Stated another way, about 70% of workers need to go into offices.
Only about a third of all workers have jobs that allow teleworking.
Source: Oregonians’ march back to the office has nearly halted – oregonlive.com
In Oregon, the % teleworking is running about 2 to 2.5x more than pre-pandemic.
For the one third where telework is permitted, some or much of that is likely not full time – but enables working off site several days per week. The data does not say whether these workers are offsite all week or just at times each week.
This is one reason that “lock downs” cannot be successful long term. Keeping society running, food on the table, access to health care – requires a highly interconnected set of activities, much of which must be done in person, and/or with specialized equipment available only in the work place. (In fact, it is estimated that more than 50% of all jobs require in person work, all the time.)
Regardless, a sizeable percent of workers are no longer in offices – and that has impacts on surrounding support services such as restaurants and retail outlets located near to places people work in the office.
Update: Intel announced this past week that teleworking is now permanent – and that it will be up to individual groups within the company to determine how many days per week staff need to come into the office. Workers in production in the fabs will need to continue to work at Intel’s onsite facilities.
