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Post by Lord Emsworth on May 19, 2022 6:39:21 GMT
Anyone else bemused by how the Tories, and some of their media acolytes, have decided that working from home is a hill worth dying on?
As someone who has worked from home on and off for years I can't see why it should become a political issue
Are they just trying to appeal to pensioners who don't understand how technology has transformed the world of work?
Dunno
What are your thoughts?
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Post by Lord Emsworth on May 19, 2022 6:55:21 GMT
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Post by Lord Emsworth on May 19, 2022 7:26:20 GMT
Two theories...
Newspaper owners are lobbying the Gov over this as the reduction in commuting has reduced in a massive slump in print sales - Dominic Cummings mentioned this in a recent communication
City centre property owners, who are also major donors to the Tories, are also lobbying the Gov as they are scared shitless about business owners not taking up space in their properties
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Post by Deleted on May 19, 2022 9:28:32 GMT
More commuting = increased running running costs for public and private transport, more purchases of takeaway food & drink, newspapers and work clothes. Commuters might need to make more use of a dry cleaner, shoe repairer or barber than a home worker, they might go shopping and treat themselves at lunchtime (clothes, music, technology...) which might not be something that they'd consider buying working from home. I'm sure the list must go on and on.
There's a whole load of businesses who must be suffering, and in turn this will impact on rents and ultimately taxes.
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Post by smogquixote on May 19, 2022 9:36:48 GMT
More commuting = increased running running costs for public and private transport, more purchases of takeaway food & drink, newspapers and work clothes. Commuters might need to make more use of a dry cleaner, shoe repairer or barber than a home worker, they might go shopping and treat themselves at lunchtime (clothes, music, technology...) which might not be something that they'd consider buying working from home. I'm sure the list must go on and on. There's a whole load of businesses who must be suffering, and in turn this will impact on rents and ultimately taxes. I think work satisfaction and general happiness take precedent over all of those things! |
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Post by Deleted on May 19, 2022 9:52:51 GMT
More commuting = increased running running costs for public and private transport, more purchases of takeaway food & drink, newspapers and work clothes. Commuters might need to make more use of a dry cleaner, shoe repairer or barber than a home worker, they might go shopping and treat themselves at lunchtime (clothes, music, technology...) which might not be something that they'd consider buying working from home. I'm sure the list must go on and on. There's a whole load of businesses who must be suffering, and in turn this will impact on rents and ultimately taxes. I think work satisfaction and general happiness take precedent over all of those things! Yeah, I agree with you 100%. Before I gave up having a proper job I used to work from home as often as I could get away with. |
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Post by doug61 on May 19, 2022 11:20:49 GMT
Yeah, the Daily Mail is probably the biggest of the commuter papers. Took a big hit. Private Eye were covering their desperation to get people back to work back in 2020. Most of the press won't even publish circulation figures anymore they are so low. They also used to count in big numbers given away free on aircraft that they also lost at first in the pandemic. Their own interests always come ahead of the public good.
The biggest daily papers sell a lot less than a million copies a day now, used to be about 3-4 million in the 80's. they can't accept the world is changing.
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Post by Lord Emsworth on May 19, 2022 12:46:20 GMT
Yeah, the Daily Mail is probably the biggest of the commuter papers. Took a big hit. Private Eye were covering their desperation to get people back to work back in 2020. Most of the press won't even publish circulation figures anymore they are so low. They also used to count in big numbers given away free on aircraft that they also lost at first in the pandemic. Their own interests always come ahead of the public good. The biggest daily papers sell a lot less than a million copies a day now, used to be about 3-4 million in the 80's. they can't accept the world is changing. You've hit the nail on the head there Doug And no one has really worked out how to make digital editions work properly |
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Post by zeopold on May 19, 2022 13:06:06 GMT
The tories hate anything that improves the lives of working people. Ain't zackly rocket science.
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Post by doug61 on May 19, 2022 13:12:37 GMT
Yeah, the Daily Mail is probably the biggest of the commuter papers. Took a big hit. Private Eye were covering their desperation to get people back to work back in 2020. Most of the press won't even publish circulation figures anymore they are so low. They also used to count in big numbers given away free on aircraft that they also lost at first in the pandemic. Their own interests always come ahead of the public good. The biggest daily papers sell a lot less than a million copies a day now, used to be about 3-4 million in the 80's. they can't accept the world is changing. You've hit the nail on the head there Doug And no one has really worked out how to make digital editions work properly I haven't bought a paper since before Covid. Was stunned to see that the "serious" papers are around £2.50, who would pay something like that when everything is free on line? The Mail and Guardian websites earn a fortune too. It's the dailies that will disappear. I think Private Eye keeps a solid quarter million which is impressive (same as the music press in their good years) The ever more tedious Uncut and Mojo struggle to 50 thousand a month, I guess there's only so many Beatles and Dylan articles you can write in different ways and the top 50 breakfast choices of Vashti Bunyan 5 page centre spreads wear a bit thin. Done my bit though by ordering the new issue of "Safety Pin" this morning, looks a decent issue. |
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Post by jsm on May 19, 2022 23:55:02 GMT
The arguments presented here so far seem pretty one sided. Not everything about working from home is positive. For one thing, it stops people socialising with others. People get more and more isolated and this is not good for people's mental health. There is also the cost. Some mention has been made about savings from less commuting etc, but some bosses love the idea of their staff working from home. It lets them save money on infrastructure, phones, internet etc. While there might be some monetary compensation made for this, I get the sense that the bosses get a lot of this for free. I have also seen claims that many people actually work longer hours at home than if they go into the office. Safety also seems to have been thrown out the window. Where I work there have always been a few people who have argued for their right to work from home. To do this they had to set up a dedicated home office and someone from Occupational Health and Safety had to inspect it to make sure it had an ergonomically sound workstation, all cables were safely tucked away, a fire extinguisher was on hand etc. Now it is just a free for all with no checks at all
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Post by Lord Emsworth on May 20, 2022 6:17:16 GMT
Yes, all good points jsm. There's a lot of negatives. The best outcome is often a mix.
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Post by Deleted on May 20, 2022 8:26:43 GMT
The arguments presented here so far seem pretty one sided. Not everything about working from home is positive. For one thing, it stops people socialising with others. People get more and more isolated and this is not good for people's mental health. There is also the cost. Some mention has been made about savings from less commuting etc, but some bosses love the idea of their staff working from home. It lets them save money on infrastructure, phones, internet etc. While there might be some monetary compensation made for this, I get the sense that the bosses get a lot of this for free. I have also seen claims that many people actually work longer hours at home than if they go into the office. Safety also seems to have been thrown out the window. Where I work there have always been a few people who have argued for their right to work from home. To do this they had to set up a dedicated home office and someone from Occupational Health and Safety had to inspect it to make sure it had an ergonomically sound workstation, all cables were safely tucked away, a fire extinguisher was on hand etc. Now it is just a free for all with no checks at all I agree, working from home is not for everybody, but for me the odd one or two days a week provided some respite from 'office life'. I'm talking about my experience which was over ten years ago now, back then I used to undock my laptop, stick it in my backpack and take it home to work the following day. There was no concern for health and safety at home even though it was a big issue in the office environment. For all they knew I could've been using free wi-fi at the pub to do my work (I wasn't btw, I was at home relaxed as fuck getting my work done without any interruptions or office politics).
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Post by Deleted on May 20, 2022 19:09:34 GMT
Never done it.
Mrs RP does it though. It's what the NHS is now calling 'hybrid working'
Sounds like a skive to be honest. Not that I'm opposed to skiving when it comes to ripping off private business...
Mind you I've worked from everything from being a dishwasher to a box shifter to a material planner in a printers so it's never been an option for me.
The liberal press reckoned that it was a tool for the working class to furnish the middle classes during Covid...
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Post by smogquixote on May 21, 2022 0:47:30 GMT
The way I see it is that if it can be done from home and the worker would prefer to do it from home then they should be able to choose.
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