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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

#331

Post by reaperducer »

trustfundbaby wrote: post #279
chrisco255 wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but if you actually look at the death count, it has dropped in the past month and a half, despite re-openings: https://ga-covid19.ondemand.sas.com/ Georgia being one of the earliest states to re-open, continue to see their deaths plummet even as their case count increases. What's the reason for this? I don't know. Better testing, maybe. Maybe a less deadly version of the virus is propagating now. Not sure.

Been saying this for a while now ... since the Georgia Reopening, I've been monitoring a lot of state data daily, lots of places that started seeing spikes 3-4 weeks ago haven't even had as much as a slight trend upwards in deaths (Here's South Carolina for example https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/south-carolina-c... ) Wisconsin has seen a spike come and go and death rates have remained about the same http…

It just feels odd that this isn't spoken about enough, and I think its because the media narrative is a bit too invested in the "danger" part of this virus

It feels odd that you blame the "media narrative" and then post two links to the New York Times.

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

#332

Post by rubidium »

moonka wrote: post #314
larntz wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am in south-ish (north palm beach) Florida and went to the beach the past few weekends. Fortunately it was nowhere near has busy as that picture. We haven't had much issue finding a spot with enough space to feel socially distanced. We also went to Longhorn for dinner yesterday and they had everyone pretty spaced out (every other booth, no seating at center tables). All the restaurant employees were wearing masks.…

I can't bring myself to dine out because while I'm not as concerned for myself, I feel like the risk has to be pretty high to the waiters/bussers (prolonged interactions with dozens of people each day, and handling used dishes/silverware). I feel better about takeout currently since it cuts down on that.

Also cuts down on their job... so it’s take the risk (Est 95% of waitstaff is in the Very low risk category) or they don’t work.

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

#333

Post by rubidium »

op00to wrote: post #312
larntz wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am in south-ish (north palm beach) Florida and went to the beach the past few weekends. Fortunately it was nowhere near has busy as that picture. We haven't had much issue finding a spot with enough space to feel socially distanced. We also went to Longhorn for dinner yesterday and they had everyone pretty spaced out (every other booth, no seating at center tables). All the restaurant employees were wearing masks.…

You were in an enclosed area. Your risk of contracting Covid is astronomically higher indoors at a place where you remain for more than a few minutes.

Where you remain for 15 minutes or more with 20 or more people.

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

#334

Post by naveen99 »

jedberg wrote: post #144
momokoko wrote: post #109

Get ready for a wave of outsourcing of everything from tech to bpo like the US labor market has never seen in the coming 6 months. Once employers go through the initial pain of setting up remote work, the more than 50%(and sometimes as much as 80%) cost savings will be irresistible. If you are not in government, healthcare, or other industry that does not have legal requirements to maintain a US presence and you work…

Time zones are still a thing. No matter how remote someone is, if they're more than a few times zones away it becomes problematic. More than nine timezones across the company is nearly impossible to do well. So if we're talking about a US company, if you want anyone on the west coast, hiring continental Europeans will be tough, unless one of those groups is willing to work outside normal hours. Also, taxes can be har…

For the amount of money on the table, some people would probably be willing to do a night shift from the wrong time zone.

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

#335

Post by ttul »

jedberg wrote: post #144
momokoko wrote: post #109

Get ready for a wave of outsourcing of everything from tech to bpo like the US labor market has never seen in the coming 6 months. Once employers go through the initial pain of setting up remote work, the more than 50%(and sometimes as much as 80%) cost savings will be irresistible. If you are not in government, healthcare, or other industry that does not have legal requirements to maintain a US presence and you work…

Time zones are still a thing. No matter how remote someone is, if they're more than a few times zones away it becomes problematic. More than nine timezones across the company is nearly impossible to do well. So if we're talking about a US company, if you want anyone on the west coast, hiring continental Europeans will be tough, unless one of those groups is willing to work outside normal hours. Also, taxes can be har…

Waving from Canada, the big cheap nation to the north... with subsidized free healthcare.

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

#336

Post by Izkata »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #106
claudeganon wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe if we had a functioning welfare state, the government would be encouraged to respond to a pandemic appropriately so as not to overwhelm its resources. Scandinavia seems to be doing better than the US at the moment. As it stands, it looks like the US is using its lack of a social floor to force people back to work under unsafe conditions, regardless of whether that’s rational or necessary, which will result in m…

This is true in the same way that if a homeless person had a million dollars he might not be homeless. The trick is how to get a functioning welfare state when your government is fundamentally broken. Note that the even the CDC failed spectacularly at its primary job; its literal raison d'etre. You can criticize that the CDC lacked funding, but that is wrong[^1] and it misses the point: not being able to properly fun…

> Procuring masks and other PPE or even planning for a supply chain shortage is the cheapest, most impactful thing they could have done even without the benefit of hindsight

IIRC we did have a massive stockpile of masks, but it was only discovered at the start of the pandemic that they weren't being rotated out and most/all of them had degraded too far to be safe.

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

#337

Post by nell »

waltherg wrote: post #274
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.

I've heard two C-level guys with two separate German SMEs say that the only part of their workforce that hadn't handled remote work well was middle management. The people doing the actual work were happy WFH and simply getting stuff done. Senior management / C-level types were content seeing sales figures and general output from afar. Middle management struggled because they had a hard time judging work estimates for…

No surprise here. This is because middle management is tasked with converting meeting room decisions to actionable work. Both ends of the chain - executives and ICs can operate independently. The intermediaries need twice the number of personal interactions to get work done.

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

#338

Post by Klinky »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #329
Klinky wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Obamacare didn't actually need Republican support, but Obama did try to reach out an olive branch to the right, and it was stomped on repeatedly. It is very hard to empathize with conservative capitalists, libertarians or the alt right, when much of their policies seem to be based on a lack of empathy. It's also kind of sad that rioting, protests and raw anger over recent social issues has been more effective at movi…

> Obamacare didn't actually need Republican support, but Obama did try to reach out an olive branch to the right, and it was stomped on repeatedly. Right. He had the right idea. Of course things wouldn’t change over night. One man making positive gestures is important but insufficient to turn the ship on a dime. A lot of mistrust had been built up by that time and others were continuing to build that mistrust. I thin…

Again, I don't buy the "meet in the middle" approach or the "both sides are at fault" theory. Only one side has a populist leader who's platform was to foment racism and pledged to destroy Obamacare, and basically no one is reigning him in. If anything, people are volunteering for their chance to be thrown under the bus. It's very hard to meet in the middle with the current situation. There is serious moral concern if meeting in the middle means "a moderate amount of racism is acceptable", and when reaching an olive branch on policies results in no cooperation and instead pledges of destruction down the road.

However even with Democrats, there are a lot of people who think Bernie was unfairly treated, and that Biden is in bed with corporations, while establishment democrats think you should vote "blue no matter who", and that Bernie supporters were loons. Again, hard to come to a middle ground even within each party.

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

#339

Post by geomark »

nautilus12 wrote: post #282
waltherg wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard two C-level guys with two separate German SMEs say that the only part of their workforce that hadn't handled remote work well was middle management. The people doing the actual work were happy WFH and simply getting stuff done. Senior management / C-level types were content seeing sales figures and general output from afar. Middle management struggled because they had a hard time judging work estimates for…

Maybe more of a statement about the necessity of middle management..

Yeah. Eliminate middle management and just have the C-levels do all the hiring, work assignments, perfomance reviews, pay raises... you know, all that worthless stuff that middle managers do.

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

#340

Post by amiga_500 »

jedberg wrote: post #144
momokoko wrote: post #109

Get ready for a wave of outsourcing of everything from tech to bpo like the US labor market has never seen in the coming 6 months. Once employers go through the initial pain of setting up remote work, the more than 50%(and sometimes as much as 80%) cost savings will be irresistible. If you are not in government, healthcare, or other industry that does not have legal requirements to maintain a US presence and you work…

Time zones are still a thing. No matter how remote someone is, if they're more than a few times zones away it becomes problematic. More than nine timezones across the company is nearly impossible to do well. So if we're talking about a US company, if you want anyone on the west coast, hiring continental Europeans will be tough, unless one of those groups is willing to work outside normal hours. Also, taxes can be har…

Exactly. Econ 101: outsourcing here we come.

Real world: nearshoring (Canada), and WFH outside the metro are at lower wages.

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