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Office Workers Don't Hate the Office. They Hate the Commute. "We have to do something about the daily commute, a ritual of American life that’s time-consuming, emotionally taxing, environmentally toxic and expensive." https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/19/opinion/elon-musk-remote-work.html
in reply to kottke.org

I used to have a job down the street. A ten-minute walk to work. That was the best.
in reply to kottke.org

I'll give you environmentally toxic and expensive, but other than that... I don't know. My commute is where I get much of my reading and music listening in... i mean I'm not loving it but it's alright.
in reply to kottke.org

There’s a lot to this. I despise driving to work, it’s close to 1:20 round trip.

But I think it’s a bit disingenuous for the NYT to portray it as either/or. Workers hate the office, too. Cubicles, poor equipment/workspaces/temp control, rude coworkers, managers that won’t let you work, the list goes on.

in reply to kottke.org

I think quite a few industry leaders understand that problem but simply have chosen not to care, because in their broader understanding of the economy commercial real estate "matters" (it doesn't) especially if buildings are part of a firms assets, whereas most employees do not.

Is that right? I would argue no. But most "captains of industry" these days seem to revel in their sociopathy.

in reply to kottke.org

Oh, plenty of people hate the office too, especially when it's made to be open-space making it super hard to concentrate for more than 5 minutes.

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