Availability for space for one. Moving your whole family in a different even state for the other -- which might not be an option, breaking lease etc during a pa

Availability for space for one. Moving your whole family in a different even state for the other -- which might not be an option, breaking lease etc during a pandemic. And not all employers have clarified when they expect employees to come back. Are you going to move across states for half a year, 3 months, less? Also, those lunches are not free: employers offer them as part of the compensation and to keep you at the office working late. Compensation negotiations always bring up the benefits as an item of your compensation. If a company makes the argument that they are paying you in fact x,000 more in the form of benefits, they are now breaking this agreement (even if it is oral) and not paying you. (I have had a "if you end up working too late and there is no food in the office, we will pay for the food and keep working." style of clause). Similarly, some people do negotiate working from home most of the time and doing a 3-4 hour commute once a week in exchange for reduced salary, to enjoy a larger and cheaper home. That is an obligation the employer placed on the employee and asks for money to lift it, and allow them to live somewhere further away. Related to the workspace, I do personally like to change working environments (e.g. coffee shops at times, quiet room at others) etc. Most people though need to consistently separate work and rest of their lives. And the workspace is the responsibility of the employee unless you have a remote work contract. (Certain countries have legislation on the matter in fact for both cases.) Imagine a car mechanic being asked now to service cars at their home instead. For engineers the work environment is not a power plug, some paper and a laptop, even for software engineers. That is romantic naivete perhaps, and dangerous thinking. If employers send surveys around and ask point blank if people have screens, space, good desk and chair, keyboards, high speed stable connection -- home connections now have to take the slack from enterprise ones -- good access to all the servers, they disagree with the above thinking. They wouldn't be paying for all of the above in the first place, otherwise.