Forget the fact that nearly every expert insists that flexible work arrangements—guided principally by employee desires—are the way of the future. Disregard, too, the fact that many workers insist they’re more productive working from home—and more likely to feel empowered to do their best work under a boss who allows them to work where they want. And pretend you don’t know that return-to-office mandates are near-universally reviled and lead to rapid retention issues, bitter company culture, and swelling resentment—with worsened productivity to boot.
With all that out of mind, it may come as no surprise to learn that the staunch pro-office bosses are winning, and remote jobs are actually getting harder and harder to find.
Ringover, a British telecom firm specializing in cloud-based software, analyzed the remote work policy shifts between 2020 and 2023 at the 100 largest U.S. companies for a report aptly titled “Remote Work Rug Pull.” What they found bodes poorly for workers who have made themselves comfortable in their assumptions that their remote set-up is here to stay.
Across the board, in-office days at America's major companies have grown from 1.1 days per week on average in 2021 to 3.4 days in 2023. Even worse news: The U.S. trails behind its major peers when it comes to remote work—just 11.5% of its office-based roles are fully remote. That’s a real fall from grace for a country that, in 2020, led the world in remote work rates, with 61.5% of jobs fully remote.