Older than this is the "open office" thing. We saw over time how this wasn't about collaboration or even space-saving, but about keeping employees under watch.
Are the managers competent? Do they know how to evaluate if work/goals are being met without counting how many hours the employee is online?
Edit: Some companies also don't like the morale effects of sink-or-swim, though Amazon is fine with it I've heard.
They could redefine the job requirements to be remote-first, but that'd require a lot of firing and hiring.
1) Companies are reducing salaries when they hire new workers.
2) Companies are not having problems finding in person employees.
I'm going to have a surprised pikachu face when the market flips and everyone resigns from these companies.
- Human contact is more important than efficiency gains, hence mandating return-to-office.
- At the same time, efficiency gains are more important than human contact, hence reducing human headcount in favor of increased AI use.
If you read between the lines, you can see how those two points are related: humans find difficult to feel connected when their communication partner is just pixels on a screen, so that's why remote workers are being replaced with AI.
First, citation needed. Second, in this day and age companies try whatever they can to ruin in-office employees' morale as well, which goes counter to the position that social quality of life is important for efficiency.
If I had to rewrite my previous message in a less subtle way, it would be that companies are constantly contradicting themselves when giving any public "reason" for their actions, and I do not think employees' happiness (which fathomdeez focuses on) is anywhere close to their actual reason.