The Hidden Cost of Return-to-Office Mandates: Environment, Employees, and Empty Optics
As major corporations—Boeing among them—push to bring employees back into the office, the real consequences of this decision remain largely ignored. While these policies are often dressed up as efforts to "restore culture" or "improve performance," they increasingly appear to be performative moves aimed at reassuring investors. What’s lost in this maneuvering is a very real cost: environmental damage, wasted time, and deteriorating employee well-being. Environmental Regression: A Step Backwards During the height of the pandemic, remote work significantly reduced pollution. Commutes vanished, cities saw clearer skies, and global carbon emissions dropped. Yet now, forcing employees back into offices brings all of that pollution roaring back—unnecessarily. Daily Commutes = Daily Carbon Millions of employees returning to daily commutes means millions more cars on the road, burning fossil fuels, and choking cities with traffic congestion. The fuel consumption alone ...