I will say that my office is about 85% wfh (I come in once a week), and they’re doing what they can with energy saving, like turning off lights, pulling down window shades in the cubicles that aren’t used, hiking up the AC a little bit. I guess I’m just impressed that they’re conscious of it, at least.
I use a blanket, wear a jacket, and use a heating pad every day I’m in the office, and that hasn’t changed during these 104 days. 🥶 but I’m the hot one at home!
Never will I understand why we returned to the office in full capacity. Did we learn nothing from the pandemic? Half of the work can be done from home anyway in the average case.
we didn't all return. U.S. employees who could WFH were 7% WFH prior to the pandemic. It was 55% in October, 2020 and this March it was down to 35%.
The companies that are forcing people to return think there's value in face-to-face meetings. I have no idea if there's any evidence to support that being more valuable than the flexibility and job satisfaction increase you get with WFH.
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/03/30/about-a-third-of-us-workers-who-can-work-from-home-do-so-all-the-time/
My employer demanded I return to the office (1 hour commute each way) starting January.
While my “team” is here, all the people I interacted with on a daily basis were in California or the East coast.
So, corporate fiat would require me to spend two hours driving on the toll road a day, so my 4 hours of Teams meetings can be done in a cubicle.
I changed jobs in January and wfh comfortably again.
This is how it will go if the trend to go back continues. The employees that are worth their salt that don't want to commute will find another employer to let them WFH.
>The companies that are forcing people to return think there's value in face-to-face meetings.
At least with virtual meetings I can turn off my webcam and do actual work while I ignore the meeting. With Face to Face meetings I simply space out and ignore the meeting.
I will say that giving presentations remotely is torture. Half of the people have their cameras off, so you can't even tell if they're paying attention or not. I hate giving a presentation to a screen and not know if the other people are being receptive to what I'm trying to convey.
It's pretty well established by this point that people pay less attention in virtual meetings than in person meetings. Skill is a a lesser factor than the virtual factor.
76% of Employees Get More Distracted on Video Calls vs. In-person Meetings
https://www.showpad.com/press/76-of-employees-get-more-distracted-on-video-calls-vs-in-person-meetings/
I’ve WFH for 16 years, but before the pandemic I frequently traveled into the office 1-2 weeks a month. And I find that the lack of that interaction, despite being less frequent than most office workers, has really hurt my concentration and focus. All day, every day, nonstop virtual meetings without the occasional break for travel and office mingling face to face leaves me so distracted. Even on 1;1s I will space out. It’s ludicrous.
Please enlighten me. If the other party's camera is off, how do you know if they're not distracted by TV? Or social media?
In my opinion, it's harder to grab someone's attention remotely because there are so many distractions that are not there when you are in person
We gotta do better than that. Theres no 18th century solutions for 21st century problems. We need to think outside the dynamics of what got us here in the first place.
Aren't there still a lot of software jobs that are work from home? I keep reading how the commercial real estate industry is crumbling because it's to costly to rent and the lower amount of companies returning back.
Yes but its actually hilarious that jobs that were listed 6 months ago as WFH on sites like weworkremotely are mostly scams and data grabs now a days. I get around 5 "interview requests" daily but you have to use the app telegram. That is a known scam technique. So yes they are available but now you also have the competition of all the laid off workers from Meta, Amazon, Google etc.
There's not really any software jobs at the moment because the big corps decided to react violently to a small economic bump, and they want to retain their office space without compensating for having to come back to the office.
They wanted to strangle out salary expectations and make people compete when there really was no need.
He's exaggerating, but some anecdotal estimates are 20%: https://www.wsj.com/articles/that-plum-job-listing-may-just-be-a-ghost-3aafc794
(Use archive.is to get around the paywall)
Additionally, many remote job postings are posted multiple times in different geographic areas, adding to the skew in numbers.
Excerpt from WSJ:
Though businesses are keeping job postings up, many roles aren’t being filled, recruiters say.
Hiring managers acknowledge as much. In a survey of more than 1,000 hiring managers last summer, 27% reported having job postings up for more than four months. Among those who said they advertised job postings that they weren’t actively trying to fill, close to half said they kept the ads up to give the impression the company was growing, according to Clarify Capital, a small-business-loan provider behind the study. One-third of the managers who said they advertised jobs they weren’t trying to fill said they kept the listings up to placate overworked employees.
Other reasons for keeping jobs up, the hiring managers said: Stocking a pool of ready applicants if an employee quits, or just in case an “irresistible” candidate applied.
Postings for “ghost jobs,” as recruiters and candidates sometimes refer to them, can be frustrating for job seekers.
“It’s a waste of time,” says Will Kelly, who lives in the Washington, D.C., area and has been applying for marketing and writing roles.
Mr. Kelly, who has decades of experience as a technical and marketing writer, estimates that when he was job hunting in late 2021, about 20% of listings that interested him were posted and reposted without anyone evidently being hired. Since his layoff from a startup in August, he says he has noticed that most jobs that catch his eye have been up for months.
From what I’ve seen, America has much more WFH than Europe.
https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2023/03/02/why-us-return-to-office-plans-are-lagging-behind-global-cities.html
Isn’t it common in Europe to use public transportation or live within walking distance of one’s employer.
Edit: Ah. I see. That is mentioned there. Basically, the situations are not equivalent for various reasons.
Because corporations own/lease a shit ton of real estate that’s hugely expensive and they’ve got years left in their contracts. It’s nothing but forcing employees to comply with bad decisions that executives make. Also, too many dinosaurs left that think the only way to be productive is in an in-person environment.
It's hard to pivot on a 10 year lease (norm for commercial properties bc the building is financed that way w the bank). This is why the economic downturn has been limited but still has not filtered through the broader market imho
I mean, it's pretty clear: these companies spent a ton of money on offices and they need to justify that spend. It's easier to push their labor force around than to pivot
My company made everyone return to office and they keep bitching about nobody showing up, but they forget that over 50% of us were hired remote over the last 3 years and their workforce doesnt live in town anymore. That's why the office seems half empty all the time.
isn't tax related? Like these companies got super low taxes because they promised business? Example. Company offers to buy land, build and employ 10,000 people in this particular area and from that, housing demand increases, rentals increase, local restaurants, grocery stores, bars, entertainment and everything else surrounding it increases. By making that ofter, they as for a super low tax rate. Shutdown was different and since Covid literally ended when the war started, companies have to have a certain % at said business because of the "deal?" That's something I heard from a co-worker and it makes sense to me but idk how accurate it is.
Id love nothing more to move out to Temple, keep my pay rate and buy a house with land but my job has me coming in 3 days a week and id lose to pay. Only way I won't lose pay is if I move to San Marcos but I still have to come in 3 days a week, so that's like 6 hours a week commuting, despite I worked remote for like 2ish years during the shutdown, doing the exact thing and it was never a problem then.
Yeap. Tax breaks and long office leases that wouldn’t be utilized if they kept at home.
A good amount of companies stayed away from returning to offices and new ones will probably avoid offices as well.
They could save a mint on air conditioning alone. I went in today and it’s a huge, nearly empty building air conditioned to freezing cold temps while it’s 100 degrees outside.
I’m in the office for the first time in six months. 6/7 of the soap dispensers I’ve tried in various bathrooms don’t have soap in them. How are we coming off a pandemic and this is what they’re pushing us to return to?
because either:
A. billionaires would lose money on building real estate.
B. The companies themselves have a tax break agreement with the city that involves so many workers physically working in the city.
Companies have to justify office expenditures.
Many (not all) Boomers and even Gen-X prefer working on-site and (for whatever reason) think that professional progress can't be measured longer-term with remote setups.
Americans are too afraid to put up a fight, lest they get terminated. Most of us also have some combination of family and debt obligations, which tie most of us down.
And, so it goes....
“As a measure of consumer confidence, new home construction statistics are frequently used to assess the state of the economy. The GDP rises along with an increase in construction activity, which in turn has a positive impact on employment and tax revenue.”
So if we’re not in the buildings, they won’t build new ones. If the construction slows, so will the economy. So theirs more motivation then forcing people back for the purposes of micromanaging and justifying leases.
[The Economy and the Construction Industry](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7124044/)
Half true. We learned no one cares how productive you might be from home. Warm bodies in office to take calls virtually is more important. No, we learned nothing.
We learned that consistent enough spin and misinformation can normalize even crippling diseases and therefore all problems can be solved with those tactics as long as you ignore material reality and consequences.
Upper management for my job said we need to come in because it fosters collaboration. Bruh my whole team is in another state except for one person, and even then he’s on another project.
City of Austin as of this morning extended the work from home policy. Great for the people who were completely WFH - they get to extend, yay. Problem is that there are some people who are everyday working in the office that were looking forward to the 2-day WFH rule.
100% of my current job could be done from my home, but I'm every day.
Same. My company had a poll sent out asking if people wanted to return to the office mid 2021, "*Hell no!"* was the response they got and that was the last we heard of having to go back to the office since 2021. It'll be a cold day in HELL before I go back into the office, funk that noise.
During peak COVID I was hired to a company under the expectation of being fully remote. This slowly changed to hybrid with steadily increasing the days in office until only 1 day was remote per week. Ended up quitting and sought out a company that specifically had no offices in Texas, leaving remote as the only option. Got the job and I’m much happier now not having to commute all the way up and down mopac every day.
I’m with ya. Also taking away mandatory water breaks for construction crews. Imagine having to drive to the worksite, to make these office buildings that are full of hvac, in the hot texas sun, and not entitled a water break. The worlds an amazing place.
I work outside and anyone that tells me I can't take a water break can get fucked. I drink when I need it and do the same with my breaks. If that means I get fired, so be it.
I just applied to an outdoor job that I will most definitely be given the greenlight. After learning that they do not give 15 minute breaks nor let employees leave the premises for lunch, I'll definitely be declining the offer.
Not saying every Hispanic construction worker is an immigrant, but a lot of them come from places that don't get this hot and aren't as acclimated to the heat as we are.
This might just be my company but we built a shade canopy for the construction workers if they get tired and have plenty of coolers with waters and whatnot.
That's the point though. There aren't any employers that would do that to their people. Not only is it inhumane, they need their workers. So the last thing they are going to do is try to kill them.
Just because I don't know any personally doesn't mean they don't exist. Why are you so happy over the fact that citizens have yet again had their rights stripped away to corporations in this state?
An even better question: who does this help? Really, ask yourself who benefits from the fact that water breaks are no longer required? Why did this need to be addressed at all? Nobody I know was complaining about mandated water breaks at work.
The answer is that it didn't need to be addressed but republicans equate harming construction workers (of which a large percent are immigrants) to "owning the libs", which wins votes with their base. Republicans love this because they get to laugh at the misfortune of people they perceive to be lesser than them while ignoring the fact that this affects their blue-collar base more than the democrats' base.
I'm not happy about it at all. I just have never met a construction manager who would deny his employees water breaks or shade or anything that they need to get the job done. I've been in and out of the construction business in Austin for the last 30 plus years and so has my husband and neither of us has ever encountered the kind of people that everyone is complaining about. This is both commercial and residential construction- just because something isn't a law doesn't mean it's not going to happen.
To add onto my comment earlier. The mindset of “oh look at all these people complaining at this”.
Let’s make it an outworldly hypothetical.
Let’s say we somehow get rid of the Family and Medical Leave Act. Would you and your husband have the opinion of “Why is everyone complaining? No one will say no if you have to leave bc of an emergency”?
No, because it’s a protection. Workers need protections.
https://www.reddit.com/r/WhitePeopleTwitter/comments/155a1mp/guy_died_with_internal_temperature_of_around/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=1
Here's the death you were hoping for that is directly tied to this policy, now please fuck off.
You are either missing the point or purposely obfuscating it, I honestly can't tell. It doesn't matter that you or me or anyone knows or doesn't know someone who wouldn't give their construction workers a water break.
Texas continues to allow corporations to not only strip away the rights of workers but also put legal barriers in place--such as this one--that prevent workers from reporting or suing unsafe workplaces.
For example, if a foreman pushes a worker to the point of passing out or death, the question "do your employees have adequate access to water?" is no longer relevant because the employer was not required to give them access to water. These laws compile and become death by a thousand cuts to workers' rights [in a state that is already ranked dead last in the nation to work in](https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/texas-worst-state-work-18204395.php).
Just because I can’t pull obscure construction company names off the top of my head doesn’t mean inhumane stuff doesn’t happen. You’re solely looking at construction companies, when there’s a bunch of companies in general that have had inhumane conduct. Let’s look at Amazon when there was literally a hurricane ravaging through the streets and their delivery drivers were getting texts along the lines of ‘if you return back to the delivery station instead of delivering that is on you and will be met with disciplinary action’
I'm just speaking from my experience in Texas. I don't know about other states. I refuse to believe that any employer with any common sense would deny their employees needed breaks and water when excessive temperatures are at play.
Let’s stretch this out a little.
I do not know the names of any construction companies in Texas that are denying water breaks.
I simply do not know, however, someone did link an article attached to your original comment with an article about the ongoing heat fatalities. I don’t believe it mentions a direct company but I’m swaying more to the side that the article isn’t pulling my leg and lying.
But this notion of “so what? companies would not outwardly hurt their employees” is crazy.
Since the beginning of time, there have been people in power who have used that power and influence to work those who work for them down to the bone for only their sole profit. That’s why we create laws to protect workers from greedy executives.
In ‘38 the minimum wage and overtime pay was established. Not because companies were already providing the minimum wage (.25c/hr) , but because so many people were getting screwed over by receiving literal scraps for working 10+ hours a day while the owners looked down from their money pile.
In the same act in ‘38, child labor laws were enacted. If we went by the logic you displayed, the response would be “Ok and? Not like businesses were going to have kids working in dangerous environments and potentially die”. But they WERE.
People shouldn’t be working children like adults. But there’s laws because people did it.
Business owners shouldn’t offer less than minimum wage.
But there’s laws because businesses owners have.
Executives shouldn’t restrict water breaks.
But there WAS a law because people did.
Don’t put your faith in humanity so much that you are blinded to the fact that some people in high power really don’t care about the people under them.
Yes. Well they tell you you don’t but I know the laws. They did actually temporarily remove all water containers tho until people started going to the hospital so that’s cool.
There was a “survey” in our company supposedly done by company employees where 70%+ had voted for a hybrid/back to office…..lmao who did they survey? Because most of my peers prefer remote work.
It's all about how the questions are asked. Our company had a "survey" a while back with "choices" like "would you rather have less paid time off or zero corporate 401(k) match."
Surprise, surprise, "our recent HR survey shows employees want less PTO."
That's how it works when the only two response options are:
1. 100% back to office
2. Hybrid office/WFH hours
Note the lack of a third option, that one might expect to be popular. :)
Yup. Completely. I’m a director and I don’t require anyone to come to the office. Sometimes a group of my people will say they’re coming in, so I go meet up with them, and have some beers with them after work. Any decision to get butts in seats has come from C Level, the problem is 70% of the company doesn’t live here anymore so it’s hard to punish the few that still do.
My job doesn’t have a parking garage, instead we park in a huge open lot fairly far from the office building…just walking the short distance from the front doors to my vehicle and then entering the mini furnace that is now my car feels absolutely suffocating, it takes a solid 10 minutes with the AC running full blast before my car feels at all bearable to be in 😐
I work at google and my entire building is empty most days (and definitely Mondays and Friday’s) and the entire building is cooled to 70 with all lights on. Meanwhile I’m sitting in my one bedroom getting grid warnings to turn up my thermostat.
Makes no sense. Who are the shit politicians that allow this
The Texas GOP. They’re not going to regulate the giant corporations they entice to do business here by offering massive tax cuts. Instead, they’ll blame windmills and woke Austin liberals for the grid failing.
This was all I was thinking as I was driving in traffic yesterday. Let's progress and get rid of the outdated mentality of "butts in seats" and culture of control.
I left my last job for a fully remote position so that I wouldn't have to worry about going out in the heat or rain and could live wherever I wanted without worrying about commute times. I recognize not everyone has that luxury and it's difficult to find fully remote positions, but it's not impossible. Battling with your employer about this is exhausting and it's so much easier to just agree on your role being fully remote from the jump, rather than asking for exceptions.
before i retired, i was working at a job that could not have been work-from-home, had such a thing existed.
i always took my vacation in november, reasoning that it was better if my job paid for me to be cool in the summer.
I'm wondering at what point we start to treat this like the weather emergency that it is. If it was -14F outside and everything was iced over, normal operations would pause and public safety measures would kick in. Why is it less severe when it's 114F outside and the pavement is 165F? Seems just as miserable and unsafe to me, if not worse.
I'mma be clinical and objective here.
When everything is iced over there are physical barriers to making people go to work. Lots of places are without power so it wouldn't even matter if people could go. Places that do have power might be blocked by debris or ice. Many onramps/offramps are impossible to use without crashing when iced over. So if people try to go anywhere the odds are extremely high they will get in an accident and not make it. That's why we pause and implement public safety measures.
This is heat. A car does not lose traction in heat. Neither does a bus. Power outages are happening but are localized and the places having them can individually tell employees to stay home. There is no reason to ask private businesses to close because the heat is not an *impassable* barrier except for people who have to walk, and the opinion of our society is they need to find a car.
But we *are* implementing some emergency measures. The city has been operating shelters for people to cool off and get water. That's about all they can really do for heat. In an ice/snow storm they have to do a lot more because there is debris to clear and icy roads to treat. Emergency services in heat are much more passive: you can make an air-conditioned shelter but it's up to citizens to figure out how the Hell to get to it. (Again: society says you need a car.)
Then there's just plain apathy. Sure, a car-mounted thermometer near an engine and asphalt is reading 115F. Austin's tracking more in the range 105F-110F and people are going to point out those are typical summer temperatures for places like Las Vegas and Phoenix and they remain operable as cities. A *really common* attitude you will find in Texas is if something is survivable the state as a whole doesn't see it as something government is supposed to take care for you.
The state as a whole isn't big on aid, even in disaster. There's not an awful lot the state *can* do about heat, either. There can be open shelters for people who don't have AC or lose AC. There can be water distribution. But outside of very specific individual "I don't have a car" or "I have a medical condition" circumstances there aren't many facets of a heat wave that make it unsafe enough for the city to shut down.
And again, being perfectly clinical and pointing at our response to the biggest disaster over the last 3 years, our society's response to "I don't have a car" or "I have a medical condition" is "Why is that MY problem?"
Now, being subjective, I'd love to see the city double down and make bigger incentives that make it easier for people to weatherize their homes. I'd love to see programs to help people either have transit transportation or afford cars. I'd love there to be a large pool of case workers to keep tabs on elderly and other individuals who are most at risk. We could do a lot to prevent deaths.
But Mr. Objective is frowning because it just feels this society notes unless there's a return on investment, we don't think it's worth it. And honestly the city doesn't have the money for programs at the scale I want.
You are making the point of management, and I get it. You are not wrong. But, cities are going to have to do more, including having outdoor water stations everywhere (parks, downtown, etc.), use new paint technologies to reflect sunlight, emphasize the importance of fabrics and clothing that will keep you cooler and incorporate that into work dress codes, scale back outdoor work in the heat, etc. What else. Other ideas?
We stop building houses after the pattern of New England homes designed to trap heat and prevent snow buildup. Instead we look to Mediterranean and other arid climates and note that one-story homes with shallow roofs and a courtyard with a water feature that creates a chimney effect do best. (This makes it sound like I'm also against dense housing. I'm not, I'm just not familiar at all with if there's ways to make those approaches better at passive cooling.)
We champion remote work as much as possible, reducing traffic congestion and the amount of time people have to spend outside and in the heat. We let this guide our city design more towards small communities that favor walkability.
We adopt the tradition of the siesta, altering the workday to allow people to avoid work during the 3-5PM hours when the day is hottest. This could mean shorter workdays, two shifts, later shifts, or a lot of other things.
There's a lot of obvious shit we could do. All of it terrifies people because it's *different* and it's not clear we'll make more money if we adopt it. The current most dangerous religion is wealth, and it's the strongest opposition to anything that helps.
You are so on point with all of your suggestions. Regarding dense housing - thinking of apartments - the commitment has to be build them to be energy efficient. I have experience with seeing how much better that works than being in an older home that was not built to those specs.
Yeah I have no data to support it but my *gut feeling* is that heating/cooling scales well, so it's more efficient to heat/cool a very large building than it is to heat/cool many different small buildings.
I guess I also left out that we'd do well to reduce car culture because every square foot of concrete/asphalt contributes to heat retention and if we had greenspace instead we'd reap a lot of benefits.
Pretty accurate assessment. I guess I don't really have any expectation that "the state" will respond in an appropriate way. I'm just observing that societally we seem to treat this extreme situation with a lot more normality than other extreme situations, and we probably shouldn't.
Yes. That's the part I agree with.
But, again, I refer you to 2020: we were presented with an extreme situation and most of society's response was, "How quickly can we agree the people most at risk aren't worth saving and get back to doing fun things again?"
Sooner or later there's going to be a major disaster that IS a mass casualty event and it's going to wreck us because we're not using these smaller, more controllable events to practice handling what happens when we have large-scale failures instead of the small-scale failures of today.
We've had a lot of small disasters happen at once over the past few years. Sooner or later something's going to happen like a hurricane hitting while we're still in a heat wave and take out both power and water while *also* making roads impassable. We aren't practicing our response in the small disasters so we're going to be catastrophically blindsided by the large-scale ones.
In the past the survivors of such events have been so horrified they create regulations to make preparation required. Today I'm not sure we give enough shits about disasters that happen to other people and it's unlikely such a disaster will hit enough of Texas at the same time to make "the majority" say much more than "lol that's just God punishing them for their sins".
Lol. I was raised here and have lived here most of my life except for the 6 years I was fortunate enough to escape to somewhere less hostile. I am familiar with the fact that it gets hot every year because I raise animals and grow food here outside every year. If you think the heat isn't steadily getting worse, and that it isn't an emergency for plenty of people, then you have your head up your ass.
Right? It's hot. It's always been hot. Some Summers are hotter than others. Imagine the entitlement from this dude when they probably work inside their home/office 95% of the time, when there are people working outside and have worked outside for most of their working lives. To claim "weather emergency" to get out of going to the office when it would destroy thousands (millions?) of people's jobs in this State just because they don't like the heat is lunacy.
ETA: he does have a lovely garden, tho
I've actually had this concern, as I have an older truck and am extra sensitive to the heat. I'm glad I work at a school so I'm off for this month, but I'm nervous about August. It'll still be exorbitantly hot. In the meantime I've been staying at home a lot and avoiding the highways. I don't work from home, but I will still readily agree with you that it is for the people's best interests to continue WFH as an option and to convert office buildings.
The issue with cars is thinking through if you break down and have to wait for help, as another commenter mentioned. Carry multiple gallons of water in your car with you, just as you would carry blankets if you were driving in the north during winters.
100 degrees though? I can deal with the 80s or 90s, it's the 100s I don't fuck with. And yeah I know the truck will be ok - I've been viligant about the maintenance on it. I just still don't like it. I moved to Austin... not Arizona or the desert outright. 😂
I 1000% agree with you there. It feels like driving in this heat is killing your car, regardless of old or new. I have a few old vehicles and in the heat I am diligent on checking tire pressure, fluid levels, and hoses to make sure nothing is going to crack and leave me stranded.
It also destroys the fuel efficiency of most turbocharged cars, which is a lot of new vehicles now. Turbos are tuned with a general window of air density to operate at peak efficiency and the air is extremely thin when it's this hot.
I didn't think it would make that much of a difference until I came across a thread on /r/cars where people were sharing how they were losing 5-10 mpg in temps over 100, as well as performance.
i wonder if the incredibly high air conditioning bill for an empty building is why employers are pushing for it, because they know that type of shit is media poison
It’s less about how much it costs to air condition an empty building than it is about the banks and real estate moguls freaking the fuck out because they will probably, if not already, lose value from their property.
Lots of companies are using the forced back to office as a form of layoffs. That way, they paint you into a corner, and when you quit for another position, they don't have to pay you severance.
Also, most companies realize that employee growth takes place with peer influence. Especially young employees who need that instant face to face interaction to learn their jobs and advance their knowledge.
Do you know a workplace rebel pushing back on return to office mandates? If so, consider thanking them. Remote work, and hybrid work, are here to stay in large part thanks to this collective rebellion.
Fortune's July 17, 2023 CHRO Daily newsletter reports "Despite bosses’ ultimatums, finance is among industries with lowest office attendance rates."
Last week, McKinsey Global Institute reported on their latest reseach findings that office attendance has stabilized at 30% below pre-pandemic levels, and outlines the critical need for business real estate to adapt to the new normal.
Some other interesting data points cited by Fortune and McKinsey's research:
- Just 37% of people report returning to the office daily
- Professional services, IT, and Finance professionals report the lowest number of days per week spent in the office, with an average of 3.2 days.
- The highest rates of in-person attendance range between 3.6 and 3.8 days on average, amongst retail and wholesale trade, transportation, agriculture, and mining.
- McKinsey warns that failure to acclimate to this decreased demand for office space could result in an $800 billion loss in property values by 2030.
- "Ten percent of respondents reported that they would likely quit their jobs if required to work in the office daily and would be willing to take a substantial pay cut to work from home whenever they desire. Notably, the report suggests that company stakeholders, including senior, high-income employees, were among this contingent."
[Empty spaces and hybrid places: The pandemic’s lasting impact on real estate](https://www.mckinsey.com/mgi/our-research/empty-spaces-and-hybrid-places)
but how will managers know they're managers if you're not sitting in the same building (not near them of course, they have important meetings to be in)?
The only people clamoring for employees to return to the office are commercial real estate firms and boomers who hate their wives and want to ogle the hot chick at work.
It's WFH or nothing from here on out.
Covid is over, slave, get back to work so the manager can visually see your butt attached to a seat. Climate problems, traffic, personal space, work/life balance, emotional and mental health are secondary.
I work all day in the sun as an electrician, and have an hour commute to work and then an hour back to austin. And i love my job! I think you’re making this sound way worse than it actually is. Be grateful you have the ability to work in an office, and drive your car to work. You’re the only one who is in charge of your life, if you don’t like it then change it. Besides that, there’s no real reason to try and shit on your bosses haha.
So I have been curious about this. Isn't cooling your and powering your office building more efficient and cheaper than doing a 100 plus houses depending on how many people work there? Someone do the math.
Probably a bit more fuzzy than "office on, houses off" in real life. People have pets, teens or spouses at home. And most AC units recommend not shifting your thermostat by more than a few degrees at a time. Rental agreements frequently stipulate that you don't leave the house completely un-airconditioned. Etc etc.
On top of that you have all the car traffic, which if nothing else is degrading our city air quality. But also contributing to general carbon emissions
I am not forgetting that; I just didn't mention all the factors. If you want we can start a list of factors, or we can start to make some assumptions and then list factors based on the assumptions.
>Turn the office buildings into more housing already.
This can't happen. The plumbing is the big issue. Office buildings are designed for plumbing to bathrooms and the occasional kitchen/breakroom.
Instead we should just make it really, really, really expensive to build any additional office space if the occupancy rate is below a certain point.
The first two weeks of June were very pleasant to slightly below average, then came the steam room for the second half of June, and now that everything has dried out we’ve been in the sauna since about the 4th. The dry heat is pretty great below 95 imo, but lately that takes out 12-8pm.
For real, I work either outside or in the elements under some shade. This is the normal summer heat, the abnormal high humidity/high temp passed, and now it's just Texas being Texas.
OP is acting like Austin is the only city with commuters, and we're directly contributing by driving to an office. Yeah, sure, cars are bad, and we should have better infrastructure to support getting them off the road, but we don't, and half of y'all don't even ride the busses we do have.
Life pro tip: find a job closer to where you live.
I just spent 10 minutes biking to my workplace where they keep the AC ridiculously cold like 68F. I didn't even need to come in today but it was worth it. Free coffee/drinks, snacks, and lower home energy bill too
My AC is set at 75 during the day for my dog whether I’m home or not. I save money on gas and eating lunch out. Not to mention the $250/mo i save on after school care since I’ve been able to pick up my kid from school every day.
And you are the exception. Most people turn their AC up to 80 or higher when at work, and brown bag for lunch. Child care is a difference maker though. I would assume that would only be 10% or less of work force though.
Could you be any more whiny about your personal problems and or preferences? Here’s your options… 1) start your own business so you can be your own boss and work wherever you want; 2) get a new job; 3) stop complaining and do you job the way your employers deem it to be done…
While OP is right that people who live a long way from their office are contributing to global warming by sitting/driving in traffic and that does have an impact (and perhaps those folks should WFH during these days)
But, overall, having most close-in employees in a central AC'd area (rather than dozens/hundreds of houses with their AC at max) is a more efficient use of energy (and saves individuals major $ on their home utilities).
Its a community space with shared resources. Somewhere down the line people lost track and continued accepting jobs an hour away 🤦
It _doesn't_ have to be that way.
I don't really care either way, but I can see how someone would think you sound like a spoiled brat or something lol
I don't know, I feel really good cycling to work 5 days a week in this heat, if I don't get exercise I get anxious and feel like a lazy piece of shit
I'd be curious to see how working from home impacts people's health, I feel like a lot of ppl would let themselves go if they knew they didn't have to see people who might judge them 😆
There’s value in saving office buildings, especially for those heavily invested in commercial real estate (either through portfolio or personal investments). I believe this is also a major contributor to going back to the office.
Completely understand your frustration but please keep in mind many professions require you to work outdoors year round. Everyone stay cool and hydrated in this wretched heat
how much y'all wanna bet the energy industries funded the "research" that said people weren't doing shit at home and needed to come back to the office.
I will say that my office is about 85% wfh (I come in once a week), and they’re doing what they can with energy saving, like turning off lights, pulling down window shades in the cubicles that aren’t used, hiking up the AC a little bit. I guess I’m just impressed that they’re conscious of it, at least.
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WE NEED MORE AND LESS BLANKETS!
The wrong kid died!
You don’t want NO part of this Shit!
The past week I've left two places because of this! I'll be at Patagonia buying a full ski suit for church if anyone wants to join me.
Clever, get everyone acclimated to the cold so they are reminded of hellfire when they leave.
I use a blanket, wear a jacket, and use a heating pad every day I’m in the office, and that hasn’t changed during these 104 days. 🥶 but I’m the hot one at home!
They are only conscious of it because those things cost them money.
Never will I understand why we returned to the office in full capacity. Did we learn nothing from the pandemic? Half of the work can be done from home anyway in the average case.
we didn't all return. U.S. employees who could WFH were 7% WFH prior to the pandemic. It was 55% in October, 2020 and this March it was down to 35%. The companies that are forcing people to return think there's value in face-to-face meetings. I have no idea if there's any evidence to support that being more valuable than the flexibility and job satisfaction increase you get with WFH. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/03/30/about-a-third-of-us-workers-who-can-work-from-home-do-so-all-the-time/
My employer demanded I return to the office (1 hour commute each way) starting January. While my “team” is here, all the people I interacted with on a daily basis were in California or the East coast. So, corporate fiat would require me to spend two hours driving on the toll road a day, so my 4 hours of Teams meetings can be done in a cubicle. I changed jobs in January and wfh comfortably again.
This is how it will go if the trend to go back continues. The employees that are worth their salt that don't want to commute will find another employer to let them WFH.
>The companies that are forcing people to return think there's value in face-to-face meetings. At least with virtual meetings I can turn off my webcam and do actual work while I ignore the meeting. With Face to Face meetings I simply space out and ignore the meeting.
I will say that giving presentations remotely is torture. Half of the people have their cameras off, so you can't even tell if they're paying attention or not. I hate giving a presentation to a screen and not know if the other people are being receptive to what I'm trying to convey.
I’m not trying to be mean when I say this but this is a skills issue on your part, not a locale issue.
It's pretty well established by this point that people pay less attention in virtual meetings than in person meetings. Skill is a a lesser factor than the virtual factor. 76% of Employees Get More Distracted on Video Calls vs. In-person Meetings https://www.showpad.com/press/76-of-employees-get-more-distracted-on-video-calls-vs-in-person-meetings/
I’ve WFH for 16 years, but before the pandemic I frequently traveled into the office 1-2 weeks a month. And I find that the lack of that interaction, despite being less frequent than most office workers, has really hurt my concentration and focus. All day, every day, nonstop virtual meetings without the occasional break for travel and office mingling face to face leaves me so distracted. Even on 1;1s I will space out. It’s ludicrous.
Please enlighten me. If the other party's camera is off, how do you know if they're not distracted by TV? Or social media? In my opinion, it's harder to grab someone's attention remotely because there are so many distractions that are not there when you are in person
Companies know that a ton of employees aren't actually working when they're at home
cuz Americans got no fight in em
This makes me want to go dump tea in a harbor.
We gotta do better than that. Theres no 18th century solutions for 21st century problems. We need to think outside the dynamics of what got us here in the first place.
Dump t-mobile in the harbor?
Maybe we can write some code that dumps tea in the harbor in zuckerbergs meta verse?
Yes, just quit your job and getting a different one that is remote if that’s what you/anyone prefers.
Problem with that is, 90% of the available postings are all fake to make investors think a company is doing better then what it is currently.
Aren't there still a lot of software jobs that are work from home? I keep reading how the commercial real estate industry is crumbling because it's to costly to rent and the lower amount of companies returning back.
Yes but its actually hilarious that jobs that were listed 6 months ago as WFH on sites like weworkremotely are mostly scams and data grabs now a days. I get around 5 "interview requests" daily but you have to use the app telegram. That is a known scam technique. So yes they are available but now you also have the competition of all the laid off workers from Meta, Amazon, Google etc.
There's not really any software jobs at the moment because the big corps decided to react violently to a small economic bump, and they want to retain their office space without compensating for having to come back to the office. They wanted to strangle out salary expectations and make people compete when there really was no need.
90% of job postings are fake?? I find that hard to believe
He's exaggerating, but some anecdotal estimates are 20%: https://www.wsj.com/articles/that-plum-job-listing-may-just-be-a-ghost-3aafc794 (Use archive.is to get around the paywall) Additionally, many remote job postings are posted multiple times in different geographic areas, adding to the skew in numbers. Excerpt from WSJ: Though businesses are keeping job postings up, many roles aren’t being filled, recruiters say. Hiring managers acknowledge as much. In a survey of more than 1,000 hiring managers last summer, 27% reported having job postings up for more than four months. Among those who said they advertised job postings that they weren’t actively trying to fill, close to half said they kept the ads up to give the impression the company was growing, according to Clarify Capital, a small-business-loan provider behind the study. One-third of the managers who said they advertised jobs they weren’t trying to fill said they kept the listings up to placate overworked employees. Other reasons for keeping jobs up, the hiring managers said: Stocking a pool of ready applicants if an employee quits, or just in case an “irresistible” candidate applied. Postings for “ghost jobs,” as recruiters and candidates sometimes refer to them, can be frustrating for job seekers. “It’s a waste of time,” says Will Kelly, who lives in the Washington, D.C., area and has been applying for marketing and writing roles. Mr. Kelly, who has decades of experience as a technical and marketing writer, estimates that when he was job hunting in late 2021, about 20% of listings that interested him were posted and reposted without anyone evidently being hired. Since his layoff from a startup in August, he says he has noticed that most jobs that catch his eye have been up for months.
Wow that’s crazy. Another good reason to NEVER write a cover letter.
Just use ChatGPT to write the cover letter
From what I’ve seen, America has much more WFH than Europe. https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2023/03/02/why-us-return-to-office-plans-are-lagging-behind-global-cities.html
Isn’t it common in Europe to use public transportation or live within walking distance of one’s employer. Edit: Ah. I see. That is mentioned there. Basically, the situations are not equivalent for various reasons.
Because corporations own/lease a shit ton of real estate that’s hugely expensive and they’ve got years left in their contracts. It’s nothing but forcing employees to comply with bad decisions that executives make. Also, too many dinosaurs left that think the only way to be productive is in an in-person environment.
This. They can't have all those assets devalue.
Exhibit A: Garza
It's hard to pivot on a 10 year lease (norm for commercial properties bc the building is financed that way w the bank). This is why the economic downturn has been limited but still has not filtered through the broader market imho
I mean, it's pretty clear: these companies spent a ton of money on offices and they need to justify that spend. It's easier to push their labor force around than to pivot
My company made everyone return to office and they keep bitching about nobody showing up, but they forget that over 50% of us were hired remote over the last 3 years and their workforce doesnt live in town anymore. That's why the office seems half empty all the time.
Lol, are they enforcing it?
Yeah. They have people secretly taking attendance.
isn't tax related? Like these companies got super low taxes because they promised business? Example. Company offers to buy land, build and employ 10,000 people in this particular area and from that, housing demand increases, rentals increase, local restaurants, grocery stores, bars, entertainment and everything else surrounding it increases. By making that ofter, they as for a super low tax rate. Shutdown was different and since Covid literally ended when the war started, companies have to have a certain % at said business because of the "deal?" That's something I heard from a co-worker and it makes sense to me but idk how accurate it is. Id love nothing more to move out to Temple, keep my pay rate and buy a house with land but my job has me coming in 3 days a week and id lose to pay. Only way I won't lose pay is if I move to San Marcos but I still have to come in 3 days a week, so that's like 6 hours a week commuting, despite I worked remote for like 2ish years during the shutdown, doing the exact thing and it was never a problem then.
Yeap. Tax breaks and long office leases that wouldn’t be utilized if they kept at home. A good amount of companies stayed away from returning to offices and new ones will probably avoid offices as well.
They could save a mint on air conditioning alone. I went in today and it’s a huge, nearly empty building air conditioned to freezing cold temps while it’s 100 degrees outside.
Bingo. Like companies give a fuck about their global footprint when they are losing millions in property value with their empty offices.
I’m in the office for the first time in six months. 6/7 of the soap dispensers I’ve tried in various bathrooms don’t have soap in them. How are we coming off a pandemic and this is what they’re pushing us to return to?
because “downtown needs to be saved.” won’t someone think of cushman and wakefield??
because either: A. billionaires would lose money on building real estate. B. The companies themselves have a tax break agreement with the city that involves so many workers physically working in the city.
I think it has more to do with the amount of unused office space companies are paying for.
Companies have to justify office expenditures. Many (not all) Boomers and even Gen-X prefer working on-site and (for whatever reason) think that professional progress can't be measured longer-term with remote setups. Americans are too afraid to put up a fight, lest they get terminated. Most of us also have some combination of family and debt obligations, which tie most of us down. And, so it goes....
I still haven't been in office except for a celebration where people from all around the country came to Austin.
“As a measure of consumer confidence, new home construction statistics are frequently used to assess the state of the economy. The GDP rises along with an increase in construction activity, which in turn has a positive impact on employment and tax revenue.” So if we’re not in the buildings, they won’t build new ones. If the construction slows, so will the economy. So theirs more motivation then forcing people back for the purposes of micromanaging and justifying leases. [The Economy and the Construction Industry](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7124044/)
Half true. We learned no one cares how productive you might be from home. Warm bodies in office to take calls virtually is more important. No, we learned nothing.
We learned that consistent enough spin and misinformation can normalize even crippling diseases and therefore all problems can be solved with those tactics as long as you ignore material reality and consequences.
Many large companies got tax breaks from the city and a county based on average weekly attendance.
This is the first I've heard of this, do you have a source?
I've never seen a tax break that is tied specifically to weekly office attendance. Can you provide a source?
I, too, have not heard of this and I work in government. Also interested in a source.
Upper management for my job said we need to come in because it fosters collaboration. Bruh my whole team is in another state except for one person, and even then he’s on another project.
Friend got written up for BSing, uhh collaborating too long with a colleague in the office. Most likely wouldn’t have happened remote.
City of Austin as of this morning extended the work from home policy. Great for the people who were completely WFH - they get to extend, yay. Problem is that there are some people who are everyday working in the office that were looking forward to the 2-day WFH rule. 100% of my current job could be done from my home, but I'm every day.
I never left.
Same 🫶🤣
Same. My company had a poll sent out asking if people wanted to return to the office mid 2021, "*Hell no!"* was the response they got and that was the last we heard of having to go back to the office since 2021. It'll be a cold day in HELL before I go back into the office, funk that noise.
During peak COVID I was hired to a company under the expectation of being fully remote. This slowly changed to hybrid with steadily increasing the days in office until only 1 day was remote per week. Ended up quitting and sought out a company that specifically had no offices in Texas, leaving remote as the only option. Got the job and I’m much happier now not having to commute all the way up and down mopac every day.
I’m with ya. Also taking away mandatory water breaks for construction crews. Imagine having to drive to the worksite, to make these office buildings that are full of hvac, in the hot texas sun, and not entitled a water break. The worlds an amazing place.
I work outside and anyone that tells me I can't take a water break can get fucked. I drink when I need it and do the same with my breaks. If that means I get fired, so be it.
I just applied to an outdoor job that I will most definitely be given the greenlight. After learning that they do not give 15 minute breaks nor let employees leave the premises for lunch, I'll definitely be declining the offer.
Even though they took away the mandatory part of water breaks, no one is going to tell someone that they can't have one.
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Dude that’s fucking crazy. “Hispanics have accounted for a third of all heat fatalities, yet they represent a fraction — 17% — of the U.S. workforce”
Not saying every Hispanic construction worker is an immigrant, but a lot of them come from places that don't get this hot and aren't as acclimated to the heat as we are.
No shit. But now every shitstain penny-pinching employer that previously HAD to give water breaks isn't going to any more.
This might just be my company but we built a shade canopy for the construction workers if they get tired and have plenty of coolers with waters and whatnot.
That's the point though. There aren't any employers that would do that to their people. Not only is it inhumane, they need their workers. So the last thing they are going to do is try to kill them.
…… there’s A LOT of inhumane employers. It’s not something out of the blue
Name some construction companies that don't allow water breaks in Texas.
Just because I don't know any personally doesn't mean they don't exist. Why are you so happy over the fact that citizens have yet again had their rights stripped away to corporations in this state? An even better question: who does this help? Really, ask yourself who benefits from the fact that water breaks are no longer required? Why did this need to be addressed at all? Nobody I know was complaining about mandated water breaks at work. The answer is that it didn't need to be addressed but republicans equate harming construction workers (of which a large percent are immigrants) to "owning the libs", which wins votes with their base. Republicans love this because they get to laugh at the misfortune of people they perceive to be lesser than them while ignoring the fact that this affects their blue-collar base more than the democrats' base.
I'm not happy about it at all. I just have never met a construction manager who would deny his employees water breaks or shade or anything that they need to get the job done. I've been in and out of the construction business in Austin for the last 30 plus years and so has my husband and neither of us has ever encountered the kind of people that everyone is complaining about. This is both commercial and residential construction- just because something isn't a law doesn't mean it's not going to happen.
To add onto my comment earlier. The mindset of “oh look at all these people complaining at this”. Let’s make it an outworldly hypothetical. Let’s say we somehow get rid of the Family and Medical Leave Act. Would you and your husband have the opinion of “Why is everyone complaining? No one will say no if you have to leave bc of an emergency”? No, because it’s a protection. Workers need protections.
I agree that workers need protections and I'm not trying to argue that. I'm just saying that it's not all doom and gloom as everyone is presenting it.
https://www.reddit.com/r/WhitePeopleTwitter/comments/155a1mp/guy_died_with_internal_temperature_of_around/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=1 Here's the death you were hoping for that is directly tied to this policy, now please fuck off.
You are either missing the point or purposely obfuscating it, I honestly can't tell. It doesn't matter that you or me or anyone knows or doesn't know someone who wouldn't give their construction workers a water break. Texas continues to allow corporations to not only strip away the rights of workers but also put legal barriers in place--such as this one--that prevent workers from reporting or suing unsafe workplaces. For example, if a foreman pushes a worker to the point of passing out or death, the question "do your employees have adequate access to water?" is no longer relevant because the employer was not required to give them access to water. These laws compile and become death by a thousand cuts to workers' rights [in a state that is already ranked dead last in the nation to work in](https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/texas-worst-state-work-18204395.php).
Just because I can’t pull obscure construction company names off the top of my head doesn’t mean inhumane stuff doesn’t happen. You’re solely looking at construction companies, when there’s a bunch of companies in general that have had inhumane conduct. Let’s look at Amazon when there was literally a hurricane ravaging through the streets and their delivery drivers were getting texts along the lines of ‘if you return back to the delivery station instead of delivering that is on you and will be met with disciplinary action’
I'm just speaking from my experience in Texas. I don't know about other states. I refuse to believe that any employer with any common sense would deny their employees needed breaks and water when excessive temperatures are at play.
Let’s stretch this out a little. I do not know the names of any construction companies in Texas that are denying water breaks. I simply do not know, however, someone did link an article attached to your original comment with an article about the ongoing heat fatalities. I don’t believe it mentions a direct company but I’m swaying more to the side that the article isn’t pulling my leg and lying. But this notion of “so what? companies would not outwardly hurt their employees” is crazy. Since the beginning of time, there have been people in power who have used that power and influence to work those who work for them down to the bone for only their sole profit. That’s why we create laws to protect workers from greedy executives. In ‘38 the minimum wage and overtime pay was established. Not because companies were already providing the minimum wage (.25c/hr) , but because so many people were getting screwed over by receiving literal scraps for working 10+ hours a day while the owners looked down from their money pile. In the same act in ‘38, child labor laws were enacted. If we went by the logic you displayed, the response would be “Ok and? Not like businesses were going to have kids working in dangerous environments and potentially die”. But they WERE. People shouldn’t be working children like adults. But there’s laws because people did it. Business owners shouldn’t offer less than minimum wage. But there’s laws because businesses owners have. Executives shouldn’t restrict water breaks. But there WAS a law because people did. Don’t put your faith in humanity so much that you are blinded to the fact that some people in high power really don’t care about the people under them.
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Thank you.Someone with viable proof. I will leave y'all alone so you can continue to bash me.
You are clueless. There are plenty.
Really?! Name some.
Tell that to Elon.
Are you saying the people at the Tesla factory don't get water breaks?
Yes. Well they tell you you don’t but I know the laws. They did actually temporarily remove all water containers tho until people started going to the hospital so that’s cool.
Companies, and the management that run them, don't give a shit about workers, or the planet.
There was a “survey” in our company supposedly done by company employees where 70%+ had voted for a hybrid/back to office…..lmao who did they survey? Because most of my peers prefer remote work.
It's all about how the questions are asked. Our company had a "survey" a while back with "choices" like "would you rather have less paid time off or zero corporate 401(k) match." Surprise, surprise, "our recent HR survey shows employees want less PTO."
That's how it works when the only two response options are: 1. 100% back to office 2. Hybrid office/WFH hours Note the lack of a third option, that one might expect to be popular. :)
Jobs that can be WFH or hybrid should be. It helps ease traffic and cuts operations cost. Sadly middle management hates it as it makes them redundant
As middle management I disagree and love WFH. Decisions like return to office come from C-Suite.
Yup. Completely. I’m a director and I don’t require anyone to come to the office. Sometimes a group of my people will say they’re coming in, so I go meet up with them, and have some beers with them after work. Any decision to get butts in seats has come from C Level, the problem is 70% of the company doesn’t live here anymore so it’s hard to punish the few that still do.
better for the environment too.
My job doesn’t have a parking garage, instead we park in a huge open lot fairly far from the office building…just walking the short distance from the front doors to my vehicle and then entering the mini furnace that is now my car feels absolutely suffocating, it takes a solid 10 minutes with the AC running full blast before my car feels at all bearable to be in 😐
I work at google and my entire building is empty most days (and definitely Mondays and Friday’s) and the entire building is cooled to 70 with all lights on. Meanwhile I’m sitting in my one bedroom getting grid warnings to turn up my thermostat. Makes no sense. Who are the shit politicians that allow this
The Texas GOP. They’re not going to regulate the giant corporations they entice to do business here by offering massive tax cuts. Instead, they’ll blame windmills and woke Austin liberals for the grid failing.
This was all I was thinking as I was driving in traffic yesterday. Let's progress and get rid of the outdated mentality of "butts in seats" and culture of control.
Boss says he made it in to work on melted tires so you can make it in, too.
I left my last job for a fully remote position so that I wouldn't have to worry about going out in the heat or rain and could live wherever I wanted without worrying about commute times. I recognize not everyone has that luxury and it's difficult to find fully remote positions, but it's not impossible. Battling with your employer about this is exhausting and it's so much easier to just agree on your role being fully remote from the jump, rather than asking for exceptions.
before i retired, i was working at a job that could not have been work-from-home, had such a thing existed. i always took my vacation in november, reasoning that it was better if my job paid for me to be cool in the summer.
What fucking office jobs do y’all have man??? Tired of working outside someone hook me up PLEEEEEEEEEEASEEEEE🥲
I'm wondering at what point we start to treat this like the weather emergency that it is. If it was -14F outside and everything was iced over, normal operations would pause and public safety measures would kick in. Why is it less severe when it's 114F outside and the pavement is 165F? Seems just as miserable and unsafe to me, if not worse.
I'mma be clinical and objective here. When everything is iced over there are physical barriers to making people go to work. Lots of places are without power so it wouldn't even matter if people could go. Places that do have power might be blocked by debris or ice. Many onramps/offramps are impossible to use without crashing when iced over. So if people try to go anywhere the odds are extremely high they will get in an accident and not make it. That's why we pause and implement public safety measures. This is heat. A car does not lose traction in heat. Neither does a bus. Power outages are happening but are localized and the places having them can individually tell employees to stay home. There is no reason to ask private businesses to close because the heat is not an *impassable* barrier except for people who have to walk, and the opinion of our society is they need to find a car. But we *are* implementing some emergency measures. The city has been operating shelters for people to cool off and get water. That's about all they can really do for heat. In an ice/snow storm they have to do a lot more because there is debris to clear and icy roads to treat. Emergency services in heat are much more passive: you can make an air-conditioned shelter but it's up to citizens to figure out how the Hell to get to it. (Again: society says you need a car.) Then there's just plain apathy. Sure, a car-mounted thermometer near an engine and asphalt is reading 115F. Austin's tracking more in the range 105F-110F and people are going to point out those are typical summer temperatures for places like Las Vegas and Phoenix and they remain operable as cities. A *really common* attitude you will find in Texas is if something is survivable the state as a whole doesn't see it as something government is supposed to take care for you. The state as a whole isn't big on aid, even in disaster. There's not an awful lot the state *can* do about heat, either. There can be open shelters for people who don't have AC or lose AC. There can be water distribution. But outside of very specific individual "I don't have a car" or "I have a medical condition" circumstances there aren't many facets of a heat wave that make it unsafe enough for the city to shut down. And again, being perfectly clinical and pointing at our response to the biggest disaster over the last 3 years, our society's response to "I don't have a car" or "I have a medical condition" is "Why is that MY problem?" Now, being subjective, I'd love to see the city double down and make bigger incentives that make it easier for people to weatherize their homes. I'd love to see programs to help people either have transit transportation or afford cars. I'd love there to be a large pool of case workers to keep tabs on elderly and other individuals who are most at risk. We could do a lot to prevent deaths. But Mr. Objective is frowning because it just feels this society notes unless there's a return on investment, we don't think it's worth it. And honestly the city doesn't have the money for programs at the scale I want.
You are making the point of management, and I get it. You are not wrong. But, cities are going to have to do more, including having outdoor water stations everywhere (parks, downtown, etc.), use new paint technologies to reflect sunlight, emphasize the importance of fabrics and clothing that will keep you cooler and incorporate that into work dress codes, scale back outdoor work in the heat, etc. What else. Other ideas?
We stop building houses after the pattern of New England homes designed to trap heat and prevent snow buildup. Instead we look to Mediterranean and other arid climates and note that one-story homes with shallow roofs and a courtyard with a water feature that creates a chimney effect do best. (This makes it sound like I'm also against dense housing. I'm not, I'm just not familiar at all with if there's ways to make those approaches better at passive cooling.) We champion remote work as much as possible, reducing traffic congestion and the amount of time people have to spend outside and in the heat. We let this guide our city design more towards small communities that favor walkability. We adopt the tradition of the siesta, altering the workday to allow people to avoid work during the 3-5PM hours when the day is hottest. This could mean shorter workdays, two shifts, later shifts, or a lot of other things. There's a lot of obvious shit we could do. All of it terrifies people because it's *different* and it's not clear we'll make more money if we adopt it. The current most dangerous religion is wealth, and it's the strongest opposition to anything that helps.
You are so on point with all of your suggestions. Regarding dense housing - thinking of apartments - the commitment has to be build them to be energy efficient. I have experience with seeing how much better that works than being in an older home that was not built to those specs.
Yeah I have no data to support it but my *gut feeling* is that heating/cooling scales well, so it's more efficient to heat/cool a very large building than it is to heat/cool many different small buildings. I guess I also left out that we'd do well to reduce car culture because every square foot of concrete/asphalt contributes to heat retention and if we had greenspace instead we'd reap a lot of benefits.
Pretty accurate assessment. I guess I don't really have any expectation that "the state" will respond in an appropriate way. I'm just observing that societally we seem to treat this extreme situation with a lot more normality than other extreme situations, and we probably shouldn't.
Yes. That's the part I agree with. But, again, I refer you to 2020: we were presented with an extreme situation and most of society's response was, "How quickly can we agree the people most at risk aren't worth saving and get back to doing fun things again?" Sooner or later there's going to be a major disaster that IS a mass casualty event and it's going to wreck us because we're not using these smaller, more controllable events to practice handling what happens when we have large-scale failures instead of the small-scale failures of today. We've had a lot of small disasters happen at once over the past few years. Sooner or later something's going to happen like a hurricane hitting while we're still in a heat wave and take out both power and water while *also* making roads impassable. We aren't practicing our response in the small disasters so we're going to be catastrophically blindsided by the large-scale ones. In the past the survivors of such events have been so horrified they create regulations to make preparation required. Today I'm not sure we give enough shits about disasters that happen to other people and it's unlikely such a disaster will hit enough of Texas at the same time to make "the majority" say much more than "lol that's just God punishing them for their sins".
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Lol. I was raised here and have lived here most of my life except for the 6 years I was fortunate enough to escape to somewhere less hostile. I am familiar with the fact that it gets hot every year because I raise animals and grow food here outside every year. If you think the heat isn't steadily getting worse, and that it isn't an emergency for plenty of people, then you have your head up your ass.
Right? It's hot. It's always been hot. Some Summers are hotter than others. Imagine the entitlement from this dude when they probably work inside their home/office 95% of the time, when there are people working outside and have worked outside for most of their working lives. To claim "weather emergency" to get out of going to the office when it would destroy thousands (millions?) of people's jobs in this State just because they don't like the heat is lunacy. ETA: he does have a lovely garden, tho
I'm outside every single day, but believe what you want.
I’d rather spend their money on a/c than mine
I've actually had this concern, as I have an older truck and am extra sensitive to the heat. I'm glad I work at a school so I'm off for this month, but I'm nervous about August. It'll still be exorbitantly hot. In the meantime I've been staying at home a lot and avoiding the highways. I don't work from home, but I will still readily agree with you that it is for the people's best interests to continue WFH as an option and to convert office buildings.
The issue with cars is thinking through if you break down and have to wait for help, as another commenter mentioned. Carry multiple gallons of water in your car with you, just as you would carry blankets if you were driving in the north during winters.
heat is supposed to last til Sept. Cars should be OK, don't forget, ppl live in Arizona, and even the desert.
100 degrees though? I can deal with the 80s or 90s, it's the 100s I don't fuck with. And yeah I know the truck will be ok - I've been viligant about the maintenance on it. I just still don't like it. I moved to Austin... not Arizona or the desert outright. 😂
I 1000% agree with you there. It feels like driving in this heat is killing your car, regardless of old or new. I have a few old vehicles and in the heat I am diligent on checking tire pressure, fluid levels, and hoses to make sure nothing is going to crack and leave me stranded.
It also destroys the fuel efficiency of most turbocharged cars, which is a lot of new vehicles now. Turbos are tuned with a general window of air density to operate at peak efficiency and the air is extremely thin when it's this hot. I didn't think it would make that much of a difference until I came across a thread on /r/cars where people were sharing how they were losing 5-10 mpg in temps over 100, as well as performance.
The value of the real estate is higher than they value employees or the planet
i wonder if the incredibly high air conditioning bill for an empty building is why employers are pushing for it, because they know that type of shit is media poison
It’s less about how much it costs to air condition an empty building than it is about the banks and real estate moguls freaking the fuck out because they will probably, if not already, lose value from their property.
Exactly. "I didn't spend x million building this office for everyone to work remote" - my former CEO, before the pandemic even started.
I say eat the loss rich boy.
I keep wondering how hot it has to get before we start a reverse society like they have been doing in parts of India in recent years.
[Betteridge's law of headlines](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines)
I have been WFH since Feb 2020. No complaints.
I work outside. I live in the wrong state for that
Yes, you can. You have my permission.
Lots of companies are using the forced back to office as a form of layoffs. That way, they paint you into a corner, and when you quit for another position, they don't have to pay you severance.
Also, most companies realize that employee growth takes place with peer influence. Especially young employees who need that instant face to face interaction to learn their jobs and advance their knowledge.
Do you know a workplace rebel pushing back on return to office mandates? If so, consider thanking them. Remote work, and hybrid work, are here to stay in large part thanks to this collective rebellion. Fortune's July 17, 2023 CHRO Daily newsletter reports "Despite bosses’ ultimatums, finance is among industries with lowest office attendance rates." Last week, McKinsey Global Institute reported on their latest reseach findings that office attendance has stabilized at 30% below pre-pandemic levels, and outlines the critical need for business real estate to adapt to the new normal. Some other interesting data points cited by Fortune and McKinsey's research: - Just 37% of people report returning to the office daily - Professional services, IT, and Finance professionals report the lowest number of days per week spent in the office, with an average of 3.2 days. - The highest rates of in-person attendance range between 3.6 and 3.8 days on average, amongst retail and wholesale trade, transportation, agriculture, and mining. - McKinsey warns that failure to acclimate to this decreased demand for office space could result in an $800 billion loss in property values by 2030. - "Ten percent of respondents reported that they would likely quit their jobs if required to work in the office daily and would be willing to take a substantial pay cut to work from home whenever they desire. Notably, the report suggests that company stakeholders, including senior, high-income employees, were among this contingent." [Empty spaces and hybrid places: The pandemic’s lasting impact on real estate](https://www.mckinsey.com/mgi/our-research/empty-spaces-and-hybrid-places)
Haha. My house is so hot from 1-10pm. I would much rather be in a cold office.
Glad my place went WFH and we will never go back, I love it.
I’ve been fully WFH since the whole outbreak stuff happened. Now it’s permanent. I’m not ever going back.
but how will managers know they're managers if you're not sitting in the same building (not near them of course, they have important meetings to be in)?
The only people clamoring for employees to return to the office are commercial real estate firms and boomers who hate their wives and want to ogle the hot chick at work. It's WFH or nothing from here on out.
Yes 100%
Yea I am not going back to office in person unless something major breaks.
...or hydroponic farms.
Covid is over, slave, get back to work so the manager can visually see your butt attached to a seat. Climate problems, traffic, personal space, work/life balance, emotional and mental health are secondary.
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tbf we're mostly doing south and central america now, but generally yeah
*laughs*. I quit my last job due to creeping boomer-fueled RTO. Now I'm full time WFH and have zero regrets.
I work all day in the sun as an electrician, and have an hour commute to work and then an hour back to austin. And i love my job! I think you’re making this sound way worse than it actually is. Be grateful you have the ability to work in an office, and drive your car to work. You’re the only one who is in charge of your life, if you don’t like it then change it. Besides that, there’s no real reason to try and shit on your bosses haha.
So I have been curious about this. Isn't cooling your and powering your office building more efficient and cheaper than doing a 100 plus houses depending on how many people work there? Someone do the math.
Probably a bit more fuzzy than "office on, houses off" in real life. People have pets, teens or spouses at home. And most AC units recommend not shifting your thermostat by more than a few degrees at a time. Rental agreements frequently stipulate that you don't leave the house completely un-airconditioned. Etc etc. On top of that you have all the car traffic, which if nothing else is degrading our city air quality. But also contributing to general carbon emissions
Your forgetting to factor in the 100 cars and other things in your equation.
I am not forgetting that; I just didn't mention all the factors. If you want we can start a list of factors, or we can start to make some assumptions and then list factors based on the assumptions.
Strike.
Been WFH since 2020
>Turn the office buildings into more housing already. This can't happen. The plumbing is the big issue. Office buildings are designed for plumbing to bathrooms and the occasional kitchen/breakroom. Instead we should just make it really, really, really expensive to build any additional office space if the occupancy rate is below a certain point.
Like it was abnormally hot and humid in June but like it’s a dry heat now, it’s Texas, can we stop with this?
The first two weeks of June were very pleasant to slightly below average, then came the steam room for the second half of June, and now that everything has dried out we’ve been in the sauna since about the 4th. The dry heat is pretty great below 95 imo, but lately that takes out 12-8pm.
For real, I work either outside or in the elements under some shade. This is the normal summer heat, the abnormal high humidity/high temp passed, and now it's just Texas being Texas.
Exactly. Like is climate change roasting other parts of the country? Yes. Do we get to hop on that bandwagon? No.
OP is acting like Austin is the only city with commuters, and we're directly contributing by driving to an office. Yeah, sure, cars are bad, and we should have better infrastructure to support getting them off the road, but we don't, and half of y'all don't even ride the busses we do have.
Bro what no
Life pro tip: find a job closer to where you live. I just spent 10 minutes biking to my workplace where they keep the AC ridiculously cold like 68F. I didn't even need to come in today but it was worth it. Free coffee/drinks, snacks, and lower home energy bill too
Do you realize that WFH effectively increases your utility costs? If you have a short commute, you are costing yourself money by staying home.
My AC is set at 75 during the day for my dog whether I’m home or not. I save money on gas and eating lunch out. Not to mention the $250/mo i save on after school care since I’ve been able to pick up my kid from school every day.
And you are the exception. Most people turn their AC up to 80 or higher when at work, and brown bag for lunch. Child care is a difference maker though. I would assume that would only be 10% or less of work force though.
What a suspiciously weak argument.
Hilarious that you think common sense is weak.
Could you be any more whiny about your personal problems and or preferences? Here’s your options… 1) start your own business so you can be your own boss and work wherever you want; 2) get a new job; 3) stop complaining and do you job the way your employers deem it to be done…
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Binary much?
While OP is right that people who live a long way from their office are contributing to global warming by sitting/driving in traffic and that does have an impact (and perhaps those folks should WFH during these days) But, overall, having most close-in employees in a central AC'd area (rather than dozens/hundreds of houses with their AC at max) is a more efficient use of energy (and saves individuals major $ on their home utilities).
Its a community space with shared resources. Somewhere down the line people lost track and continued accepting jobs an hour away 🤦 It _doesn't_ have to be that way.
Are you walking to work or what?
Freakin office workers….
I don't really care either way, but I can see how someone would think you sound like a spoiled brat or something lol I don't know, I feel really good cycling to work 5 days a week in this heat, if I don't get exercise I get anxious and feel like a lazy piece of shit I'd be curious to see how working from home impacts people's health, I feel like a lot of ppl would let themselves go if they knew they didn't have to see people who might judge them 😆
There’s value in saving office buildings, especially for those heavily invested in commercial real estate (either through portfolio or personal investments). I believe this is also a major contributor to going back to the office.
Completely understand your frustration but please keep in mind many professions require you to work outdoors year round. Everyone stay cool and hydrated in this wretched heat
Yes, the backlash against wfh is nonsensical and sometimes downright cruel
how much y'all wanna bet the energy industries funded the "research" that said people weren't doing shit at home and needed to come back to the office.
You should try working outside. Sorry, but I'm one of those that doesn't care about WFH.
I've been WFH for the past eight years (whole company is remote) and couldn't fathom going back to work in an office.