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Fewer Canadians working from home: StatCan (globalnews.ca)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/canada@lemmy.ca
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A report shows fewer Canadians are working from home than at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. It also found working from home had potentially important implications for society.

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[–] 18 points 2 years ago (2 children)

I'm in IT, and ALL of my work is remote, even when I'm in the office. My company started out at 2 days/week. A few months ago they bumped up to 3d/week in the office.

It's a small change, but it's very much a power move. Two days says "We would like to see you in the office, socializing with your coworkers, building a team." Three days says "We can't trust you to work from home. This is only the first squeeze."

I push it to the limit during the winter because winter sucks and it takes longer to drive or bus than walk (45 minutes). If they fire me, they fire me. I will not make myself miserable over a particular job; and if they try to make things miserable, they'll lose a lot of talented staff.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago

    and if they try to make things miserable, they’ll lose a lot of talented staff.

    This is what a lot of workplaces are finding out: you can squeeze staff, but you'll end up with a retention problem and you'll have a shallower pool of talent to draw from.

    My local paper referred to the anti-lockdown protests as "a revolt of the bosses" and I don't think they were wrong: COVID struck fear into the capitalist class not just because of the loss of income, but because, after decades of having it all their own way--to the point where they were getting resentful of customers not spending enough money!--business-owners were rudely reminded that they needed labour to both make their goods and services, and buy their shit.

    They desperately want the late-2010s back, when money was cheap and the poors had to fight for a job.

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