The whole “return to office” thing is a cocktail of like… “Feelings Driven Leadership” and “The Cruelty is the Point”. Oh, and “I’m incompetent so everyone else must be incompetent in the same way, too.”
Many managers make decisions based purely on feelings. You can show them data but they don’t care. They feel like being in-office is better. And maybe, maybe, it is, on some metrics. Are those metrics better for workers? Probably not.
And the cruelty? Well, as others have said, some people get off on having power over others.
The last point, there are some people who just can’t manage themselves so they seem to think no one else can, either. Like someone the other day was saying he can’t work from home because he’ll just play xbox. To which I respond, from the depths of my soul, fuck off. Grow up and stop making everyone else around you suffer because you’re an incompetent, unmedicated, shit. You can go into the office if you have to. Don’t make everyone else suffer a pay cut too because you’re trash tier at self control.
You’re forgetting the whole…" I invested entirely too much in corporate real estate".
When there’s instability in the market a lot of fortune 500 corporations will start investing in corporate real estate as a “safe bet” to hedge more risky investments.
Skyscrapers and large office spaces are on paper horrible investments and have an awful time filling enough vacancies to offset their upkeep. The only thing that makes them a “safe” investment is that every company uses them as a way to bank equity. If those same companies pulled the rug from under themselves they would all lose that safe equity piggy bank.
Skyscrapers and large office spaces are on paper horrible investments and have an awful time filling enough vacancies to offset their upkeep. The only thing that makes them a “safe” investment is that every company uses them as a way to bank equity. If those same companies pulled the rug from under themselves they would all lose that safe equity piggy bank.
This is just the sunk cost fallacy though. You can inflate the paper value of assets by playing games like this, but the bill always comes due in the end. Yes, companies that do this can juice their books a bit in the short term, but they’re harming themselves in the long term. They retain a bit higher book value for their real estate, but they make whatever goods or services they provide noncompetitive in the marketplace. They have competitors who aren’t bogged down by past bad real estate decisions. Those competitors can outcompete them on price and can attract better talent. Meanwhile, they’re stuck in their ways, fruitlessly trying to inflate their real estate holdings, all while their revenue is plummeting because they can’t attract good people and have to charge higher for their services than their competitors.
It’s just the sunk cost fallacy. You could inflate the book value of real estate by doing all sorts of foolish things. You could create a subsidiary and have that company rent out some of your floor space for absurdly high rates. But you’re ultimately just robbing Peter to pay Paul. Those commercial real estate properties have already lost their value. The value was lost the minute it was proven that work from home was a superior work model.
These companies are going to go bankrupt at a mass scale when the next recession rolls around.
Fuck, these companies might actually be violating the law. Deliberately choosing unproductive business practices just to cook your real estate books is something Enron would do.
This is just the sunk cost fallacy though. You can inflate the paper value of assets by playing games like this, but the bill always comes due in the end. Yes, companies that do this can juice their books a bit in the short term, but they’re harming themselves in the long term.
I mean… That’s kinda what late stage capitalism is all about, squeezing blood from stones on a quarterly basis.
You could create a subsidiary and have that company rent out some of your floor space for absurdly high rates. But you’re ultimately just robbing Peter to pay Paul.
Reminds me of the twin towers. One of the reasons it was such a catastrophe is because the towers were such a money sink that the city of New York subsidized the development by relocating a ton of government offices to there.
Fuck, these companies might actually be violating the law. Deliberately choosing unproductive business practices just to cook your real estate books is something Enron would do.
Pretty much the standard quo nowadays…why invest in things like labour when you can just inflate the worth of assets for free? Capitalism is about reducing cost while simulating growth, there is no reason to actually invest in the company if you can simulate investment enough to make share price go up.
Maybe if capitalism actually relied on competition for growth as capitalists often claim, however it’s pretty easy to recognize that corporations often work together to create their own demand.
Yeah, you just have to know yourself. Personally I feel like I need to go into the office once per week otherwise work starts becoming an abstract thing. But I’ve known some co-workers I wouldn’t see for months at a time that were really on the ball. Ask an obscure question about something really technical on slack and get an answer within seconds kind of thing. I knew another guy that said he had to come into the office every day because his family was too distracting.
Everyone needs to know what works for them and be a responsible professional about it.
And yeah managers that want 100% RTO are just admitting they can’t handle working from home. Ok that’s your thing, but it’s not a thing for everyone else.
Anyway I got out the the RTO thing because I told them of the times some computers were having issues and I had to work the whole weekend (from home) to fix them. If I’m going to be 100% RTO then I’m 0% WFH and the next time something like that happens I won’t be able to start working on it until 9am on Monday morning. So I’m still in the office one day per week, weather permitting, which is my preference.
The whole “return to office” thing is a cocktail of like… “Feelings Driven Leadership” and “The Cruelty is the Point”. Oh, and “I’m incompetent so everyone else must be incompetent in the same way, too.”
Many managers make decisions based purely on feelings. You can show them data but they don’t care. They feel like being in-office is better. And maybe, maybe, it is, on some metrics. Are those metrics better for workers? Probably not.
And the cruelty? Well, as others have said, some people get off on having power over others.
The last point, there are some people who just can’t manage themselves so they seem to think no one else can, either. Like someone the other day was saying he can’t work from home because he’ll just play xbox. To which I respond, from the depths of my soul, fuck off. Grow up and stop making everyone else around you suffer because you’re an incompetent, unmedicated, shit. You can go into the office if you have to. Don’t make everyone else suffer a pay cut too because you’re trash tier at self control.
You’re forgetting the whole…" I invested entirely too much in corporate real estate".
When there’s instability in the market a lot of fortune 500 corporations will start investing in corporate real estate as a “safe bet” to hedge more risky investments.
Skyscrapers and large office spaces are on paper horrible investments and have an awful time filling enough vacancies to offset their upkeep. The only thing that makes them a “safe” investment is that every company uses them as a way to bank equity. If those same companies pulled the rug from under themselves they would all lose that safe equity piggy bank.
This is just the sunk cost fallacy though. You can inflate the paper value of assets by playing games like this, but the bill always comes due in the end. Yes, companies that do this can juice their books a bit in the short term, but they’re harming themselves in the long term. They retain a bit higher book value for their real estate, but they make whatever goods or services they provide noncompetitive in the marketplace. They have competitors who aren’t bogged down by past bad real estate decisions. Those competitors can outcompete them on price and can attract better talent. Meanwhile, they’re stuck in their ways, fruitlessly trying to inflate their real estate holdings, all while their revenue is plummeting because they can’t attract good people and have to charge higher for their services than their competitors.
It’s just the sunk cost fallacy. You could inflate the book value of real estate by doing all sorts of foolish things. You could create a subsidiary and have that company rent out some of your floor space for absurdly high rates. But you’re ultimately just robbing Peter to pay Paul. Those commercial real estate properties have already lost their value. The value was lost the minute it was proven that work from home was a superior work model.
These companies are going to go bankrupt at a mass scale when the next recession rolls around.
Fuck, these companies might actually be violating the law. Deliberately choosing unproductive business practices just to cook your real estate books is something Enron would do.
The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.
You’re right. It’s all right. Except the part where you think they can’t do this for long. How long did it take Madoff to get caught?
And there are enough barriers to competition to sustain this as long as they need. If anyone threatens them, they can just buy the competition.
I mean… That’s kinda what late stage capitalism is all about, squeezing blood from stones on a quarterly basis.
Reminds me of the twin towers. One of the reasons it was such a catastrophe is because the towers were such a money sink that the city of New York subsidized the development by relocating a ton of government offices to there.
Pretty much the standard quo nowadays…why invest in things like labour when you can just inflate the worth of assets for free? Capitalism is about reducing cost while simulating growth, there is no reason to actually invest in the company if you can simulate investment enough to make share price go up.
Capitalism, such efficiency!
Pull all your own, sell office space. Profit?
Maybe if capitalism actually relied on competition for growth as capitalists often claim, however it’s pretty easy to recognize that corporations often work together to create their own demand.
The office or a park with cell reception, a cafe, a fucking wework, a…
Yeah, you just have to know yourself. Personally I feel like I need to go into the office once per week otherwise work starts becoming an abstract thing. But I’ve known some co-workers I wouldn’t see for months at a time that were really on the ball. Ask an obscure question about something really technical on slack and get an answer within seconds kind of thing. I knew another guy that said he had to come into the office every day because his family was too distracting.
Everyone needs to know what works for them and be a responsible professional about it.
And yeah managers that want 100% RTO are just admitting they can’t handle working from home. Ok that’s your thing, but it’s not a thing for everyone else.
Anyway I got out the the RTO thing because I told them of the times some computers were having issues and I had to work the whole weekend (from home) to fix them. If I’m going to be 100% RTO then I’m 0% WFH and the next time something like that happens I won’t be able to start working on it until 9am on Monday morning. So I’m still in the office one day per week, weather permitting, which is my preference.