Newsflash NYT, everyone knows that. We all talked about that years ago when the return to office shit kicked off en masse.

I always assumed it was to keep everyone busier with commutes so we have less time and energy to organize against and criticize the ruling class.

It's commercial real estate value

It’s great to see this in ultra mainstream NYT.

When you finally get an office instead of a cubicle but now everyone is at home and has their own office so you don’t get to brag about it.

In the years after the epidemic lockdown the RTO mandates started coming hard and fast, and it was evident for two clear reasons.

a) Upper management was feeling lonely and wanted its entourage back. They feel powerful when they see busy workers being busy for their benefit. See also BULLSHIT JOBS, and...

b) Companies were stuck in leases of expensive business space that was now empty, and that just felt too wasteful, so the vibes solution was RTO mandates.

I think having people present is a crutch for bad managers too. Instead of checking in, setting goals, and reviewing goals reached they can just roll around the compound and see if everyone is fiddling with their doodads and looking stressed out.

Companies leased all this space in commercial office buildings. So they need to justify it. And if/when the commercial real estate market collapses it’ll cause another stock market collapse.