[CobrastanJorji]

> and buying up tons of real estate when so many people either WFH full time or are hybrid?

My pet conspiracy theory is that a significant motivating factor for why some of these big tech companies are so bullish on returning everyone to the office is that otherwise all of the real estate purchases and leases make the executives look like fools.

[cvhashim04]

Not really a conspiracy when it’s a fact of the matter. Expensive offices are sitting around empty.

[alfalfasprout]

it's not even a conspiracy theory... investors have outright called for RTO for that reason.

[CobrastanJorji]

Why would investors want that? The building's already paid for. It doesn't seem like putting people into it or not would matter at that point, assuming RTO is employee performance neutral. And unlike executives, investors have no need to fool people into thinking they're making sensible decisions.

[the_third_wave]

Those buildings will be worth much less if the culture of working from home becomes ingrained since the demand for this type of office space will permanently decline. Those who invested in office real estate may stand or fall with people returning to their offices.

[CobrastanJorji]

Oh, right! Excellent point.

[Rzor]

Maybe they feel hurt every time they are reminded of the empty buildings because it's a waste of money and to get everyone back wouldn't hurt anybody in their assessment, it's actually how it was done before and it worked well, yadda yadda, so why not.

I do think the reasoning applies much better to executives, though.

tl;dr human stuff

[chestervonwinch]

it's their unused treadmill in the living room they bought back in November