Govt Work at Home May Be Over

[SamSpade]

Regardless, I still think its BS.

80% of their time was spent in-person? Laughable Unless the "in-person" part means they actually were inside their home instead of at Target or building their deck.

This is actually fairly simple math. The numbers they use INCLUDE the huge majority of persons who ALWAYS report in person, because they are ineligible for telework or remote work.

There are about 2.7 million federal workers and about 300,000 of them work in the DC metro area. Most federal workers are never going to be working from home. Of those who are teleworking - most of those are in a hybrid category of working either from home or a designated remote place some part of the week - or in person, in some staggered desk sharing mechanism - the rest of the time.

It is not hard to figure that the total in person numbers would be high. Since only a portion of those eligible for telework make use of it - and most of it hybrid - I am surprised it isn't a little higher, since you are averaging their hours with those not teleworking at all.

 

[DogWhisperer]

People who have moved away from the location of the office during Covid will likely not return to work. I think there are a lot of people who fit into this category. Early move to where they wanted to retire when that day eventually came, and it came early in the form of Covid and offices condoning it or, more likely, were never informed of the move.

 

[SamSpade]

People who have moved away from the location of the office during Covid will likely not return to work. I think there are a lot of people who fit into this category. Early move to where they wanted to retire when that day eventually came, and it came early in the form of Covid and offices condoning it or, more likely, were never informed of the move.

At least two people I work with were hired DURING COVID - and they work remotely. This screws them, because they took the job never having made any agreement they would have to move 500 miles to keep their job.

The thing is - most federal workers - the average number of years worked is WAY higher than for most industries. Your average federal worker has about 14 years experience there. Eliminate some of the entry level persons from the equation and that number is much higher. IF you take measures to pressure people to leave - you are most likely to push out two kinds of workers - those with the skillset to keep them in very large demand, so that working elsewhere won't be difficult (typically younger ones) - and older management who are close enough to retirement that they decide to leave early.

Leaving a higher percentage - of the kinds of workers you were MOST hoping to eliminate. See, in private industry, your typical worker has been there 3-5 years. Over half of all federal workers have a degree - not so in private industry, where the number is a lot lower. When you have a company where the bulk of the staff are warehouse workers or phone support - ditching a few employees might help even in the short run. In federal government, it works against you, because they are not "bottom heavy".