It’s not always that easy. Many people over the last few years have reorganised their life under the expectation of continued hybrid working, and can’t trivially reorganise it back to full time.
Found by accident a job near my home. Small company with private office for me and unlimited home office ruling. Use home office only when I am ill. During this period I found out, that I absolutely love my private office and hate daily commuting and open offices.
Where did they say it was easy?
They said maybe try going back to the office and seeing if you like it.
Heresy here on HN, I know.
Why should an employer bear the burden of an employee's own poor decision making?
Jobs and employers aren't for life. If you uprooted and reorganize your whole life based on the circumstances of a once in a lifetime global pandemic expecting things to stay like that forever, you've done goofed.
Also your approach seems to be to just accept whatever employers throw at you. Have you considered that they might be colluding (in a sense) to deprive you of options?
I would like to know a rational reason why I should spend so much of my day travelling.
Where do you see me saying such a thing?
>I would like to know a rational reason why I should spend so much of my day travelling.
Companies say it's for "better collaboration". You would do it if you had no other options if every potential employer would require you to be on site depriving you of remote options, but because the market is in your favor giving you options, it's difficult for you to empathize with the other situation.
Your solution appears to be "choose a different employer" without any hint of "demand more from the current employer".
> You would do it if you had no other options if every potential employer would require you to be on site depriving you of remote options, but because the market is in your favor giving you options, it's difficult for you to empathize with the other situation.
You assume something that's not the case. I am of the opinion that everyone who can, should have this option regardless of the market situation and I think it's terrible people are forced to commute. It's like paid leave or health insurance - an achievement in workers' rights.
That's only what you implied, not what I said. If simply demanding stuff from your current employer would just work then there wouldn't be so many unhappy workers everywhere. But that's not it works in the real world. The only language employers understand is the "F you, I quit" part.
>I am of the opinion that everyone who can, should have this option regardless of the market situation
That's nice but how do you propose that to happen? Did you see any workers rioting on the streets to have remote work as a guaranteed labor right? No? Then you can forget about it.
All rights and perk that labor currently has, like the 8h workday, free healthcare, paid vacation days, paid sick leave, have been won only through blood and conflict. It's not like your government is ever gonna hold a referendum and ask workers how many paid vacation days do you want to have and everyone gets to choose. If you want change you need to fight for it, physically with violent force, otherwise you'll be at the mercy of the "free market" which may or may not be in your favor depending how the wind blows. Perks aren't just gonna fall out of the sky for the working class, ever. The covid years were a fluke.
Which I think is very unfortunate, because working from home is a huge benefit to people who want to, while not being an actual cost to employers (in my opinion, not in theirs).
The part I'm struggling to understand, and please be honest here, is you almost sound a little smug that people are being made to return to the office. Maybe you have a good reason for that, or maybe I'm misreading your tone?
Of course it does - at least wherever unions exist.
> Perks aren't just gonna fall out of the sky for the working class, ever.
That's defeatist. There are ways beyond violence and you're allowed to negotiate the terms of your employment.
I occasionally got perks from my employers because I was the only person who asked.
Also there's the less popular route - voting. Where I'm from actually helped over the years.
Working in hazardous environments is outlawed (unless proper care is taken), working from the office is not outlawed. If you want working from the office to be outlawed as a health hazard you'll have to convince the government to do that as part of OHSA and labor laws but good luck getting any workers' sympathy that commuting to work in your cushy air conditioned office is not to your taste from the likes of those doing landscaping or roofing.
Otherwise we can stretch the definition endlessly to working with Windows, Agile, Scrum, Teams and Jira is a health hazard and should be also outlawed because I just don't like them, but me not liking something is not enough to make it outlawed.
Why is it a terrible reply? What should you do if you don't like your job? What's your point here?
Most people on the planet do jobs they don't like, welcome to reality. Otherwise we'd all be racecar drivers, twitch streamers, musicians and painters and get paid for our hobbies, but that's not how it works for most people.
We do a job not because we always like it or like everything about it, we do it to pay for food, shelter and if money allows, to afford hobbies and leisure that make life nice. Venting on the internet won't improve societal issues or issues you have at your job, it's still up to you to change your situation to what fits you because nobody will do it for you.
That's not true - you just talked about OSHA. What did they do before that? They did what you advocate - they left, or maybe lost a hand or two. Then we got this codified and boom! Now somebody else does it for you (thank god).
It's not just about like/dislike. There are real impacts. Thousands of tons of CO2, lives lost in car accidents, countless human lifespans wasted on a commute. These are real impact that you, yes YOU, will face head on.