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Most employees of NYT won’t be required back in physical offices until 2021

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Re: Most employees of NYT won’t be required back in physical offices until 2021

#161

Post by sushshshsh »

claudeganon wrote: post #136
jonathanpeterwu wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Building on this. If you have the risk tolerance. Just stating that you have to work remotely (if its legitimate) at-risk health, child care, family care I'm sure there can't be a ton of pushback on an individual level. Otherwise it might be a GREAT signal to leave a company who in the midst of a pandemic is irrational.

Companies being willing to throw their employees into meat grinders has generally been rewarded by the market (which also tends towards the irrational).

This is absolutely true, and normally those companies will receive reduced profit/revenue if the move is truly detrimental, and the company will slowly die and accumulate debt and drop in share price.

Unless of course the Federal Reserve continues to pull a BOJ and prop up zombie firms with free money, thus completely destroying the "disruption" of an otherwise bad company's business model.

Re: Most employees of NYT won’t be required back in physical offices until 2021

#162

Post by Consultant32452 »

tsm wrote: post #92
dannyw wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well hopefully you don't have vicious mobs at your workplace.

My generally-pretty-friendly workplace has recently had quite a bit of viciousness about: a) bbatsov's response to calls for Rubocop to be renamed b) The use of "master" as the canonical branch's name in our main git repo c) Linking to xkcd #75 (which uses the c-word) (the link was provided in response to a thread about mixed levels of profanity)

It sounds like your workplace has jumped the shark. I hope you're able to find another soon.

Re: Most employees of NYT won’t be required back in physical offices until 2021

#163

Post by throwaway894345 »

majormajor wrote: post #146
throwaway894345 wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm inclined to agree, but I do wonder how we avoid people just adjusting their risk threshold to account for the welfare state. I know it seems to work in other places, but I'm not convinced that what works in Scandinavia (or wherever) will work in the US. It seems like the US has a lot of other problems that it needs to sort out in order to be in the same ballpark as these model countries with respect to successful…

> I'm inclined to agree, but I do wonder how we avoid people just adjusting their risk threshold to account for the welfare state. Which direction are you picturing this going? I would be a lot more flexible in what jobs I would take, what things I would consider doing with my life (starting my own company, taking time off and pursuing some sort of artistic side project...) if I had a good health care safety net. So…

I was specifically concerned that people would take unproductive risks. Worse business investments, having children outside of an unstable family situation more often, etc. But your point is a good one; my concern could be unfounded and maybe people would be more productive? I genuinely don't know. One question I would have about your model is how it stacks up against countries with strong social safety nets? Do they tend to be more entrepreneurial as your model predicts? If not, why not?

Note that while by certain measures, those countries tend to be less productive than the US, I don't necessarily think that comes down to welfare, and in either case I don't think it's an awful thing to be somewhat less productive. I would personally like to work less.

Re: Most employees of NYT won’t be required back in physical offices until 2021

#164

Post by staysaasy »

Remote work is such a fascinating leadership challenge given how dogmatic both sides have become. The tone of the debate is verging on a religious argument (on both sides), but it's all centered on work-related topics which typically don't engender such extreme responses.

Re: Most employees of NYT won’t be required back in physical offices until 2021

#165

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

redisman wrote: post #158
SpicyLemonZest wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't right now, but I certainly have people who dislike each other for some reason or another, and I'm worried about what that looks like when they all start going 3, 6, 9 months without seeing each other.

That sounds like... an improvement?

Hopefully, but I think there's a very plausible world where a lack of familiarity shifts people from "I kinda think he's wrong on these issues" to "I can't possibly work for a company that'd employ this jerk".

Re: Most employees of NYT won’t be required back in physical offices until 2021

#166

Post by jkaptur »

spyspy wrote: post #113
Krasnol wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a nightmare. Now imagine half of them being on the phone....terrible.

It's surprisingly quiet actually. It's not a trading floor with people screaming at each other. Source: am a former NYT and worked in that exact room.

FYI, most trading floors are very quiet as well, for mostly the same reasons.

Re: Most employees of NYT won’t be required back in physical offices until 2021

#167

Post by walshemj »

dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #40
Loughla wrote: post #5

Meanwhile, my employer has said zero remote work once the state transitions into the next phase. They want to be "fair" to everyone, including those who have positions that cannot be performed remotely. So, you have a co-morbidity? Nope. You have no childcare suddenly? Nope. It's startling how stuck in the 1980's some people are. Just absolutely astonishing.

> They want to be "fair" to everyone This is the explanation I hear most often, but when you examine it, it makes no sense. Otherwise you would need everyone to make the same money, which makes no sense either. People are different, their duties are different, some jobs are better suited for remote work than others - putting everyone in the same basket is plain stupid.

The trouble is from an IR (industrial relations) perspective that actually can be problem if one group perceives that some other group has something they don't have. (Brigit's Jones Smaug Marrieds )

Also how would you audit this "oh her she's friends with manger x so she gets o work from home etc"

Re: Most employees of NYT won’t be required back in physical offices until 2021

#169

Post by spyspy »

jkaptur wrote: post #166
spyspy wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's surprisingly quiet actually. It's not a trading floor with people screaming at each other. Source: am a former NYT and worked in that exact room.

FYI, most trading floors are very quiet as well, for mostly the same reasons.

You're probably right, my imagination of trading floors is born from financial movies set in the 80s.

Re: Most employees of NYT won’t be required back in physical offices until 2021

#170

Post by deevolution »

nicoburns wrote: post #49
dvfjsdhgfv wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everybody should be you, if possible. Having enough savings to be able not to worry about the nearest future is not just a perfect option, it's a necessity.

Unfortunately it's not a realistic option for most people. If we're talking about "shoulds", then we should have a welfare state that covers these scenarios rather than putting the burden on individuals, many of whom will not have the means to implement it even if they wanted to.

A welfare state isn't necessary if people save aggressively like in Singapore. People are actually required to save something like 35% of their income and their employers have to contribute an additional 15%. Some welfare exists but only for special circumstances like for the needy or disabled. Simply telling people to save more wouldn't cut it in America. If we end welfare like the Republicans want, I think we would need a government mandated savings rate or employment matching program similar to Singapore. We also need to go back to a gold standard and end inflationary fiat money - this is exactly why people dont have a rainy day fund / have no incentives to save in the first place. Its left the individual and the family vulnerable, fragile, and it has lowered our time horizons and corrupted our institutions and increased our dependence on the government.
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