Amazon Engineer Sues for Work from Home Costs
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Re: Amazon Engineer Sues for Work from Home Costs
#2My understanding is that California’s language is pretty unambiguous that businesses are responsible for all work expenses. I think on the legal merits the engineer may ultimately prevail, but I just don’t see how this is a battle worth fighting considering the massive savings that work from home already provides. It’s likely a lawsuit like this could also damage one’s long-term career prospects.
It will be interesting to see whether the courts see a difference between incremental expenses vs things the employee was already purchasing (e.g. internet vs electricity)
Re: Amazon Engineer Sues for Work from Home Costs
#3I'm not sure I agree with the article. I'm not even sure that I get corporate logic at this point.
Offices cost money, much more money than configuring an enterprise for remote work. There's always that minor percentage of employees who cannot develop successful patterns to work from home. As the pandemic showed, these folks are the minority today.
Under this paradigm, as long as remote work costs less than a building then remote work should be attractive to a company. Yet, many companies are chasing hybrid models even though that direction causes a good bit of attrition as well (people want the whole thing).
My personal hypothesis is that companies are doing an organized, long term pull out of offices, but are resisting doing it all at once because they'd impact each other's commercial property values. This confusing state we're in is purposeful.
Re: Amazon Engineer Sues for Work from Home Costs
#4In australia you can claim things like internet or computer and such at home if it’s used for work. Used to claim back half my internet costs every year.
Re: Amazon Engineer Sues for Work from Home Costs
#5It does raise the question of why large companies _aren't_ responsible for paying for commuting costs. We've obviously never done it that way, but is there a reason that we couldn't?
Re: Amazon Engineer Sues for Work from Home Costs
#6My understanding is that California’s language is pretty unambiguous that businesses are responsible for all work expenses. I think on the legal merits the engineer may ultimately prevail, but I just don’t see how this is a battle worth fighting considering the massive savings that work from home already provides. It’s likely a lawsuit like this could also damage one’s long-term career prospects. It will be interesti…
The bigger cost would be a rent equivalent on a home office. That's probably low five figures annually.
But I don't agree with the overall conclusion. Ultimately the cost of an employee boils down to one number. If they have to pay 15k for home office rent then salary will just be 15k less.
Re: Amazon Engineer Sues for Work from Home Costs
#7The article makes 2 main points: 1) that this lawsuit will cause companies to take WFH away. and 2) It's extremely difficult to bill things like fractional electricity and internet usage.
The first is a flimsy premise because companies simply don't have the power to take WFH away and I think they know that. If they did, they would. But the collectivization for WFH, brought by lockdowns, is far too powerful. So powerful, in fact, that it's a hiring advantage for your competitors if you attempt to bar WFH.
The second point is just lazy. Billing for fractional usage is not impossible nor difficult, and you can bet if a company was billing a customer for fractional usage, they would have it down to an exact science. In fact, the resistance on this point shows the weakness of their position from the first point.
I do have some sympathy for the people who like to go to an office and interact with people face to face. But we've been operating with their preference as the default for a long time, so they can learn to adapt now.
Re: Amazon Engineer Sues for Work from Home Costs
#8My understanding is that California’s language is pretty unambiguous that businesses are responsible for all work expenses. I think on the legal merits the engineer may ultimately prevail, but I just don’t see how this is a battle worth fighting considering the massive savings that work from home already provides. It’s likely a lawsuit like this could also damage one’s long-term career prospects. It will be interesti…
The bigger cost would be a rent equivalent on a home office. That's probably low five figures annually. But I don't agree with the overall conclusion. Ultimately the cost of an employee boils down to one number. If they have to pay 15k for home office rent then salary will just be 15k less.
I agree with you generally but there’s also the question of whether an expense is reasonable. Should you be expected to put a desk in your bedroom and have that be sufficient? I live in New York and have an extra bedroom for my office, should my employer be forced to pay for that instead?
Re: Amazon Engineer Sues for Work from Home Costs
#9I'm not sure I agree with the article. I'm not even sure that I get corporate logic at this point. Offices cost money, much more money than configuring an enterprise for remote work. There's always that minor percentage of employees who cannot develop successful patterns to work from home. As the pandemic showed, these folks are the minority today. Under this paradigm, as long as remote work costs less than a buildin…
> My personal hypothesis is that companies are doing an organized, long term pull out of offices, but are resisting doing it all at once because they'd impact each other's commercial property values. This confusing state we're in is purposeful.
I doubt it, because most companies rent their space and they wouldn't care about the impact to the building. I think your premise is flawed:
> There's always that minor percentage of employees who cannot develop successful patterns to work from home. As the pandemic showed, these folks are the minority today.
Sure, maybe most people can develop 'successful patterns', but that doesn't mean that most people are most productive at home (in the eyes of company heads). The term 'successful patterns' is relative given the situation, and right now that means doing the best we can given the circumstances.
Re: Amazon Engineer Sues for Work from Home Costs
#10It does raise the question of why large companies _aren't_ responsible for paying for commuting costs. We've obviously never done it that way, but is there a reason that we couldn't?
The answer I heard is because part of the initial salary negotiations the employer/employee should have already factored that in.
However, it could make sense that if they initially worked from home, then had to start commuting, the company should pay for gas, car maintenance, tolls, public transportation, etc.
Then, the same goes in reverse, if the worker agreed to the salary working from the office, when forced to work from home, they could make a case of the company having to pay for monitors, a desk, electricity, a faster internet, etc.