In March 2020, offices across America shut down and employees started working from home in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The resulting two-year period has been “an unplanned experiment with a different way of working,” the New York Times reported. Only 6 percent of white-collar workers worked exclusively from before the  pandemic; by May 2020, the figure rose to 65 percent, according to Gallup. 

While for many Americans, working from home has meant missing out on socializing in the office, for others, it has offered a reprieve from what they view as oppressive office culture, the Times reported, based on responses it received from 700 readers. Some respondents reported that they had found office banter to be annoying or isolating, so they welcomed the opportunity that virtual set-ups offered to focus just on their work. 

So now that many firms are asking employees to return to the office, some workers are resisting. For many, it’s more about the culture than the commute. According to studies of 10,000 office workers conducted last year by Future Forum, a research group backed by Slack, women and people of color, in particular, reported that they found pre-pandemic office culture oppressive and thus found working from home to be more beneficial. In the United States, 86 percent of Hispanic and 81 percent of Black knowledge workers said that they preferred hybrid or remote work, compared with 75 percent of white knowledge workers. Internationally, 50 percent of working mothers who participated in the studies said that they wanted to work remotely most or all the time, compared with 43 percent of fathers. Since May 2021, a sense of belonging at work increased for 24 percent of Black knowledge workers surveyed, compared with 5 percent of white knowledge workers.  

The Times quoted Youngjoo Cha, a sociologist at Indiana University who cited surveys that found a reduction in the percentage of employees who say that working long hours is important to being successful at their organizations. “We had a nationwide experiment in telecommuting,” Cha said. “These conditions challenged the notion of ideal workers.” 

According to the jobs platform FlexJobs, roughly two-thirds of remote workers are reluctant to return to the office. 

In New York City, Mayor Eric Adams has softened his stance on a full return to the office, Gothamist reported. While he has promoted a full return as part of the city’s economic comeback, on Thursday, he told reporters, “It is going to take us some time before we define what [the workplace during] COVID is going to look like.” He noted that some employers, such as those in the tech sector, are “operating differently.”

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul has also acknowledged that many employees are reluctant to return to the office. “There's a sense that if one company tells their employees to come back, that they'll lose their employees who want flexibility to another employer,” she said earlier this month. She added that she envisioned a future where people come in “at least three to four days at minimum” so as to benefit from social interaction and in-person collaboration.