Eric Levitz, a senior writer for Intelligencer who covers politics and economics, posted some interesting thoughts about a growing problem, in an article titled, “Remote Work is Poised to Devastate America’s Cities”.
The nation’s office buildings aren’t as empty as they were before COVID vaccines became widely available in spring 2021. But they’re still far less populated than they were in 2019.
A recent analysis of Census Bureau data from the financial site Lending Tree found that 29 percent of Americans were working from home in October 2022. In New York City, financial firms reported that only 56 percent of their employees were in the office on a typical day in September.
I will say, right off the bat, that I was in the office on a typical day in September, assuming they were talking about September 9.
But I also don’t work for a financial firm in New York City, thank heavens. And, for purposes of disclosure, I don’t own a signature office skyscraper in San Francisco, about which I am also glad. Especially now, after COVID has made people to realize they can easily work from home, and never get out of their pajamas.
There’s even a new “Work From Home” acronym. “WFH”.
To to be confused with “WTF”.
From Mr. Levitz’ article:
When only 50 percent of a company’s staff leave their homes in the morning, that firm’s desire for floorspace plummets. If storm-clouds appear on the economic horizon — like, say, a central bank dead set on slowing the economy to kill inflation — downsizing your office becomes the easiest way to cut expenses. Thus, as rising rates have laid tech low, San Francisco’s signature office towers have emptied out. In New York, meanwhile, Meta has ditched 450,000 square feet of office space.
Across the nation as a whole, only about 47 percent of offices are occupied, Mr. Levitz reports.
I assume he’s talking about ‘corporate offices’… and not ‘home offices’. Because my own ‘home office’ is 100% occupied. And that’s without even trying. There are days when I never leave the office. (Not especially difficult, because it’s also my bedroom.)
This “WFH” trend is hitting big cities particularly hard, causing commercial real estate values to drop, which means less property taxes for local government… and fewer people shopping during their lunch hour, fewer people grabbing a sandwich at the corner deli, meaning less sales tax for local government… and fewer people riding the buses.
On the other side of the coin, it ought be be easier to find a parking space.
But why would you want a parking space? You’re “WFH”.
Personally, I wouldn’t mind seeing real estate values drop in Pagosa Springs, even though my heart bleeds for our local governments in their constant quest for more tax revenue.
Luckily, we don’t have any half-occupied office skyscrapers here. We don’t have any skyscrapers, period. But we do have a rather tall house under construction on South 9th Street.
But human existence has always been a swinging pendulum. In the days of the Neanderthals, everyone worked at home, unless they were hunting woolly mammoths. Then some people managed to get rich and powerful, and made slaves of the poor people, who sweated under the hot sun while the lords of the land sat around in the shade, counting their money or playing gin rummy. Then the poor people learned they could make fancy clothes and teacups for the lords and ladies, and quite a cottage industry sprang up, people working at home. That lasted quite a while until some of the poor people escaped to North America and became slave owners, and the invented cars.
To make their car payments, they had to go to work in office towers.
Until now, when nearly everyone can work from home (“WFH”) and still make their payments.
Assuming they have a home. Not the easiest thing to come by, here in Pagosa Springs.
According to Mr. Levitz, the owners of the half-empty office towers in New York and San Francisco are looking at ways to convert office towers into housing. Given the housing shortage and all.
For that reason, I’m sorry that we don’t have a bunch of mostly vacant office towers in Pagosa. Think of all the people who could work from home, here? If they had a home to work from.
Underrated writer Louis Cannon grew up in the vast American West, although his ex-wife, given the slightest opportunity, will deny that he ever grew up at all.