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JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

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Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#51

Post by benreesman »

JohnMakin wrote: post #33
999900000999 wrote: post #21

I dislike RTO for one simple reason . I'm not at work to make friends, I'm not at work to chit chat. I'm not at work so we can talk about who won the last football game . I go to work in exchange for currency, which is required to acquire goods and services. All this other crap, all these holiday parties, all of this let's dance in diversity videos, no that's not what I'm here for . Most of the time coming to the off…

> I go to work in exchange for currency, which is required to acquire goods and services Social currency is also a thing, which is much more difficult to gain in a remote setting - if not impossible. I don't go to work to socialize either, but I'm not naive enough to think that without an extremely established career and reputation at an org that I'll be promoted or employed strictly on merit. there is always some de…

There will always be some social-ness, but let’s be real that it’s out of fucking control right now. I’ve been doing this professionally for more than 20 years and “who you know not what you know” hasn’t run this badly amok in that entire time.

The industry is very unsettled right now: credible (or at least loud) opinions on AI range from “fancy autocomplete nothingburger” to “programmers are obsolete starting now”, RTO is in some weird ass place where it’s really unclear the merits or lack thereof, consolidation of half the S&P into ~7 companies and the whole startup pipeline running through guys who fit in a banquet room is uh, not highly not a working free market.

This is how you get a chorus of “talent shortage” on one side and a chorus of “CS is cooked fam” on the other: software engineering jobs are experiencing a market failure, price discovery isn’t happening, and shit is going to be weird until the market starts working again.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#53

Post by ewhanley »

HamsterDan wrote: post #25

Workers need to tread carefully here. If you there's no need to be in the office, what's to stop corporate from replacing you with an Indian that costs 1/3rd as much? Push back too hard on RTO and you may not have a job at all in five years.

This always comes up in RTO discussions. Why haven't they already done it - why go through the pain of forcing an RTO when they can cut costs by 2/3?

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#54

Post by silverquiet »

0xcafefood wrote: post #12

Labor unions seem like the wrong model for organizing "knowledge workers." A professional association like the American Medical Association might be a better way to structure things. One difference is how they gain leverage. Labor unions seem to rely on the fact that they are the ones _right there_ who can work in a factory, clean a facility, etc. But capital sort of did an end run around some of that by literally pa…

> capital sort of did an end run around some of that by literally packing factories up and shipping them overseas.

Knowledge workers did this to themselves by moving everything to the cloud and remote work. My boss was literally told by one of our private equity overlords that if a job can be done from home, then it can be done from India. They proved good on their word by doing it to my job within two years. And that was before the current era of mass layoffs. I was here warning people to this effect and making myself rather unpopular back during the boom times.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#55

Post by gretch »

bko wrote: post #34
TrackerFF wrote: post #4

I think RTO mandates will be the straw that broke the camel's back, for a lot of Americans. Workers in sectors that previously wouldn't even think about unionizing, are now having serious discussions. Going back to commutes, wasting time, for no obvious reason - yeah, that did wake up people. EDIT: I'm talking about rigid 5 days a week RTO policy. As other have pointed out, having a flexible WFH policy is often "good…

So why do companies insist? If it has no meaningful impact on productivity, and workers don't like it (including a lot of managers), why push it? That's why I believe that companies have some evidence (or belief) that work from home employees are not as productive, enough so to wage this political battle and pay loads in office expenses.

One aspect I rarely see discussed on these messages boards, but one of critical importance, is the role that in-office has on developing new employees over time.

Imagine you are a new grad who just got hired but all the senior employees all work remote. How do you learn the trade? It’s much harder to become established.

However senior employees who were established already pre covid don’t experience this problem.

If you are the leader of the company, you realize that one day all of these senior ppl will retire one day and the people who are juniors today will be the main work force. Will they be just as good in this remote-first environment?

Maybe yes, maybe no, either way it’s a huge unknown and that means big risk.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#56

Post by currymj »

I generally think for many jobs, in-person is actually better.

SWE in a place with good process, remote is probably fine. Generally similar for jobs with clear deliverables on that kind of time scale. if it's more research oriented, there is a huge benefit to being in-person in front of a whiteboard. For a job with shifting requirements day to day (like some legal or banking work), it is easier to coordinate everyone in the same office.

unclear if this overcomes cost to employees of the commute, housing, etc., but the value is there.

however there is also "worst of all possible worlds" RTO, where you have to commute to the office because the office is the place you are required to sit for your 4+ hours of Zoom calls per day with other colleagues in other offices. I expect a lot of companies are going to do this, which is totally stupid.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#57

Post by estebank »

galleywest200 wrote: post #32
EncomLab wrote: post #11

The key to me is the flexibility - I have the option of WFH 2 days per week, but most weeks I'm in the office 5 days (sometimes a half day on Saturday) because I am fortunate to have a "real office" with a door, a nice view, a stocked break area - and no home distractions. If I was still in a cube farm with a barely stocked vending machine (where I spent the vast majority of my career) I'd be using every WFH moment I…

I am not paid for the two hours of sitting in traffic (one hour to work, one hour back). The company does not reimburse for gas, car insurance, vehicle wear and tear, etc. Take the bus? Not sure they pay for bus fare either. Those are two hours every single week-day that I could use to either do more work for the company or, more realistically, do self-improvement tasks or hobbies.

> Not sure they pay for bus fare either.

A lot of companies have commuter benefits that cover bus fare at a minimum. Sometimes it is "free" money, sometimes it is "pay for your bus pass with pre-tax money".

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#58

Post by [deleted] »

iugtmkbdfil834 wrote: post #30
HamsterDan wrote: post #25

Workers need to tread carefully here. If you there's no need to be in the office, what's to stop corporate from replacing you with an Indian that costs 1/3rd as much? Push back too hard on RTO and you may not have a job at all in five years.

Shrug. In our latest meeting our leaders had no problems hiring 'outside hires' for random unexpected project resulting from them trying to stiff US vendor ( don't get me started on how that makes sense ). Adding those contractors with the amount of time spent in meetings, we likely have already spent more than the money that would be paid to the vendor, but I digress. Anyway, I am mentioning it, because the usual is…

[deleted]

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#59

Post by paxys »

HamsterDan wrote: post #25

Workers need to tread carefully here. If you there's no need to be in the office, what's to stop corporate from replacing you with an Indian that costs 1/3rd as much? Push back too hard on RTO and you may not have a job at all in five years.

What stopped them from doing exactly this 20 years ago? Turns out the differentiating factor isn't salary but talent. They pay you $$$$ because they can't find equivalent talent in India. And the talent that does exist in India isn't going to work for peanuts.

Re: JPMorgan Workers Ponder Union in Wake of Return-to-Office Mandate

#60

Post by rpcope1 »

bloomingkales wrote: post #22
TrackerFF wrote: post #4

I think RTO mandates will be the straw that broke the camel's back, for a lot of Americans. Workers in sectors that previously wouldn't even think about unionizing, are now having serious discussions. Going back to commutes, wasting time, for no obvious reason - yeah, that did wake up people. EDIT: I'm talking about rigid 5 days a week RTO policy. As other have pointed out, having a flexible WFH policy is often "good…

American society doesn't want to accept that a lot of our problems happen because the parents aren't home. Michael Moore had an interesting scene in Bowling for Columbine where he showed a 6 year old shooter's mother had to work hours away daily and wasn't home. Mine and most of my friends parents always had to be outside of the house during our formative years. We had very robust economy in the 90s/2000s that pretty…

I agree but would take it further: a very aggressive income tax on any non-primary earner in a household that has a total income above 2 or 3 times the median wage. I know there's a lot of "line must go up" types that salivate at the idea of maximizing worker participation rate and GDP, but I think life is probably better when the thumb is put on the scale such that only one breadwinner is encouraged (no matter their gender).
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