cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/1125686
Archived version: https://archive.ph/vL1mC
Archived version: https://web.archive.org/web/20230806071111/https://www.businessinsider.com/employees-work-from-home-benefits-as-good-as-raise-2023-8
At least. If you work an 8 hour day, a 0.5 hour commute each way adds an extra 12.5% to work time commitment each day, and it’s considered unpaid time.
And your gas and car wear and tear
Yep, the IRS estimates that it is $0.655/mi in wear and tear on one’s car via the 2023 Mileage Rate.
That depends a LOT on the car.
A small suzuki would be a hell of a lot cheaper than a BMW 7 series… (not in the price tag, but… running costs)
Sure, but that is the rate that the IRS has come up with as an estimate/reimbursement amount.
A mile of city traffic is tremendously different than a mile of rural driving.
- You might need to buy additional food
- Wear and tear of work attire
- Might need to pay extra for someone to watch pet/child
Also there are additional costs of time
- Extra time shaving or similar (if you know you are staying home some things can be delayed a bit)
- Possibly extra time to prepare food
- Traffic/weather delays
- Extra effort for small things easily manage while at home e.g accepting deliveries, watching pets or opening for maintenance workers
That’s of the top of my head, so 1 hour lost per day is a low estimate.
Yeah, for me WFH is a lot more than 8% raise. It’s a lot cheaper. We were paying to work and didn’t even realized it
Also your spine, tailbone, piriformis, hamstrings, and psoas muscles. Cars are bad for your back.
I couldn’t believe how much more time it felt like I had in the day just cutting out the short work commute. You don’t really realize the extent of how much time you waste going into work until it’s gone. Even a short commute adds up quick when you include all the time to get ready in the morning and decompress at night. Plus all the extra maintenance on a daily driver and gas… Companies making people go into the office when it’s not even necessary are just power hungry morons. That’s all there is to it.
Yup. I have meetings at 8AM. If I had to do them in the office, I’ll have to be up at 6AM to get ready and leave to be able to get to the office in time. If I do it at home, I wake up at 7:50, which gives me almost 2 hours of extra sleep.
If I leave the office at 5PM, I’ll get home around 6PM. At home, I can log off as soon as the clock strikes 5, and now I have an extra hour of time to do whatever.
That adds up to around 3 hours a day that I save from not commuting to an office.
And for many, half an hour primping in order to be seen in public. I guess if you’re still in vid convos that somewhat still applies, but for others, now you can lay around in your underwear and stink and still get work done.
My wife was talking about this recently. She used to wake up at 5:30AM everyday, take a shower, blowdry her hair and style it, put on makeup, and prep her lunch by 7AM. Then she’d set out on her 1.5 hour commute to the office.
Once we started working from home, all of that extra time went to sleeping well and relaxing.
Working from home made me decide that I will never wear uncomfortable clothes again. I’ve seen the other side I will never go back
If you have complicated health problems that can increase the amount of time done “primping” as well. I generally have to be awake three to four hours before I have to be anywhere and it’s a fucking nightmare.
The traveling time I’m saving by working from home, is directly reinvested into having a walk with the lady and the dogs, including sitting on a bench in the sunshine including a coffee, and if the mood is right, we’re staying for my first meeting at 10:00, …
Money can’t buy this, …
Sorry to hear about your troubles :-(
I went from commuting 1-3 hours a day to zero commute. It is unbelievable how much of a quality of life improvement it is.
I am grateful I worked in a couple offices before switching to fully remote for my next few jobs, because it showed me how much better remote working is for me.
People don’t like offices and are more productive when they’re happy. Who knew?
I did. I always knew.
Bullshit. You only knew since I told you on Thursday.
Companies forcing people back to the office are a red flag for bad management, so I’m sure that’s another reason they’re seeing people leave.
My company realized that they can remove office space and use that money for more employees. What a fucking crazy concept.
Honestly. It’s about more than money.
If your boss says you must return to the office, after 3 years of WFH. At best, it shows that they do not value or respect you, and are just making an arbitrary decision in a bid to sell more stocks.
At worst, there might be some insidious reason to make employees physically available. Maybe they are getting a kickback somehow, or selling data that they can only get when you are there, or maybe they are just horny and want to seduce you sexually.
A remote worker is often happier, more productive, and cost less to employ even if they are paid the same as an on-site worker. Offices do not have to provide parking, seating, HVAC, power, wifi, and will even have less physical security vectors.
If some people prefer to go into an office, then it should be optional. Not a hybrid model where they force you to come a certain number of days a week.
At the end of the day unless you are on some kind of probation or evaluation period WFH should be the default when ever possible.
Control is another thing. I can’t tell you the amount of execs I’ve heard say “they’re losing control of their company” or “I don’t feel I have the same control over my people”. It’s crazy that they think that. What do they think the past 3 years have been when they’ve gotten record profits “oh, but our profits would be even better if we had people back in the office”. Sadly no amount of data will override the entrepreneurial “it could always be more” what if that they throw out.
I’m working in IT and as my last team lead hasn’t had any technical knowledge in my area, and he didn’t had to for his job, he wouldn’t even be able to control what I’m doing, …
He couldn’t control whether you’re doing your work properly, but he can control that you "pretend* to be controlled by him.
It’s never about making you a better worker, it’s just about the illusion of control.
Think about it, when was the last time you had an interaction with your superior that actually had anything to do with your actual job? It’s all just a huge charade.
Any executive who has “lost control” of their business by allowing their employees to work from home is no more than the ring master of a runaway circus that they never actually controlled to begin with.
I’ve had the unfortunate displeasure of working for at least one company that made a full time job of keeping their employees under their thumb and I can say this much: the more you micromanage your workforce, the better your workforce becomes at professional time wasting. By that I mean finding creative ways to look very busy while achieving nothing of benefit to the organization.
But then again, much of the corporate world runs on incompetence so poor business decisions based on some executives feelings, rather than statistics, aren’t exactly rare.
Can confirm. I quit my last job because they told us to come back to the office. In 2020, when COVID was still in full swing. And being remote was our company’s entire business model.
People don’t quit jobs, they quit managers.
I’m on my second probationary period entirely WFH, you shouldn’t be required to work in the office unless the job physically requires it. Return to office is very often a big power grab by shitty management that don’t know how to measure outcomes properly and instead prefer to micromanage. It is one of the biggest red flags.
I agree with almost everything hog say, and strongly think WFH is the future and worth the costs.
But I think physical security concerns are a fair one for some companies to hold for WFH, if they handle sensitive data where leaking is a concern.
Commuting is also a nightmare. Thats 1-2 hours a day of slog to get to an arbitrary location to do a job that I could do at home. Combine this with school drop offs and pick ups and the ability to do life admin during the week instead of cramming it all on a Saturday with everyone else like pre COVID and WFH is a winner.
I love those benefits. I would be extremely upset if I had to go back to the office. I’m more comfortable at home and I’m able to help my wife care for my son who is special needs. I save on gas and wear and tear on my car. The fact that I can listen to my music while just wearing shorts and a t-shirt was a game changer. IMO people in general suck and it’s nice not to have to interact with them face to face on a daily basis. Some of my coworkers say they miss being in the office. I think they’re nuts.
Also for people that can’t WFH. I’m stuck in a traffic jam every day because of office workers that arbitrarily have to go to office.
It’s not a perk. Don’t reinforce their framing
I have not read the article yet but the headline saying “equivalent to an 8% raise” does not just have to mean some kind of soft value. I have to drive 50 km each way to my office. I am much more likely to eat out while at work ( or to hit a drive-thru on the way home ). Given the price of gas where I live, going to the office probably costs me $50 a day more than staying home. That is $50 after tax so you can simplistically double that in terms of salary that it consumes. If I have two jobs to choose from, from a purely financial stand-point, my current job and a fully remote one that pays me $100 less per day are equivalent in terms of the value they bring to my family.
Crap. I have been a “want to be in the office some of the time” guy but making me actually type this out has made me question that. I think I need to start shopping my CV.
I can’t go back to working in an office full time anymore. It would be a really difficult adjustment especially losing the time to commuting and needing to deal with child care. Plus we found that we no longer needed a second car anymore since we were both at home so we sold one. Our life is built around not having to commute anymore.
The push has nothing to do with anything but getting money back into real estate. The majority of wealthy people’s money is tied up in either oil or real estate. Billion dollar office buildings going unused is unexplainable to the oligarchy. And I don’t use the word Oligarchy lightly. Combined with less oil being used moving people around, and you have the most powerful people in the western world yelling at business executives to get their workers back in the office or they’ll be unable to barrow money from the 0.0001% small companies don’t have a lot of debt from the Oligarchy so they don’t have to listen to them. But if you know anything, wealthy people don’t like it when the poors don’t filter their money upwards so this fight is long from over.
Don’t forget micromanaging bosses who can’t stand not being able to watch their employees at all times.
It’s not like the land wouldn’t be viable for high end housing if the corps could push for rezoning. It doesn’t have to stay only office space.
Conversion would cost billions for most of those buildings. And many of those areas can’t support a population increase on the level of hundreds of thousands of people. It’s do able but these people are not willing to do anything that improves humanity.
I’m right there with you. It’s just incompatible with how I want to live my life and the cost savings and time savings are unbelievable.
Keep in mind this does not just apply to ‘top talent’.
Anyone who is confident they can find something elsewhere and have a good enough resume to land a hybrid/WFH job will do so, if pushed.
My parent company issued an RTO for everyone stating the typical corporate talking points (we did great during COVID but now we need to all come back within a month because we all work better together, blah, blah, blah). A half hour later an HR rep had to clarify it was meant to apply only for the parent company. I imagine the parent company is doing poorly and is trying to shake off some workers to cut down on its payroll. The only reason I can think of why they can’t force my smaller company is because we’re actually making them a lot of money so far.
I prefer to think of myself as top talent though
My coworkers and I figure it at about 20% raise. No need for a second vehicle for the household, less money on food and clothes, plus the extra time.
Crazy that it’s so low. I’d assume people who commute to work waste like an hour minimum going to and from work, so 1/9th of their work day is just unpaid “work” as far as I’m concerned.
That’s ignoring all the benefits in comfort at home. I’m surprised it’s just 8%.
I’m not surprised; WFH is a great benefit to workers. The big thing is going to be how companies choose to balance remote and in-person work and it is going to be wildly different across different industries.
I could trade my WFH for a room with a view and a door. :) fuck openspace and flexdesks!
Honestly I wouldn’t. I can’t think of anything that would make me work in an office again. I can’t do it.
8% seems extremely low. You could double my pay and I don’t think I’d stop working from home
That’s what I’m saying. Unless they talk about hybrid then yeah it’s equivalent to 8%, but if we’re talking full remote try more like 800% raise to get me back into an office. lol
You could triple my pay and I’d still probably say no.
It might be the average. Some pepole like working from office beacuse they feel lonely at home or they want to separate their work space from their home space.
Or don’t have the space at home, especially if it’s two or more people at a time
I’m lucky because I have room in the house for desks for me and my wife that are in different rooms, and not in our bedroom
That’s a luxury many people don’t have
From experience I have seen how employers/government were forced back to the office. My Indian colleagues had to return to their offices because the office buildings were empty and it cost money. Government officials either owned or had friends own office buildings and it made monetary sense for them to force workers back to the offices. It was a play between corrupt officials and businesses, nothing more. Well, that and a profound and deep distrust of their workforce. It was a sad sight to see that happening to them.
My guess is that this could also occur the same way in the west.
Government officials either owned or had friends own office buildings and it made monetary sense for them to force workers back to the offices.
Even that is sunk-cost fallacy. If they own the buildings, that means they’re already paid for. The only money they lose is theoretical and non-existent.
Some collect rent from sub companies, some have fears of devaluation of buildings if not occupied, etc. Plenty of angles where the lost money.
Right, theoretical money. “Opportunity cost.” They’re not losing anything, they’re missing out on potentially making more.
Boo hoo
Hey, I agree. It is about corrupt officials and businesses who want to make more. I’m not burning a candle for the (perceived) plight of these monsters 😀
The giant multinational corporation that owns the company that owns the company that owns the buildings is the same multinational corporation that owns the company that leases the office space.
How are they going to surreptitiously pull money out of the country otherwise?
On the sustainability front:
WFH means people aren’t commuting. This is good, as we use less energy, particularly gas in our cars. On the down side, public transit agencies may have to dramatically cut service, increasing people’s reliance on cars to get around. At an extreme level, they may go bankrupt due to lack of ridership.
Energy - home energy use has increased home residential energy use by between 7% and 23%. Lower income residents who do not have air conditioning can also suffer disproportionately. Higher income workers can readily afford expensive home upgrades, like adding a home office. Since empty commercial buildings still need to be heated and cooled, the energy savings aren’t as great.
Real Estate - the US will need to delete 18% of its commercial real estate. There is trillions of dollars worth of commercial real estate debt maturing in the next 3 years that will be worthless. I’ve actually seen vacancy rates approaching 30% in many downtown markets.
This will leave every major city with a giant hole in its central city and cause major economic disruption in both the real estate investment market, construction I distry and walkability of cities. We may be staring down the barrel of another “white flight to the suburbs” that we saw empty out cities from the 1950s through the late 1990s.
The upside to these empty buidings is they can - and should be - transitioned to housing. It’s just the rich companies who own the buildings don’t want to have to invest any money in that.
Gov’ts should force them to, but that won’t happen either. :/
I am all for converting commercial to residential. However, a civil engineer or architect (I can’t remember)on reddit explained all of the reasons that’s not practical or sometimes even feasible due to how commercial buildings are constructed. Plumbing, electric, HVAC, etc aren’t designed for units. Retro fitting is cost prohibitive to the point where they’d need to be torn down and built from scratch.
I don’t know how accurate that is, but it sounded legit.
Yet other engineers have said it can be done by refitting the window-facing offices as sets of single/double units with the interior of the floor as communal kitchen/gathering spaces, and separate floors for larger family units and spaces.
It’s not that hard to figure out ways to do it but companies will have to be forced, either by threat of bankruptcy or gov’t rules.
communal kitchens sounds like a freaking nightmare. Thats not realistic or practical. You are asking people to “just change their culture and social norms”.
You seem to think that everyone would want what you want.
If it’s not to your taste, don’t live there. But there are thousands of unhoused people who may very well enjoy that vs living in a shelter or on the street.
I would rather make 50k WFH than 100k in an office.
For double the salary, I’d need to think long and hard about it tbh.
For me it would heavily depend on where the office is located relative to my apartment, and how long my commute would turn out to be. More than 15-20 minutes by bike is a no-go (I live in Europe).
Also assuming the requirement to be in the office isn’t a huge red flag for bad management in the first place.
Well obviously the commute should be within a reasonable distance, I wouldn’t spend 5 hours a day in a car or train for it. But let’s say the total time spend back and forth is about 1,5 - 2 hours total. I feel that’s worth the time spend for a hypothetical double salary.
Obligatory presence in the office is indeed a red flag if it doesn’t actually provide a benefit to the role. To clarify, I’m 100% WFH in Denmark so I’m not advocating to push people into an office building but there’s definitely a point where nearly everyone would go into the office full-time, if salary and benefits are high enough.
Lol, my family can’t afford to live on $50k a year. So that’s a hard no for me.
Hahaha, yeah definitely a no for the family man. But as a single man 50k is fine, and the flexibility is worth more than a 100% raise.
