So the next logical step is...
No office working. No one commutes to the city to work (oh, well, 50%+ reduction - same difference). Ditto for entertainment, social life, etc. - there is a big difference between making a special trip and remaining where you already are. No one wants to live in a city where no one wants to come to in the first place. Shops, restaurants, theaters, museums, concert halls die. Many more people lose jobs. (Aside: do office workers realize how many people even a smallish restaurant employs?) Younger people don't socialize anymore (no, Insta or TikTok is not a substitute, they are actually hungry to meet their peers in person) - and neither do older people with established families - not outside their immediate "bubbles", anyway. What would a big city with council estates in place of offices full of people - people who go out for lunch, plan to go to an exhibition or a theater performance or go for drinks or to a date after hours - offer tourists? A suburb with a local and an event horizon of a couple of blocks won't have the same power of attraction. So, much less travel then? And a feedback loop adversely affecting transportation infrastructure?
Sorry, but it sounds like a recipe for social degradation to me. IMHO there is no substitute for face-to-face interactions, for meeting new people, for cultural and social experiences outside of one's quotidian routine, etc. And all those things are interlinked and I don't believe for a second that some of those links may be severed without affecting others. Just a few months in this direction has already led the world a long distance down this path, and frankly, it looks horrifying.
I suspect that Dell et al. - some people there, anyway - see their workforce as output-producing units and not - cough - people. I also hate working from home - I do have a home office and it's occasionally useful to block interrupts to give a "push" towards some specific goal, but there is no substitute to the energy of face-to-face interactions with your peers (some of whom are actually quite smart and nice, believe it or not, at least if you are reasonably lucky, hmphh) that shaped up that goal in the first place.
A lights-out factory producing Dell PCs will work. Dreaming up and designing a new new thing if everyone works by remote? Sorry, but I have my doubts. And assembling Dell PCs is not my life's ambition. Nor will I discount going to a concert, to a performance, to a museum, or to a nice meal with an old friend or with someone new or both, in a lively city on a different continent if opportunity presents itself.
This "new normal" looks quite abnormal for humanity, if I may be so ambitious in expressing myself.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
