Economic effects of WFH | General financial discussion | Discussion forum

That IBM study is kinda dated. Much has changed technology-wise since then and much has been learned on remote-work processes.

Continued remote-work will mean many changes for commercial real estate; like fewer offices, more shared offices, more conference rooms and less office space overall. It could be great for suburban hospitality and retail, less great for downtown hospitality and retail. It could be great for the home-reno busineses.

I'm sure the list of pluses and minuses is quite long.

I worked remotely for many years before retiring in 2015. I loved it although it required a lot of discipline. For me, the issue was making sure I took time off as I routinely had conference calls anytime between 3AM and 12AM with partners in NA, SA, EU and AP. One thing everyone should be aware of is that if you can do your job without ever going to the office, so could someone from anywhere ...

That’s the thing. When Canadian office workers all cheer for permanent WFH, they don’t really think of it may become no work at all, as being replaced by another person in another country in another home.

savemoresaveoften said
I am debating the ultimate cost to the economy if WFH becomes permanent for a good portion of the white collars. My gut feel is it is a net negative to the economy, based on consumption will simply be less if there is less commute, more time at home, etc. Travel industry will prosper tho, as that becomes one of the main venue to get out of the house 🙂

I disagree that there would be any negative effect on the economy. I remember an old saying, "No one makes more money, just more expenses."

Anytime someone makes more money or finds a way to save, those savings are rarely ever taken and actually saved. Instead, people establish a certain comfortable spending level and will always spend towards it. Any money saved from dry cleaning, lunch, commute costs will simply be re-directed to something else, such as entertainment, holidays, or toys.

You said so yourself: "Travel industry will prosper"

I think that some people will do better working from home and others will do worse. It depends on their personality, their home arrangements, the nature of the work, the nature of the supervision, etc.

Extroverts will have a need to get out and be with their co-workers as a stimulus. Introverts not so much. Extroverts get hired more often than introverts from what I've seen as they are good at looking perky and babbling happily through interviews with enthusiasm and they seem to enjoy the interview process.

Employers, managers, and HR staff will have a job on their hands to sort out what is best for their company and the jobs they offer. It will take a while to sort this out - years. I do believe all employees need to come into work on some sort of regular basis and to have something to do there. It's best for everyone - employers get to know their employees, and employees get to have better working relationships and to showcase their achievements to help them get promotions.

I read recently that at the Gore company, the one that makes those waterproof breathable fabrics, each unit of the firm has no more than 100 (or was it 120 or 150 - memory is fading, but one of those anyway) employees. They all know each other within the unit to some extent and know who to turn to instantly when they have a issue. Each unit is limited to a particular product line. Hierarchy is not emphasized and it's not obvious who is above whom. They work more on a model of cooperation than of chain-of-command. Apparently this works very well for them and the company remains privately held or did when the info I read was published. all of this is harder at home. At Gore, the parking lots are built so that there are only enough parking spaces for the staff required for one unit of optimum size. If they feel the need to exceed that they know it[s time to subdivide, start a new unit, and specialize further in the units involved.

This anecdote brings to mind the fact that a huge number of employees dislike their bosses and even their co-workers, and that there is a lot of psychopathology and incompetence in a lot of work environments. To the extent that people want to work at home in order to avoid these problems, it may not work too well as the problem will not really have been fixed and the enterprise will continue to be negatively impacted. A healthy work environment , should there be any(!), will be a good place to work together, where people will be happy to be together, and where there is high retention.

I think it's all rather complicated, and we don't know the answers yet. As for retail, I think we will see a boom IF retail stores can ever get their act together and provide what people want to see and experience. I think the interest is definitely there. "Retail therapy" used to be a fond pursuit, and still could be but they lost their creativity and just cut everything to the bone, not a recipe for success. You could spend hours in some stores and never have an employee talk to you, let alone be helpful.
We are all aware of the issues of dealing with online everything, be it shopping or banking. There is lots of room to provide a more attractive experience, online or in person.