Skip to main content

What I’ve Been Reading This Week: Work From Home Edition


Yet another week of (work from home) work has come and gone.  With that comes the opportunity to look at a few articles which have taken a deep dive into the dynamics of work from home...both from the perspective of those impacted by the large number of workers that are currently working remotely as well as from the viewpoint of the workers themselves.

As always, below are a couple articles that caught my eye this week.



On Monday, Google announced that it was extending the option for most of its employees to work from home through June of 2021.  As The San Francisco Chronicle reports, with many of the company’s employees already working remotely, there has been a noticeable dip in the housing market in the Bay Area, a plunge in leases in the area, and a direct hit to San Francisco’s bars and restaurants.  (With much of the company’s employees being located in the Bay Area, this would undoubtedly be an area severely hampered by having many of Google’s employees not in the office.)   With this announcement of an even longer work from home option being provided to employers, it is somewhat sobering to think of the effect this will continue to have on the Bay Area over the coming months.



Eleanor Cummins at Vox write a recent article which tracked the emergence of work from home as an option for workers from some of its earlier roots in the 1970’s through today.  In the article, attention is paid to large scale employers such as Yahoo, IBM, and FaceBook in an effort to show that while work from home has curtailed in recent years (before the coronavirus pandemic started, only about 14% of workers in the country worked from home five or more days per week), that has taken a sharp reversal.  However, with nearly half the workforce working from home now, the prevalence of distractions from work abound.  Although the article does not give employers or employees a full proof guide on how to cut out the distractions, it does provide a few stories about how some workers are coping that I believe are worth a read.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

NLRB: Discussion Among Employees About Tip Pooling is Protected Concerted Activity

  This Advice Memorandum from the National Labor Relations Board’s Associate General Counsel, Jayme Sophir, addressed whether employees which discussed and complained about tip pooling at work constituted protected concerted activity. In relevant part, an employer in New York operated a chain of steakhouses.  While tip pooling was in place at these steakhouses, some of the employees objected to it on the grounds that it was not transparent and improperly divided tips among the workers.  Employees were told not to complain or talk to each other about the tip pool and were told that doing so would endanger their jobs.  Despite the employer later attempting to provide some clarity as to how the tips were being divided, rancor still existed among some employees.  At one point, the employees were told by a general manager that some employees that had been talking about the tip pool were “cleared out” and the employer would continue to do so. In the Advice Memorandum,...
Post a Comment
Read more

Breaking: Labor Secretary Rumored to Be Leaving Administration

A few hours ago, word leaked out that Labor Secretary Marty Walsh (“Walsh”) is in the midst of negotiations to head up the NHL Players Union and leave his position at the Labor Department. Walsh, who has served as the sole Labor Secretary under President Biden, has taken part in a labor renaissance of sorts as support for organized labor has increased during his term as Labor Secretary (although the number of workers that have joined a union over the past two years has not grown as mush as some expected.)  He has also overseen the ongoing negotiations with rail workers over a new contract, although that matter is still on shaky ground and playing out as we speak. As for who might step into the vacant Labor Secretary role, there are already rumblings that President Biden should nominate Deputy Labor Secretary Julie Su (a strong labor advocate) or even a progressive like Senator Bernie Sanders.  Until Walsh officially gives his notice, however, I would expect some/many potential...
Post a Comment
Read more

San Diego Rolls Back Vaccine Mandate For City Workers

Last Tuesday, the San Diego City Council voted to do away with the vaccine mandate for city employees. The city’s vaccine mandate that was in place required city workers to get the coronavirus vaccine or risk termination.  Perhaps to this surprise of no one, the city’s policy came under fire with 14 employees being terminated and over 100 other employees resigning.  With the coronavirus subsiding, including in Southern California, the San Diego City Council took action. Now, bear in mind, the repeal of the vaccine mandate does not take place immediately. With that being said, the mandate will be repealed March 8th.  I suppose the question now is, what other cities or regions follow San Diego’s lead? For additional information:   https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/politics/story/2023-01-24/san-diego-repeals-controversial-covid-19-vaccine-mandate-citing-drop-in-cases-hospitalizations
Post a Comment
Read more