NYC Mayor demands CEOs end work from home as economy struggles
forbes.com
forbes.com
They somehow managed to twist this in such a way that the burden was shifted on the workers-consumers themselves. Instead of saying that all these businesses that relied on a social arrangement whereby the workers were forced to consume overpriced services and products - thus, an arrangement that was more disadvantageous to the workers than any other party - will now need to find new ways to make money, the suggested solution is instead to continue to force workers to consume there, so those businesses not close down.
One could argue that forcing consumers to support certain geographic areas or businesses in order for these not to close down is as far as possible from the free market that is supposedly at play, considering that the consumers will obviously spend their money elsewhere.
NYC doesn’t have that problem maybe, but many cities will have to deal with this shift, and the solution isn’t to be regressive but to start finding new ways to make these places vibrant.
It used to be FiDi was the same, but it's become pretty residential. Still, I know many restaurants there that only open M-F, especially on the eastern side where fewer tourists venture.
Everywhere else in Manhattan is sufficiently residential enough (or in the case of Midtown, touristy enough) to be lively on nights and weekends.
We've always found it odd how we see these news stories of the local downtown dying yet, they all offer nothing of value to many on the evenings and weekends.
It's unfortunate but it's still better than paying the tax and making the commute.
San Francisco is having the same issue - they are taking a major hit in taxes due to a lack of commutors.
Since 2009 residents of NY who live in counties adjacent to NYC are subject to a 0.34% tax if they work in NYC. I believe this tax does not go toward general NYC operations, but rather helps fund the mass-transit that supports their commute. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commuter_tax
The local govt is asking people back because they run on NYC property taxes, but both them and the property needs to learn that rates needs to come back to reality.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLkVbIsAWN2lvV4KY2Ag7r...
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLkVbIsAWN2lt_n88l7WC2...
I expect a wave of deurbanization in the coming century, where humans spread through the unsettled landscape in smaller, less densely populated communities, and most professional, information heavy work being done remotely. Most of these cities will become ruins.
Sounds great. As someone who deeply dislikes large, noisy polluted cities I think a move back to smaller communities whereby everyone knows each other is a positive thing.
and some people will definitely move. but cities will only be getting better moving forward.
This is easily worth 50k to me. I see no point in to riding the train for hours per day, at the same time I understand that without business commuters many bigger cities will just collapse.
Doesn't mean society should listen, though.
Enough about the pros, are there any cons?
Vegan hotdog economics. Love how out of touch this seems. Has to be satire.
However, is he better than de Blasio? Is he better than Sliwa?
That's all that matters.
That's quite a sad statement if you really believe "all that matters" is being just slightly less incompetent than the most incompetent. And even the jury on that is still out as he's only been in office six weeks.
I don't have any such evidence. I don't think the way I phrased my question implied I did.
awarding his brother the top NYPD job
There's a long history of nepotism in politics. Here's a famous case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Kennedy#Attorney_Genera... I think there are now laws against that at the federal level.
"all that matters" is being just slightly less incompetent
Many are upset about that reality. But I've been observing politics for many decades and I haven't seen anything better. NY doesn't do recalls (or didn't when I lived there, maybe it changed). California does allow them but that seems to result in an altogether different clown show.
In my case, sometimes - about 50% of the time roughly - I want an office to work out of. I want to separate home and work life for a multitude of reasons, most notably, just to get some damn peace when I'm done with work.
The emotional toll of "walk into your living room, there's work. Wake up, there's work. Done with work? Go chill in your living room an-nope, there's work." can be a pain in the ass after so many years.
So I wonder if I'm somewhat unique in that and maybe it's all in my head, or if eventually, once they've had a substantial remote experience for a few years, more people will be in a place similar to me: they like the benefits of remote, but man that constant work presence thing takes a hell of a toll after a while.
Guess we'll see in a few years if people eventually change their points of view. I don't expect it to be the majority opinion by a long shot, probably not ever, but eventually it may rise to a non-negligible number.
Personally I'd prefer a flexible "come to the office when you want and for very rare special occasions" (critical client meetings once or twice a year, etc.) policy. I think success here is going to break the simplistic "everybody must do x" one-size-fits-all-whether-you-like-it-or-not typical corporate narrowminded oversimplicity, and instead be enabled by flexibility and control on the employee's part, effectively managed by a good manager.
That'll be rare.
It takes some conditioning to break a workaholic mindset. For me, I filled my time with playing music and then farming. Hobbies became a necessary distraction to maintain a work-life balance. But once the habit was formed, I couldn’t imagine going back.
Still, I agree with your approach here entirely, this is the way to handle it. Co-working space also could work, but then you have a commute, so you might as well just go into the office at that point! Glad you were able to make it work for you!
Looking forward to the next couple of months where our company is going to have 2/3 office/remote weeks
Cities are networks effects in the physical world, if they start to unravel then most people will be out of a job. That's totally your right to want to never come back to the office, I'm sure you will have no problem doing just that. On the contrary, it's actually the mayor's JOB to keep those network effects (i.e. the city) going.
So yeah, we could reconfigure New York, and maybe we should, but that will cause a lot of pain to a lot of people who can't do what you are doing and who don't make 100k+ in the comfort of their own home.
It reeks of ugly desperation and parental overreach. The people have spoken. Now it's time to learn to surf.
This seems like a big part of the problem that remote work has solved.
Way less carbon emissions, far cheaper for me, more work-life balance, no commutes eating up my day and driving me nuts. No crappy work lunches where I snag McD's cuz it's close by; I can whip up something in a slowcooker during my "lunchbreak" and have good food all day. I'm happy to run errands during rush hour since traffic is still reasonably light.
Hell, I even get to pet my dog during the work day for occasional and immediate stress relief; at the office I'd just sulk in a cube somewhere.
I'll concede that the COVID lock down made it hard to be remote since I couldn't hit a gym, bar, or hang with friends, but now that it's looking like we're reopening again those are viable.
But screw going back. If the cities can't handle it, good -- let the free market it do it's thing.
will be interesting to see what happens. But from an efficiency perspective I can't see any reason companies would comply. There are almost no benefits but a lot of costs to requiring in person work