Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the visibility is important. After 20 years in the workforce, I've learned that it's more important to be liked than it is to do a good job. If people work from home, the managers have trouble knowing who to keep, and who to lay off, because they can't interact with you socially in person.
Wow, that is wrong on so many levels. Getting rid of good workers because you don't personally like them? Keeping your mates even if they're useless? If a manager can't figure out who is productive from looking at what they deliver and how, then the manager needs to be finding another job.
Things are rarely so clear-cut. Usually there are shades of gray and humans tend to develop affinity for the ones they interact with in person. So if two colleagues are similar in performance, one in office gets preferential treatment due to unconscious bias.
That's just human nature and how we have evolved. If you want to learn more about it, here is a pointer - https://www.betterup.com/blog/proximity-bias