5 ms·

My biggest frustration with the WFH discussion has been that the vast majority of people say that the #1 (and sometimes only) reason they prefer WFH is to save

My biggest frustration with the WFH discussion has been that the vast majority of people say that the #1 (and sometimes only) reason they prefer WFH is to save time on the commute. But this has not led to any discussions on how we can actually improve the commute, improve housing policy so people can live closer to work, etc. Instead, people have simply decided that theh will WFH instead, an option which isn’t available to the majority of workers, who are generally not as privileged as the people who can WFH. The next step will be all the WFH people who are almost certainly significantly higher earners complaining about having to pay taxes towards improving commutes and public transit which they don’t even use, so gradually public transit will get worse and/or more expensive at the turnstile, making life even worse for the largely underprivileged who don’t have the option to WFH. The push for WFH has been approached entirely from an individual perspective, which will result in further separation between the privileged and the rest, a further rise in inequality, a further increase in social disunity and a further destruction in community. It didn’t have to be this way. We could have approached WFH in a much more community oriented way, having people WFH but simultaneously investing in making the lives of those who don’t/cannot WFH easier as well, through investing in better public transport, etc.

criddell 4y ago
> improve housing policy so people can live closer to work Or, improve labor policy so work becomes a much smaller part of most people's lives.
- Ancalagon 4y ago
  Hot take this is the right line of thought. Restructure society so we work less, not so that we can work more.
  - sahila 4y ago
    But doesn’t this drive home OP’s point further? For people who work in service jobs - healthcare, schools, shopping, and restaurants/cafes, for example - how would you approach working less? People want to go out and eat and places are already struggling to hire. Parents want in person learning for their young kids.
    - kjkjadksj 4y ago
      Pay people more. Wages have been flat for 50 years for these positions.
    - dinosaurdynasty 4y ago
      The only places struggling to hire are places not paying enough.
    - Ancalagon 4y ago
      Pay people more, hire more employees. The market will decide which businesses remain viable. I am honestly hopeful demand for places like restaurants decreases or the market becomes less viable because of the labor shortage, simply because that industry has mistreated its employees for so long and many have moved on the bigger and better things for themselves.
- listenallyall 4y ago
  Come on... people work far less than they ever did before, that should be pretty obvious if you just think about it. Further, tons of "work" is done with zero physical strain, lots of those "work" hours are the in-between stuff -- travel, meetings, calls, lunches -- meaning that actual hours laboring are even less. https://ourworldindata.org/working-hours https://ourworldindata.org/working-hours
  - yboris 4y ago
    Have you heard about 4DWW - Four Day Work Week? This is arguably the biggest and most-needed improvement in labor / worker rights in at least a few decades. I can't wait until it is implemented across the whole world. England, Portugal, and other countries are at the forefront already.
    - listenallyall 4y ago
      Hey, I like the idea of working less too. But why is this needed? If 4 becomes the law, how long until people will demand 3? And we have already experienced shortages of goods recently, how will things get made or shipped or fixed if people are working 20% less?
      - yboris 4y ago
        All the efficiencies and productivity gains we've seen in the last 30 years have not resulted in increasing wages, but instead resulted in higher incomes of the executives and owners. Perhaps more importantly, the 4DWW isn't a pie-in-the-sky proposal, there are numerous companies that have switched over and have found the productivity gains offset the lesser hours. As for "how long until people will demand 3?" - we'll see. When AI starts pumping out the same quality of work as humans do, should all humans starve? Or should all humans work fewer hours and capture the benefits?
        listenallyall 4y ago
        Wages have increased, but they've also been distributed to places like China, India, Vietnam, as business owners naturally seek low wage costs (and demanding 4-day work weeks will only accelerate the exportation of labor). Although many first-world countries' median wage hasn't increased much (despite wage growth all around in warehousing, fast-food, etc), the number of high-paying jobs in tech, finance, law, healthcare, media and more has certainly increased. How many software engineers were making $150-250k annually in 1997?
dont__panic 4y ago
On the other hand, allowing those who can WFH to do so clears up road space so that people who must WFO don't have as much traffic to deal with. When you live in a society like the USA that has already created a car-dominated dystopia, and those cars don't scale for everyone to commute at the same time without massive traffic problems... it does take some of the pressure off the system, and ought to help some of those WFO people's commutes. I think you're right that public transit won't fare well with WFH. But it was already so bad in the USA I'm not sure it can death spiral much more.
khyryk 4y ago
This privilege (which is really just code for $$$) you mention existed in the same exact way prior to mass WFH, except that it resulted in more air pollution, more wasteful traffic, etc. Individuals rationally take a small scale solution to a direct problem instead of potentially solving a huge problem in 50+ years. The post in general is like ranting about not collectively curing cancer when someone asks for a bandage for a small wound.
kjkjadksj 4y ago
Its not just the commute but the other things around the house you can parallelize e.g. during a zoom meeting and save time. Doing the dishes, laundry, working out, running errands midday without traffic, not having to go to the dmv on saturday. That really opens up a lot more time than just the commute. Its really an entire paradigm shift of changing work from a block of time removed from the day, to just a series of tasks in your job queue that has some home chore tasks as well that can be taken care of when its actually convenient. You basically become an hpc job scheduler. Thats way more efficient than the blocks of time approach with going into the office and not being able to do these things.
dinosaurdynasty 4y ago
As an individual I have essentially no ability to improve housing policy, etc. I can however apply for and work at WFH jobs.
asciimov 4y ago
I don't want to live downtown! I want separation between my neighbors so I don't have to hear them, and so they don't have to hear me. I lived in apartments for nearly 15 years... never again. We also have the cost of housing. I can't afford to live anywhere close to the places that tech places typically pick, and they like picking downtown because it's cool, hip, and trendy. Thanks to investors, people moving from the west coast to my city, and the significant lack of affordable housing being built, I had to move even further away from downtown to afford a house.
lolinder 4y ago
> But this has not led to any discussions on how we can actually improve the commute, improve housing policy so people can live closer to work, etc. Letting most office workers not commute is the fastest way to improve the commute of those who must. Letting most office workers not live next to their company's headquarters is the fastest way to free up housing space near company headquarters. Making marginal improvements to the commute of 100% of workers pales in comparison to ending commutes altogether for 20% of workers. It doesn't matter if a lot of people still have to go to work, the ecological and economic benefits of getting that many people off the roads are massive, especially for those who still have to drive to work.
stripline 4y ago
I actually enjoy my commute. About 30-35 minutes each way. Gives me time to listen to a podcast and mentally separate my work and home lives.

criddell 4y ago

> improve housing policy so people can live closer to work Or, improve labor policy so work becomes a much smaller part of most people's lives.

Ancalagon 4y ago
Hot take this is the right line of thought. Restructure society so we work less, not so that we can work more.
- sahila 4y ago
  But doesn’t this drive home OP’s point further? For people who work in service jobs - healthcare, schools, shopping, and restaurants/cafes, for example - how would you approach working less? People want to go out and eat and places are already struggling to hire. Parents want in person learning for their young kids.
  - kjkjadksj 4y ago
    Pay people more. Wages have been flat for 50 years for these positions.
  - dinosaurdynasty 4y ago
    The only places struggling to hire are places not paying enough.
  - Ancalagon 4y ago
    Pay people more, hire more employees. The market will decide which businesses remain viable. I am honestly hopeful demand for places like restaurants decreases or the market becomes less viable because of the labor shortage, simply because that industry has mistreated its employees for so long and many have moved on the bigger and better things for themselves.
listenallyall 4y ago
Come on... people work far less than they ever did before, that should be pretty obvious if you just think about it. Further, tons of "work" is done with zero physical strain, lots of those "work" hours are the in-between stuff -- travel, meetings, calls, lunches -- meaning that actual hours laboring are even less. https://ourworldindata.org/working-hours https://ourworldindata.org/working-hours
- yboris 4y ago
  Have you heard about 4DWW - Four Day Work Week? This is arguably the biggest and most-needed improvement in labor / worker rights in at least a few decades. I can't wait until it is implemented across the whole world. England, Portugal, and other countries are at the forefront already.
  - listenallyall 4y ago
    Hey, I like the idea of working less too. But why is this needed? If 4 becomes the law, how long until people will demand 3? And we have already experienced shortages of goods recently, how will things get made or shipped or fixed if people are working 20% less?
    - yboris 4y ago
      All the efficiencies and productivity gains we've seen in the last 30 years have not resulted in increasing wages, but instead resulted in higher incomes of the executives and owners. Perhaps more importantly, the 4DWW isn't a pie-in-the-sky proposal, there are numerous companies that have switched over and have found the productivity gains offset the lesser hours. As for "how long until people will demand 3?" - we'll see. When AI starts pumping out the same quality of work as humans do, should all humans starve? Or should all humans work fewer hours and capture the benefits?
      - listenallyall 4y ago
        Wages have increased, but they've also been distributed to places like China, India, Vietnam, as business owners naturally seek low wage costs (and demanding 4-day work weeks will only accelerate the exportation of labor). Although many first-world countries' median wage hasn't increased much (despite wage growth all around in warehousing, fast-food, etc), the number of high-paying jobs in tech, finance, law, healthcare, media and more has certainly increased. How many software engineers were making $150-250k annually in 1997?

dont__panic 4y ago

On the other hand, allowing those who can WFH to do so clears up road space so that people who must WFO don't have as much traffic to deal with. When you live in a society like the USA that has already created a car-dominated dystopia, and those cars don't scale for everyone to commute at the same time without massive traffic problems... it does take some of the pressure off the system, and ought to help some of those WFO people's commutes. I think you're right that public transit won't fare well with WFH. But it was already so bad in the USA I'm not sure it can death spiral much more.

khyryk 4y ago

This privilege (which is really just code for $$$) you mention existed in the same exact way prior to mass WFH, except that it resulted in more air pollution, more wasteful traffic, etc. Individuals rationally take a small scale solution to a direct problem instead of potentially solving a huge problem in 50+ years. The post in general is like ranting about not collectively curing cancer when someone asks for a bandage for a small wound.

kjkjadksj 4y ago

Its not just the commute but the other things around the house you can parallelize e.g. during a zoom meeting and save time. Doing the dishes, laundry, working out, running errands midday without traffic, not having to go to the dmv on saturday. That really opens up a lot more time than just the commute. Its really an entire paradigm shift of changing work from a block of time removed from the day, to just a series of tasks in your job queue that has some home chore tasks as well that can be taken care of when its actually convenient. You basically become an hpc job scheduler. Thats way more efficient than the blocks of time approach with going into the office and not being able to do these things.

dinosaurdynasty 4y ago

As an individual I have essentially no ability to improve housing policy, etc. I can however apply for and work at WFH jobs.

asciimov 4y ago

I don't want to live downtown! I want separation between my neighbors so I don't have to hear them, and so they don't have to hear me. I lived in apartments for nearly 15 years... never again. We also have the cost of housing. I can't afford to live anywhere close to the places that tech places typically pick, and they like picking downtown because it's cool, hip, and trendy. Thanks to investors, people moving from the west coast to my city, and the significant lack of affordable housing being built, I had to move even further away from downtown to afford a house.

lolinder 4y ago

> But this has not led to any discussions on how we can actually improve the commute, improve housing policy so people can live closer to work, etc. Letting most office workers not commute is the fastest way to improve the commute of those who must. Letting most office workers not live next to their company's headquarters is the fastest way to free up housing space near company headquarters. Making marginal improvements to the commute of 100% of workers pales in comparison to ending commutes altogether for 20% of workers. It doesn't matter if a lot of people still have to go to work, the ecological and economic benefits of getting that many people off the roads are massive, especially for those who still have to drive to work.

stripline 4y ago

I actually enjoy my commute. About 30-35 minutes each way. Gives me time to listen to a podcast and mentally separate my work and home lives.