‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy • Hacker News Board

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#41

Post by toomuchtodo » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:51 PM UTC

osigurdson wrote: post #9

toomuchtodo wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Workers have leverage and are using it. You don’t have to understand it for workers to work towards having more agency over their working arrangements. The NLRB is likely about to reinstate the Joy Silk doctrine, which will make it even easier to organize. Workers who want flexible work arrangements as a right should lean into that. Public support for unions exceeds 70%, the highest amount in almost 60 years. So stra…

>> “you just have to do what your employer dictates or go elsewhere.” Isn't that pretty much exactly the case? No one in software is going to go to the trouble of unionizing.

Too early to tell if white collar is going to just roll over tbh. I’m more focused on lower income earned organizing at the moment due to the increased quality of life for those folks.

It’s fairly straightforward to notify the NLRB you want to hold an election. Just drive forward the effort if you believe in not being held hostage by employers in the aggregate. Remember, those who don’t support unions are a small minority (30% in the US). I see parallels to when HN folks confidently expounded about Dropbox not being a real business as they went on their way to becoming a large enterprise. How? You ignore the talk and naysayers and instead, default to action. Why listen to people who can’t stop you? Your agency and quality of life is more important than their opinion.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#42

Post by voisin » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:51 PM UTC

bluefishinit wrote: post #6

It feels like RTO is quickly evaporating the leverage these big companies temporarily created with their mass layoffs. I think the plan was to create a poor labor market so they could demand RTO. Well, it looks like the majority of the industry is calling their bluff and refusing to go back to the office regardless of the threat of unemployment. The tech job market seems to be rejuvenating so I think if people couldn…

This seems like wishful thinking to me. It seems to me like more companies are enforcing hybrid, starting with 1 day a week, then 2, and now many are at 3. Maybe there’s a plateau somewhere, but purely remote seems to have lost a lot of steam.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#43

Post by davewritescode » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:51 PM UTC

I think full time work in the office is 100% dead and buried. It's never coming back for people who have enough skills to leverage that kind of arrangement. I think the first place we need to start is there. Most of us are NEVER going back to 5 days a week in the office.

However, most of the folks complaining about return to work I've noticed are senior people who have enough skills to perform their job and don't require constant attention. What I've noticed is these kinds of workers absolutely thrive remotely, however younger employees greatly benefit from in person learning and mentoring.

I've personally worked with many junior engineers over the years and it's really hard to mentor someone over a computer screen. It's definitely possible, but being able sit down informally and talk about something that's hard to understand, or unclear is much harder remotely.

I haven't figured out a virtual way to give an intern a small assignment and determine if they're struggling remotely (yet) short of doing peer programming. If I ask an intern to fix a bug that's 2 lines of code and I hear furious typing over the walls for extended periods of time, that's probably a good time to ask how it's going and offer some help.

I don't have the answers here but I don't think it's fair to be so dismissive of face to face time in the office.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#44

Post by eru » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:51 PM UTC

dleslie wrote: post #16

shortrounddev2 wrote: post #5

I fear that state governments will start imposing taxes on businesses which hire remote employees, but I also feel that will just drive businesses out of those states and into the midwest/south

It really should be the other way; they ought to tax office space punitively in order to coerce people not to commute at all. Commuting is a major source of emissions, personal health ailments, and encourages human-hostile urban design.

I might agree with your policy aims, but the policy cure you proposed would be worse than the disease.

If you don't like people driving, then tax that directly.

Or better, for a start, remove subsidies for driving first, whether they be explicit or implicit. Only then think about levying special taxes. Eg remove mandatory minimum parking requirements for real estate developers, convert most roads to be paid for by their users via electronic tolls instead of by general taxes, etc. (And remove 'commuting allowances' that one can claim as a deduction on income taxes.)

And if you still want to levy taxes, levy them on what you don't like, and not some imprecise proxy like office space. Eg directly on emissions or negative health externalities.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#45

Post by martin8412 » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:52 PM UTC

dleslie wrote: post #16

shortrounddev2 wrote: post #5

I fear that state governments will start imposing taxes on businesses which hire remote employees, but I also feel that will just drive businesses out of those states and into the midwest/south

It really should be the other way; they ought to tax office space punitively in order to coerce people not to commute at all. Commuting is a major source of emissions, personal health ailments, and encourages human-hostile urban design.

It's also a major source of income from taxes on things like fuel.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#46

Post by tekla » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:52 PM UTC

themaninthedark wrote: post #8

It's kind of funny to me that for a long time the people in cities looked down on rural people and life and touted the benefits of living in close proximity. When COVID hit, we saw a mass exodus from the cities and now people don't want to return.

It's kind of funny to me that rural people are so dependent on a international system of gas/diesel production that they can be priced out of being able to get food without significant Federal Govt intervention during price shocks

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#47

Post by voisin » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:52 PM UTC

bluefishinit wrote: post #32

fullshark wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No one has any master plan here, everyone is winging it and trying not to screw up so much they get fired/replaced by the board, while still achieving their preferred outcome. The end result is this kind of limbo, where no one can trust the current status quo fully.

This is incorrect. CEOs are literally planning these moves together. In a more general sense they're also creating an open culture to promote this type of thing. Take a scroll through some VC/CEO twitter accounts and see how many whine about WFH or people "cheating" at work, working two jobs, not having a work ethic... The capital class is good at working in its own interest and it has a lot of leverage to do so.

> CEOs are literally planning these moves together.

Source? I would hope by 2023 we would agree that tweets != reality.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#48

Post by eru » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:53 PM UTC

toomuchtodo wrote: post #3

whywhywhywhy wrote: post #2

Just genuinely don't see the point in this debate anymore, like some companies will want you to show up, some will be fine with you working from home. If your company is asking you to show up, time to just get another job if that's important to you. Thankfully it's an easy solve because the people who like showing up are tired of video calls anyway.

Workers have leverage and are using it. You don’t have to understand it for workers to work towards having more agency over their working arrangements. The NLRB is likely about to reinstate the Joy Silk doctrine, which will make it even easier to organize. Workers who want flexible work arrangements as a right should lean into that. Public support for unions exceeds 70%, the highest amount in almost 60 years. So stra…

No unions necessary, just move your job if you don't like it (or don't take one in the first place that you don't like). In a strong labour market that's a sufficient threat.

And in a weak labour market, even a union can't rescue you.

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#49

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:53 PM UTC

jeffbee wrote: post #17

themaninthedark wrote: post #8

It's kind of funny to me that for a long time the people in cities looked down on rural people and life and touted the benefits of living in close proximity. When COVID hit, we saw a mass exodus from the cities and now people don't want to return.

Every clause of your post is false. There was not a mass exodus from cities during COVID. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/12/16/in-2020-f... Urban people do not look down on rural people. It’s the opposite. Rural people are the most likely to hold negative opinions about people who live in other situations, and urban dwellers are the least likely. https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2018/05/22/how-…

[deleted]

Re: ‘It’s Not My Responsibility’ to Save the Office Economy

#50

Post by gotaran » Wed, Aug 23, 2023, 1:53 PM UTC

heyjamesknight wrote: post #13

themaninthedark wrote: post #8

It's kind of funny to me that for a long time the people in cities looked down on rural people and life and touted the benefits of living in close proximity. When COVID hit, we saw a mass exodus from the cities and now people don't want to return.

Is that "mass exodus" really that sticky though? At least in NYC, rents are back up above what they were pre-pandemic. Nobody I know can find an apartment.

NYC’s population is still below pre pandemic levels. . Exorbitant rent prices there are due to multiple factors, but population increase is not one of them: https://www.thecity.nyc/2023/8/4/23819420/why-is-nyc-rent-so....