both my wife and I are working in our small apartment now while our 3 year old yells outside our second bedroom with grandma chasing after him. Ya...no, this isn't working.
- odysseus 7y ago
  Homes can be designed for working from home: Don't forget that you can have a comfortable climate controlled detached garage.
- HenryBemis 7y ago
  You got space limitations because you moved to a smaller flat. Office furniture is never a problem. You can make a table from IKEA (4 legs and the tabletop) can cost as low as £50 and if you pick them special legs you can make it a standing desk with the same cost. The only thing you can't cut corners on is the chair, a bad chair will ruin your health.
CiPHPerCoder 7y ago
> How many jobs can be done at home? Infinite. That's because the set of possible vocations is only bounded by human imagination. This results in an uncountable set, which would resolve to a value that approaches infinity. A more insightful question is, "How many of the jobs that people hold today can be done at home?" 34% seems like a reasonable metric.
- eeZah7Ux 7y ago
  Despite the downvotes you make a good point. The paper does not address the underlying assumption: jobs are fixed in number and type and we can only change the location. In reality, job markets are extremely elastic. Case in point: millions of jobs in the world exist only because a human worker is slightly cheaper than a machine at a given task.
sabujp 7y ago
I'll gladly WFH if the kids weren't here!
monadic2 7y ago
Tl;dr petite bourgeois If you think this is detracting from conversation, try reading a book.
motohagiography 7y ago
Head mounted displays that were immersive as a motorcycle helmet with headphones could suddenly move from being a luxury product to a substitute for a private space for an office in apartments with families. If I were in the business, I'd be re-marketing HMDs as a work from home privacy solution. What makes something mass market is it serves people and solves a problem for them, not something that's just entertaining. Edit: and someone's already there: https://www.techradar.com/news/the-cheapest-active-vr-headset-could-be-the-perfect-remote-working-tool https://www.techradar.com/news/the-cheapest-active-vr-headse...
droithomme 7y ago
> most jobs in finance, corporate management, and professional and scientific services could plausibly be performed at home Or some of this could simply not be done at all. > very few jobs in agriculture, hotels and restaurants, or retail Au contraire, all agriculture work can be done at home when we raise our own food. All teaching can also be done at home and currently is being done so. The basic need of a hotel, a place to sleep, and restauranting, of preparing and serving food, can be done at home. And retail is already done at home, store clerks are largely obsolete. What can't be done at home yet is delivery services and most manufacturing in its current state, but manufacturing probably could be done at home through expanding micromanufacturing. Networks of craftsmen shops running mini production lines can make a lot of things.
- alricb 7y ago
  Micromanufacturing, aka the cottage industry. Everything old is new again.
shirro 7y ago
I stopped going into the office a decade ago to be a home dad. I raised 3 kids at home while doing home duties and casual web dev and server support. It is very isolating and I think a lot of people are going to struggle with it. I have always been socially awkward, I didn't grow up with siblings and have always been comfortable with silence and something to read. But even I struggled a bit. I think most people should make extra time to keep in touch with colleagues and do video meetups and fun stuff with them. It might be disruptive to work and some people might want to do something else instead but I think the effort probably needs to be made.
badrabbit 7y ago
Look, I am just gonna say it a certain way: It is better now but there were long stretches in my life where the only in person human interaction I had was at work or at stores(until delivery apps became a thing) would have sucked big time if I did wfh then. I also did wfh doing call support and now IT/infosec stuff. Night and day! Team dynamics: not everyone can develop interpersonal relationships well when wfh compared do in person. Imagine being the new guy and have a million questions but your personality forces you to evaluate body language and greetings in person before you are comfortable approaching someone. Oh, and.. Some people have terrible home situation. I don't mean just kids but sick people to care for, abusive people living with them,loud roommates,etc .... WFH being the norm would suck,but companies should be much more accomodating these days.
Animats 7y ago
If it all goes in and out over a wire, a computer can probably do much of it now and more of it soon.
JSavageOne 7y ago
If you stare at a computer all day, ie. you have an office job, your job can be done from home. I really hope remote work becomes more accepted as an option. It's not even just about individual productivity and happiness, it's better for the environment. What annoys me on these threads is when I see people say "I don't like WFH, therefore other people shouldn't be able to WFH". There's nothing wrong with preferring to go into the office, but who gives you the right to tell others how they have to work? Everyone should have the freedom to work how they are most comfortable, so long as they can get the work done.
- non-entity 7y ago
  > "I don't like WFH, therefore other people shouldn't be able to WFH". Could you point me to an example of this, because I dont think I've ever seen this. The opposite, however I've seen pretty commonly where since "I like WFH so everyone should WFH".

205 points by erentz 7y ago

I'm a little confused by their definition of "jobs" here. Is this the absolute number of jobs? Or the types of jobs available? Looking at the article, they use wages to get a more firm grasp on this (saying something like 44% of wages could be made from home). If that's the case, what does that statistic say for the unemployment rate in the US, should social-distancing remain long term? Are we going to see >50% unemployment??

bdcravens 7y ago
A large number of the remaining 56% are classified as "essential": grocery and certain retail, public servants and first responders, healthcare, education, automotive services, etc. In Houston, for example, many of the energy sector jobs are classified as essential. Stay at home orders don't impact those jobs (though many of them may be operating at partial capacity)
- jbullock35 7y ago
  > A large number of the remaining 56% are classified as "essential": grocery and certain retail, public servants and first responders, healthcare, education [...] The authors already code 82% of teachers as able to work from home, albeit with difficulty. See the second footnote in the paper.
  - Noos 7y ago
    That's not just working from home if so, that's reassigning an industry from face to face to virtual, and if history is any guide a lot of teachers may lose their jobs as well as secondary jobs becoming lost too. Sort of a pyrrhic victory.
blendo 7y ago
I was also unclear about whether they mean "How many workers in the US could work from home", or whether "How many job categories can work from home". But they state "To answer these questions, we classify the feasibility of working at home for all occupations and merge this classi cation with occupational employment counts for the United States." So it looks like they're counting number of workers.
morgante 7y ago
> If that's the case, what does that statistic say for the unemployment rate in the US, should social-distancing remain long term? Are we going to see >50% unemployment?? Highly unlikely. The government will abandon social distancing long before tolerating a long-term 50+% unemployment rate.

ravenstine 7y ago

> Our classification implies that 34 percent of U.S. jobs can plausibly be performed at home. If even 25% of jobs could be made remote, that would be huge. The reduction in automobile traffic, the improved happiness of workers(who want to work remote), as well as parents being around more for their kids, would benefit society overall.

throw1234651234 7y ago
I have a feeling that a low double-digit percent of jobs will permanently convert to remote or partial remote after this experience. I have been in two companies that went remote, and the bosses don't want to, until they try and realize the convenience.
- ravenstine 7y ago
  The company I work for already is fully remote, but I heard from a colleague that their company, which was previously hesitant towards remote work, has seen a productivity increase after having been forced to do remote, and now plans to allow 100% remote work after lockdowns are lifted.
  - take_a_breath 7y ago
    ==I heard from a colleague that their company, which was previously hesitant towards remote work, has seen a productivity increase after having been forced to do remote== Could also be that employees, as a whole, are more worried about losing jobs in this environment and are producing more to protect themselves.
- bachmeier 7y ago
  Convenience is now only a minor part of it. Being a remote company provides crucial insurance. Even part of the company being remote will allow some operations to continue uninterrupted at a time like this.
- georgeecollins 7y ago
  Anecdote is not data, but I am realizing that I can be more productive at home than I guessed. Also I think my bosses are going to be more comfortable with me working from home after this. However, there is still so much knowledge / creative work that is best done face to face. What I can see happening in my work place is more people might take work at home days. There is no way we will want to keep taking important meetings on Zoom.

xt00 7y ago

Many people have brought this up, but there are definitely things to consider for a job to be done while working from home: 1) worker productivity (does it go up or down for all of these professions) 2) do companies want to pay you as much if you work from home? 3) is it sustainable for large swathes of people vs. small groups of people who self-select to like this work-style 4) will people abuse the system such that it ruins it for everybody else I can see a far more likely implementation of this would be a mixed case -- "work from home wednesdays" or something like that.. not friday or monday because then basically people would assume there is a certain amount of abuse of people working for 1 hour on Friday then starting their weekend early..

heymijo 7y ago
> 2) do companies want to pay you as much if you work from home? Is there anyone out there with a good argument for why remote workers should be paid less? Especially interested in hearing from anyone not incentivized by this practice (eg not the CEO or Chief People Officer of an org that practices this) > will people abuse the system such that it ruins it for everybody else An inevitable question and likely consequence. A counter question: are the myriad ways in-office employees game/abuse the system working materially worse than how remote workers might?
- gowld 7y ago
  > Is there anyone out there with a good argument for why remote workers should be paid less? supply and demand competition. Anything that makes labor easier increases supply, applying downward pressure on prices.
- Kalium 7y ago
  > Is there anyone out there with a good argument for why remote workers should be paid less? If I don't care where my team members are, why would I want two when I could have four of the same quality? Sounds attractive, I should think.
- the8472 7y ago
  > Is there anyone out there with a good argument for why remote workers should be paid less? Lower expenses from commuting. Perhaps initially somewhat offset by the need for home office equipment/space.

k__ 7y ago

I had the idea of an remote apprenticeship startup to educate people at home in regulated jobs here in Germany. Well, that was a few years ago, and I guess the market will be flooded now.

somethoughts 7y ago

All remote work is not created equal. I think an aspect of remote work being a more seamless/smoother transition is for the distributed team to be in the same time zone or have less than 1 hour time difference. At my current company, we have conference calls between SF-Portland without much change in work/life. We evan have virtual lunches together. I recall having to do SF-Asia and even SF-Dallas and SF-Europe calls in my previous job and I was burnt out real quick. Just trying to plan a meeting that wasn't already a recurring scheduled meeting took about 2 days. [EDIT] Based on the initial responses I changed it from the same time zone being a key aspect to an aspect which makes the transition seamless/smoother.

dictum 7y ago
> I think a key aspect of remote work being successful is for the distributed team to be in the same time zone or have less than 1 hour time difference I think the exact time difference doesn't matter so much as everyone can be at work simultaneously at least 70/80% of the time.
pedrosorio 7y ago
SF-NY works fine
- closeparen 7y ago
  SF-GRU also works really well as a cost of living arbitrage where the time difference doesn't hurt too much.
- somethoughts 7y ago
  Agreed - SF-NY can work and many companies are doing it. Its more if a CEO/founder is finding sites for a second remote office from scratch all things being equal, SF-Seattle/Portland/LA or even SF-Reno/Sacramento/Santa Cruz/San Diego/Phoenix (if more cost of living arbitrage is desired) will be easier than SF/NY. - Impromptu virtual meetings do not need an additional 1-3 hour buffer at the beginning/end of the day to avoid disrupting the majority of people's daily work patterns. - In person visits can likely be done by driving versus flying. An if flying - a day trip can suffice. - No timezone/jetlag from a coast-coast red eye.

brenden2 7y ago

Keep in mind that those "work from home" jobs depend on people in China labouring away to produce your cheap computer hardware.

kempbellt 7y ago
I'd argue that a large majority of people who have "work from home" computer jobs either already have a computer that they can use for work, or their employer does. Or it can be purchased from already existing inventory (used or new). Also, a computer purchase for an employee isn't usually a frequent occurrence. Maybe once during hire, and once a year to stay up to date (if that). Computer manufacturers can probably take a break for a couple of months and the tech industry will survive.
- brenden2 7y ago
  It's naive to think the whole world can just "work from home" indefinitely. Everything's interconnected, and the vast majority of jobs are still jobs that can't be done without humans labouring in meatspace. If you want to pretend the US is some magic island that doesn't depend on China, go for it.
Noumenon72 7y ago
Wow, that's scary. I expect these disruptions to continue for eighteen months. If a developer can't get a replacement computer, what good is our home office then?
- brenden2 7y ago
  Let's hope it never comes to that.
umanwizard 7y ago
It also depends on people in Arizona laboring away to produce lettuce. What's your point? Nobody ever said that every job could be done from home.

ars 7y ago

If you look at these images: https://www.google.com/search?q=piecework%20from%20home&tbm=isch&safe=active&safe=active&tbs=rimg%3ACWqKwee01nVqImAKKespCKpy84Lpx-LFQC12RsF72suB7cM04zLOWQ4y3AmKrrcwnvf4KBFzUFAxIWPibqAZDSdWvoj87jzp_1dqcDDBbP8jpHRU7HSCChPkGhATYtBZgHxbOXtNVWHlXwZsqEgkKKespCKpy8xFOxgvhnHj9VCoSCYLpx-LFQC12EWu1O3CAMWIaKhIJRsF72suB7cMRF8xan6t7XScqEgk04zLOWQ4y3BGxTADB5uCTvSoSCQmKrrcwnvf4ER0hkVsNyUc1KhIJKBFzUFAxIWMRIqvlkUsl1VoqEgnibqAZDSdWvhEnFcBNE5iLuyoSCYj87jzp_1dqcEfaNsu97gqSqKhIJDDBbP8jpHRURmBtDfyEzym8qEgk7HSCChPkGhBHgow1V8De_1DyoSCQTYtBZgHxbOERB9os9bK8rUKhIJXtNVWHlXwZsR49UApPak9C1hZMvRYm7JCpg&hl=en&ved=0CAIQrnZqFwoTCJjc4cvyx-gCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAG&biw=1146&bih=1035 https://www.google.com/search?q=piecework%20from%20home&tbm=... You will see there is a lot more than can be done from home than people realize. Obviously it doesn't all translate over, there's a lot more machinery now. But if people had to work from home, people would get creative and there's more that could be done.

0xFACEFEED 7y ago

As someone who's worked from a lot and also worked from an office, I feel like there's an important component missing when discussing WFH for professions outside of tech. One important issue IMO is just having a workspace. Software engineers are kinda spoiled in this regard because we make the big bucks. We can afford to retrofit areas of our homes to create good working conditions. We can take our laptops to coffee shops in a pinch. I recently upgraded my living situation by moving into a much nicer place, but it's smaller so I ditched the "home office" setup I had before. Now with COVID I'm working in my dining room and on my couch. It's so much worse. It might sound silly but I'm putting a lot more wear/tear on my furniture by being around all day. My take on this is that homes aren't and never were designed for WFH conditions. There are so many details about offices that we take for granted. I found myself having to clean way more often and do way more dishes now that the entire family is stuck in the house together. Then there's a socialization aspect. Tech has a culture of "as long as you can do the job, it doesn't matter how you behave/dress/interact" -- this thinking is applied along a spectrum, some companies are more extreme than others about it. But a lot of professions like sales/legal/etc rely very heavily on close social interaction. Tech is also unique in this regard IMO.

seanmcdirmid 7y ago
We are looking to buy a new house soon and have made room for a home office a priority due to the current virus. Both my wife and I are working in our small apartment now while our 3 year old yells outside our second bedroom with grandma chasing after him. Ya...no, this isn't working.
odysseus 7y ago
Homes can be designed for working from home: Don't forget that you can have a comfortable climate controlled detached garage.
HenryBemis 7y ago
You got space limitations because you moved to a smaller flat. Office furniture is never a problem. You can make a table from IKEA (4 legs and the tabletop) can cost as low as £50 and if you pick them special legs you can make it a standing desk with the same cost. The only thing you can't cut corners on is the chair, a bad chair will ruin your health.

CiPHPerCoder 7y ago

> How many jobs can be done at home? Infinite. That's because the set of possible vocations is only bounded by human imagination. This results in an uncountable set, which would resolve to a value that approaches infinity. A more insightful question is, "How many of the jobs that people hold today can be done at home?" 34% seems like a reasonable metric.

eeZah7Ux 7y ago
Despite the downvotes you make a good point. The paper does not address the underlying assumption: jobs are fixed in number and type and we can only change the location. In reality, job markets are extremely elastic. Case in point: millions of jobs in the world exist only because a human worker is slightly cheaper than a machine at a given task.

sabujp 7y ago

I'll gladly WFH if the kids weren't here!

monadic2 7y ago

Tl;dr petite bourgeois If you think this is detracting from conversation, try reading a book.

motohagiography 7y ago

Head mounted displays that were immersive as a motorcycle helmet with headphones could suddenly move from being a luxury product to a substitute for a private space for an office in apartments with families. If I were in the business, I'd be re-marketing HMDs as a work from home privacy solution. What makes something mass market is it serves people and solves a problem for them, not something that's just entertaining. Edit: and someone's already there: https://www.techradar.com/news/the-cheapest-active-vr-headset-could-be-the-perfect-remote-working-tool https://www.techradar.com/news/the-cheapest-active-vr-headse...

droithomme 7y ago

> most jobs in finance, corporate management, and professional and scientific services could plausibly be performed at home Or some of this could simply not be done at all. > very few jobs in agriculture, hotels and restaurants, or retail Au contraire, all agriculture work can be done at home when we raise our own food. All teaching can also be done at home and currently is being done so. The basic need of a hotel, a place to sleep, and restauranting, of preparing and serving food, can be done at home. And retail is already done at home, store clerks are largely obsolete. What can't be done at home yet is delivery services and most manufacturing in its current state, but manufacturing probably could be done at home through expanding micromanufacturing. Networks of craftsmen shops running mini production lines can make a lot of things.

alricb 7y ago
Micromanufacturing, aka the cottage industry. Everything old is new again.

shirro 7y ago

I stopped going into the office a decade ago to be a home dad. I raised 3 kids at home while doing home duties and casual web dev and server support. It is very isolating and I think a lot of people are going to struggle with it. I have always been socially awkward, I didn't grow up with siblings and have always been comfortable with silence and something to read. But even I struggled a bit. I think most people should make extra time to keep in touch with colleagues and do video meetups and fun stuff with them. It might be disruptive to work and some people might want to do something else instead but I think the effort probably needs to be made.

badrabbit 7y ago

Look, I am just gonna say it a certain way: It is better now but there were long stretches in my life where the only in person human interaction I had was at work or at stores(until delivery apps became a thing) would have sucked big time if I did wfh then. I also did wfh doing call support and now IT/infosec stuff. Night and day! Team dynamics: not everyone can develop interpersonal relationships well when wfh compared do in person. Imagine being the new guy and have a million questions but your personality forces you to evaluate body language and greetings in person before you are comfortable approaching someone. Oh, and.. Some people have terrible home situation. I don't mean just kids but sick people to care for, abusive people living with them,loud roommates,etc .... WFH being the norm would suck,but companies should be much more accomodating these days.

Animats 7y ago

If it all goes in and out over a wire, a computer can probably do much of it now and more of it soon.

JSavageOne 7y ago

If you stare at a computer all day, ie. you have an office job, your job can be done from home. I really hope remote work becomes more accepted as an option. It's not even just about individual productivity and happiness, it's better for the environment. What annoys me on these threads is when I see people say "I don't like WFH, therefore other people shouldn't be able to WFH". There's nothing wrong with preferring to go into the office, but who gives you the right to tell others how they have to work? Everyone should have the freedom to work how they are most comfortable, so long as they can get the work done.

non-entity 7y ago
> "I don't like WFH, therefore other people shouldn't be able to WFH". Could you point me to an example of this, because I dont think I've ever seen this. The opposite, however I've seen pretty commonly where since "I like WFH so everyone should WFH".