Employees lose leverage in push for remote work

Pandemic health concerns aside, the concept of hybrid or remote work was always about leverage and that leverage is shifting toward the employer, according to Michael J. Romer, Managing Partner of Romer Debbas LLP.

He tells GlobeSt.com that companies are absolutely scaling back on hiring remote employees. And new data from LinkedIn bears that out.

“Simply put, in many industries, there is little to no need to hire a remote employee when there is a substantial pool of candidates out there who are willing to report to the office full time,” Romer says.

“The greatest threat to remote work is and has always been the threat of job loss. By most indicators, we are amidst an economic recession and the job market is certainly tightening.

“Many employers are faced with the difficult challenges associated with layoffs, salary cuts and/or freezes. Now, more than ever, employers are deeming the remote employee a luxury and potentially even an unnecessary one. To ensure job security, employees are realizing that returning to the office is the smart move.”

Remote job postings on the decline

Remote work is making getting a read on the labor market a bit trickier, according to new data from LinkedIn.

“While more people want to work from home,” according to the online business networking platform, “remote job postings are declining and are receiving a majority of applications.”

The percentage of applications that went to remote jobs reached just over 50% in October (slightly lower than its peak of 53% in July 2022).

“Hence, workers continue to prize flexibility and work-life balance even as the economic outlook darkens,” says Rand Ghayad, PhD, head of economics and global labor markets at LinkedIn.

The percentage of remote-job listings on LinkedIn reached an all-time high of 20% in February but fell to 14% in October and is slowing, the online business networking platform said.

Some only seek remote work, some only seek in-office jobs

LinkedIn’s measure of labor market tightness suggests that there are two labor markets today.

“There’s the market for people who have been only seeking remote work, and the market for people who have been only applying for on-site jobs,” Ghayad says.

The latter appears to be exceptionally tight,” according to LinkedIn.

“The cooling in the remote labor market is driven by both a slowdown in remote openings and an uptick in the number of people who want more of it,” Ghayad says.

In February, four days in the office, Snap announced

Snap announced this week that starting in February, its employees will be expected to spend at least 80% of their time in the office, coming out to four days a week for most employees, according to an internal memo seen by Bloomberg.

CEO Evan Spiegel says the new return-to-office policy would help Snap achieve its “full potential” and argued that what workers might give up “in terms of our individual convenience” would be offset by “our collective success,” Bloomberg reports.