The back-to-office backfire: Companies ending WFH perks lose out on top talent, who view flexible work as equivalent to an 8% raise

At least. If you work an 8 hour day, a 0.5 hour commute each way adds an extra 12.5% to work time commitment each day, and it’s considered unpaid time.

And your gas and car wear and tear
- Yep, the IRS estimates that it is $0.655/mi in wear and tear on one’s car via the 2023 Mileage Rate.
- You might need to buy additional food
  Wear and tear of work attire
  Might need to pay extra for someone to watch pet/child
  Also there are additional costs of time
  Extra time shaving or similar (if you know you are staying home some things can be delayed a bit)
  Possibly extra time to prepare food
  Traffic/weather delays
  Extra effort for small things easily manage while at home e.g accepting deliveries, watching pets or opening for maintenance workers
  That's of the top of my head, so 1 hour lost per day is a low estimate.
- Yeah, for me WFH is a lot more than 8% raise. It's a lot cheaper. We were paying to work and didn't even realized it
- Also your spine, tailbone, piriformis, hamstrings, and psoas muscles. Cars are bad for your back.
I couldn't believe how much more time it felt like I had in the day just cutting out the short work commute. You don't really realize the extent of how much time you waste going into work until it's gone. Even a short commute adds up quick when you include all the time to get ready in the morning and decompress at night. Plus all the extra maintenance on a daily driver and gas... Companies making people go into the office when it's not even necessary are just power hungry morons. That's all there is to it.
- And for many, half an hour primping in order to be seen in public. I guess if you're still in vid convos that somewhat still applies, but for others, now you can lay around in your underwear and stink and still get work done.
- The traveling time I'm saving by working from home, is directly reinvested into having a walk with the lady and the dogs, including sitting on a bench in the sunshine including a coffee, and if the mood is right, we're staying for my first meeting at 10:00, ...
  Money can't buy this, ...
- I went from commuting 1-3 hours a day to zero commute. It is unbelievable how much of a quality of life improvement it is.
  I am grateful I worked in a couple offices before switching to fully remote for my next few jobs, because it showed me how much better remote working is for me.
- It's not just the commute even, my "morning routine" is maybe 10 minutes if I'm not going into the office, 30+ if I am. Need to make myself "presentable", pack some food, make a to go coffee. When I'm able to just snack and make coffee during downtime waiting for replies etc at the office it's so much easier, I get another hour of sleep if I need it...

People don’t like offices and are more productive when they’re happy. Who knew?

I did. I always knew.
- Bullshit. You only knew since I told you on Thursday.
Companies forcing people back to the office are a red flag for bad management, so I'm sure that's another reason they're seeing people leave.
My company realized that they can remove office space and use that money for more employees. What a fucking crazy concept.

Honestly. It's about more than money.

If your boss says you must return to the office, after 3 years of WFH. At best, it shows that they do not value or respect you, and are just making an arbitrary decision in a bid to sell more stocks.

At worst, there might be some insidious reason to make employees physically available. Maybe they are getting a kickback somehow, or selling data that they can only get when you are there, or maybe they are just horny and want to seduce you sexually.

A remote worker is often happier, more productive, and cost less to employ even if they are paid the same as an on-site worker. Offices do not have to provide parking, seating, HVAC, power, wifi, and will even have less physical security vectors.

If some people prefer to go into an office, then it should be optional. Not a hybrid model where they force you to come a certain number of days a week.

At the end of the day unless you are on some kind of probation or evaluation period WFH should be the default when ever possible.

Control is another thing. I can't tell you the amount of execs I've heard say "they're losing control of their company" or "I don't feel I have the same control over my people". It's crazy that they think that. What do they think the past 3 years have been when they've gotten record profits "oh, but our profits would be even better if we had people back in the office". Sadly no amount of data will override the entrepreneurial "it could always be more" what if that they throw out.
- I'm working in IT and as my last team lead hasn't had any technical knowledge in my area, and he didn't had to for his job, he wouldn't even be able to control what I'm doing, ...
- Any executive who has "lost control" of their business by allowing their employees to work from home is no more than the ring master of a runaway circus that they never actually controlled to begin with.
  I've had the unfortunate displeasure of working for at least one company that made a full time job of keeping their employees under their thumb and I can say this much: the more you micromanage your workforce, the better your workforce becomes at professional time wasting. By that I mean finding creative ways to look very busy while achieving nothing of benefit to the organization.
  But then again, much of the corporate world runs on incompetence so poor business decisions based on some executives feelings, rather than statistics, aren't exactly rare.
- Control sounds insidious, but there are a lot of ways in which being physically present plays into your psychology and manipulates you into working harder/later/ect. Thinking back to the last time I was in an office, usually when someone was fired/they announced layoffs, the anxiety in the space was palpable. You ended up working later voluntarily just because you were afraid of not being seen at your desk and they'd fire you next.
  WFH allows me to be more rational with my employer. They can't scare me into working harder, and I'm not at all attached to the "office culture" if it suits me better to leave. I think a lot of the "soft power" of the employer-employee relationship comes from physical proximity, which is why you have middle managers not involved with the bottom line profitability rooting for BTO.
- The executives are nervous everyone will realize how overpaid and absolutely fucking useless they are. Every good workplace I've ever had, was absolutely nothing to do with the VPs/C levels. The best work places those people are barely involved in most of the day to day.
Can confirm. I quit my last job because they told us to come back to the office. In 2020, when COVID was still in full swing. And being remote was our company's entire business model.
People don't quit jobs, they quit managers.
I'm on my second probationary period entirely WFH, you shouldn't be required to work in the office unless the job physically requires it. Return to office is very often a big power grab by shitty management that don't know how to measure outcomes properly and instead prefer to micromanage. It is one of the biggest red flags.
I agree with almost everything hog say, and strongly think WFH is the future and worth the costs.
But I think physical security concerns are a fair one for some companies to hold for WFH, if they handle sensitive data where leaking is a concern.

Commuting is also a nightmare. Thats 1-2 hours a day of slog to get to an arbitrary location to do a job that I could do at home. Combine this with school drop offs and pick ups and the ability to do life admin during the week instead of cramming it all on a Saturday with everyone else like pre COVID and WFH is a winner.

I love those benefits. I would be extremely upset if I had to go back to the office. I'm more comfortable at home and I'm able to help my wife care for my son who is special needs. I save on gas and wear and tear on my car. The fact that I can listen to my music while just wearing shorts and a t-shirt was a game changer. IMO people in general suck and it's nice not to have to interact with them face to face on a daily basis. Some of my coworkers say they miss being in the office. I think they're nuts.
Also for people that can't WFH. I'm stuck in a traffic jam every day because of office workers that arbitrarily have to go to office.
7 hours a week and I didn't even have that bad of a drive.
$50 in gas. $50 in food minimum. That's happiness lost + costs increased.
I had 2 offers and one was not only a 15k bump vs the other, but the lower one was in the office 2 days a week. That was a pretty easy decision

It’s not a perk. Don’t reinforce their framing

I have not read the article yet but the headline saying “equivalent to an 8% raise” does not just have to mean some kind of soft value. I have to drive 50 km each way to my office. I am much more likely to eat out while at work ( or to hit a drive-thru on the way home ). Given the price of gas where I live, going to the office probably costs me $50 a day more than staying home. That is $50 after tax so you can simplistically double that in terms of salary that it consumes. If I have two jobs to choose from, from a purely financial stand-point, my current job and a fully remote one that pays me $100 less per day are equivalent in terms of the value they bring to my family.
Crap. I have been a “want to be in the office some of the time” guy but making me actually type this out has made me question that. I think I need to start shopping my CV.

I can't go back to working in an office full time anymore. It would be a really difficult adjustment especially losing the time to commuting and needing to deal with child care. Plus we found that we no longer needed a second car anymore since we were both at home so we sold one. Our life is built around not having to commute anymore.

The push has nothing to do with anything but getting money back into real estate. The majority of wealthy people's money is tied up in either oil or real estate. Billion dollar office buildings going unused is unexplainable to the oligarchy. And I don't use the word Oligarchy lightly. Combined with less oil being used moving people around, and you have the most powerful people in the western world yelling at business executives to get their workers back in the office or they'll be unable to barrow money from the 0.0001% small companies don't have a lot of debt from the Oligarchy so they don't have to listen to them. But if you know anything, wealthy people don't like it when the poors don't filter their money upwards so this fight is long from over.
- Don't forget micromanaging bosses who can't stand not being able to watch their employees at all times.
- It's pressure from real estate and also managers who do nothing but hover and stare. So multiple sides.
  The only people I feel bad for are restaurant/coffee shop workers who definitely aren't getting nearly as much money
- It's not like the land wouldn't be viable for high end housing if the corps could push for rezoning. It doesn't have to stay only office space.
- If Zoom is trying to get people back into offices, it may not be a real estate issue.
  After all, are you going to argue that companies that are more than happy to outsource and offshore work overseas and sell off industrial assets are suddenly going to care about keeping their 4-year leases?
I'm right there with you. It's just incompatible with how I want to live my life and the cost savings and time savings are unbelievable.

8% seems extremely low. You could double my pay and I don't think I'd stop working from home

It might be the average. Some pepole like working from office beacuse they feel lonely at home or they want to separate their work space from their home space.
- Or don't have the space at home, especially if it's two or more people at a time
  I'm lucky because I have room in the house for desks for me and my wife that are in different rooms, and not in our bedroom
  That's a luxury many people don't have
That's what I'm saying. Unless they talk about hybrid then yeah it's equivalent to 8%, but if we're talking full remote try more like 800% raise to get me back into an office. lol
You could triple my pay and I'd still probably say no.

Keep in mind this does not just apply to ‘top talent’.

Anyone who is confident they can find something elsewhere and have a good enough resume to land a hybrid/WFH job will do so, if pushed.

I prefer to think of myself as top talent though
My parent company issued an RTO for everyone stating the typical corporate talking points (we did great during COVID but now we need to all come back within a month because we all work better together, blah, blah, blah). A half hour later an HR rep had to clarify it was meant to apply only for the parent company. I imagine the parent company is doing poorly and is trying to shake off some workers to cut down on its payroll. The only reason I can think of why they can't force my smaller company is because we're actually making them a lot of money so far.

Holy smokes, working from home is not a “raise.” You should be compensated for the value you bring, not where you’re sitting when you bring value.

I spend $400 a month on gas because of my long commute. Work from home is definitely a raise in my situation. Gas bill goes down to $100 a month. Works out directly to a 5% raise just in gas alone. Car insurance can be switched to leisure only saving money further. Gain an extra two hours a day which were unpaid before, so my workday is now only 8 hours instead of 10, that is another equivalent to 25% on an hourly rate indirectly.
Then there is all the other benefits such as just being happier and more productive.
- From the business' perspective though, you are using less of their resources to do your job
I think it's basically saying companies need to pay more if they want people in-office. Which makes sense to me. If you want someone to spend time and money to commute they need to compensate for that. You can't ask someone who has been WFH to start coming in without some incentive or else you're basically cutting their pay.
That said, many people won't switch from WFH to in-office for any amount of money.
- Okay, I see what you’re saying and I concur. Thanks for the clarifying comment! 🫡
It could be considered a raise in terms of the amount of time you dedicate to work and the amount you get paid for it.
8 hour shift plus 1 hour commute both ways means you effectively dedicate 10 hours to your job. Replace the commute with a 30 second walk from your bed to your desk and you are now making more money for your time.
Mind you, I still agree that remote work should never be actively viewed as a raise or a perk. It should be the default for jobs that are compatible, which is a ton of them.
In terms of time returned, gas, wear & tear, etc., I would consider being told to go back to the office as a pay cut.
If I'm being asked to sit somewhere else, then I would definitely want to be compensated for that.
Well, financially it can be a raise
But emotionally, it has no equivalent and is like losing a toxic work element
I get paid about $200 (miles, after gas) to go to work so even any office work is extra money for me
I view it as a benefit, and I'm willing to make concessions on salary for additional or better benefits. Arguably you could have both, but I think unionization is required for that and I'm in a low unionization industry.
It is in the sense that commute time is not paid so compared to commuting jobs your effective hourly wage goes up. Also, commuting time is actually a negative wage.
Especially galling since if I were to move to a cheaper region my company would want to pay me less. It's "we only pay you for the value you bring" when cost of living goes up, but "we want some of those lifestyle savings" if I can get my costs down.
How convenient.
Many people also seem to forget that not everyone has a dedicated room or otherwise extra space to work in. Sure, if you live alone it doesn't matter but with other people living in the same apartment/house and perhaps them also working remotely, you suddenly need extra space just for good working conditions. Working space has a cost, be it in an office building or at employees' homes. Also good ergonomics means one needs a good desk and a great office chair which are not cheap to buy. Sure, I wouldn't necessarily demand more pay just for WFH, but I would never ever ever take a lower compensation in exchange either.
That said, I love working remotely from home and wouldn't go back to office. It's just that even if you save time and money in commutes, there are other costs in place that wouldn't otherwise necessarily exist.
Holy smokes, working from home is not a “raise.”
Sure it's not a raise, but that's not really the question. The question is the hidden cost that companies are imposing on themselves by demanding that employees come into an office. If employers are going to demand that out of their employees, they should do that with the expectation that employees will ask to be compensated or will leave.
Before the pandemic I was spending almost 2 hours a day on my commute to office, while being on site for 9 hours with an unpaid one hour lunch break. That’s 20% of my working hours.
I can use this time for entertainment and side projects
There’s not enough money in the world to pay for the time I save.
Besides, I save a lot on gas and food, and gain much more comfort (my house, my coffee, my chair, my screens, my toilets)
To be perfectly clear, if my company wants me back to office they will have to raise me more than 30%.

But boomer bosses need to physically see their workers sitting in chairs, they need that feeling of power!

It's because they need the real estate money, they built a lot of buildings on long term leases which are now expiring. Also, who is going to rent a space for a restaurant when no one is using restaurants for lunch in business districts?
- Maybe we don't need those expensive shitty food restaurants anymore.
My boss wants me to leave him alone, lol. He trusts me to get my work done so he can focus on his own stuff.
jeez, using boomer at every sauces is so cringe. grow up, little fluid-anime keyboard warrior.
- using boomer at every sauces is so cringe
  Finally someone with sense. They're good for gravy, stews, and broths as well

I could trade my WFH for a room with a view and a door. :) fuck openspace and flexdesks!

Honestly I wouldn't. I can't think of anything that would make me work in an office again. I can't do it.
My office had a window and a door. Wouldn't trade WFH to have them back.
Honestly yeah, having my own door really helps me survive my new job even though it can't be WFH.
- Yes, people didn't get my comment. We don't have all the choice and luxury to work for a great company or good project. In old Europe, a 1 WFH was an ultimate privilege before COVID. Nowadays, It should be choice, I don't mind coming 2 days a week but it to be a "mandatory minimal" 2 days is a bit ridiculous. Still, If I have my own or max 4 seats offices, I'll be okay with it.

My coworkers and I figure it at about 20% raise. No need for a second vehicle for the household, less money on food and clothes, plus the extra time.

Crazy that it's so low. I'd assume people who commute to work waste like an hour minimum going to and from work, so 1/9th of their work day is just unpaid "work" as far as I'm concerned.

That's ignoring all the benefits in comfort at home. I'm surprised it's just 8%.

I'm not surprised; WFH is a great benefit to workers. The big thing is going to be how companies choose to balance remote and in-person work and it is going to be wildly different across different industries.

What's galling is that big companies claim that the main reason for making people come into the office is to promote in-person collaboration. But, they constantly demonstrate that they don't, in fact, value in-person collaboration. They organize people into cross-geography teams all the time to save money on hiring. So, you're often sitting in a cubicle on a conference call with people on the other side of the planet that you will never see in the hallway. Or worse, you're sitting in a conference room with a handful of coworkers, struggling to communicate over a crappy speaker phone with a handful of coworkers on the other side of the planet. They also frequently lay off entire product teams in one fell swoop. Decades of institutional knowledge that you might tap into during a water cooler conversation just disappears overnight. It's hard to go along with all the extra real costs and pay the happiness tax that commutes and cubicle farms extract when it's so obvious that the stated reason for it all is a lie.

From experience I have seen how employers/government were forced back to the office. My Indian colleagues had to return to their offices because the office buildings were empty and it cost money. Government officials either owned or had friends own office buildings and it made monetary sense for them to force workers back to the offices. It was a play between corrupt officials and businesses, nothing more. Well, that and a profound and deep distrust of their workforce. It was a sad sight to see that happening to them.

My guess is that this could also occur the same way in the west.

The giant multinational corporation that owns the company that owns the company that owns the buildings is the same multinational corporation that owns the company that leases the office space.
How are they going to surreptitiously pull money out of the country otherwise?
- And they're all owned by Sheinhardt Wig Company.
Government officials either owned or had friends own office buildings and it made monetary sense for them to force workers back to the offices.
Even that is sunk-cost fallacy. If they own the buildings, that means they're already paid for. The only money they lose is theoretical and non-existent.
Edit: In fact, it costs them more money as you have to pay for utilities, maintenance, overhead, etc. when you fill a big building with people 5 days a week.
- Some collect rent from sub companies, some have fears of devaluation of buildings if not occupied, etc. Plenty of angles where the lost money.

8% my ass. I view WFH as a 300% raise.

Dude chill, that's not how you negotiate
Your suppose to say it's a %8 paycut and work your way to 0% change in pay, but still he to work from home

8%? Who came up with that? It's at least 20%

Shhhhhhhh

I'm waiting to hear back from a job and chomping at the bit to leave because they offer a hybrid work schedule (3 home/2 office). It's a 6% pay bump (from $80k to $85k) but being able to work from home 3 days a week is such a big plus (and not having to manage anyone being the other) makes it worth it for me. Not to mention that I can cash out all the vacation time that I've accrued. I'm sitting on 287 hours of vacation time right now so that would be roughly $10.9k paid out when I leave. I asked them if I could cash some out earlier this year but was told "no but if you leave the company, you'll still get paid out so don't worry about losing it". Well guess I'll be leaving the company then. I rolled over 218 hours so it's not like it wasn't time I didn't have accrued. I also have 300 hours of sick time and 41 hours of weather time too. Those won't get paid out though.

I worked from home for over a year and we had our best year in commercial lending as a credit union while everyone was home. Now everyone needs to be in the office every day. Yeah, no thanks.

300 hours of sick leave? I think I feel a fever coming on.
- Yeah. We get 2.77 hours per pay period in accrual. The most you can get to is 60 days (480 hours) since they don't offer short term disability. But once you hit 440 hours you can cash out 45 hours of sick time for 15 hours of pay or once you hit 480 you can cash out 60 hours for 20 hours of pay (3:1 conversion to cash).
- I've got about 200 days of sick leave lol. probably should use it more often
"Yeah, boss. Weird thing... There's a thunderstorm in my house, gonna take me about 41 hours to figure this out."
- It's an old relic from pre-covid where if it was snowing and you needed to come in an hour or two late (like if your kids had a delay at school), you could. Now we all have laptops and can work remotely if needed (minus the branch staff). Also, we didn't get shit for snow here in PA this past winter either.
Yeah, just keep in mind that in some countries, paying out vacation hours results in a large portion of that sum being paid to the tax-man. In the Netherlands that's about 40% (from the top of my head).
- Yeah, I'm in the US and I understand that a bunch of that might be paid to the tax man but at the very least, I'm getting that cash out. Currently, the only way for me to benefit from it is to get my same salary every week but just have times where I'm not at work which just means I have more work when I come back. Things have been tight since my wife lost her job (though she does have an interview next week so fingers crossed) so just getting even half of that $10.9k in cash back to replenish our rainy day fund would be a big relief.

Also informed by boomer consultants/board members advising millennial CEOs. No valid justification in most industries

On the sustainability front:

WFH means people aren't commuting. This is good, as we use less energy, particularly gas in our cars. On the down side, public transit agencies may have to dramatically cut service, increasing people's reliance on cars to get around. At an extreme level, they may go bankrupt due to lack of ridership.

Energy - home energy use has increased home residential energy use by between 7% and 23%. Lower income residents who do not have air conditioning can also suffer disproportionately. Higher income workers can readily afford expensive home upgrades, like adding a home office. Since empty commercial buildings still need to be heated and cooled, the energy savings aren't as great.

Real Estate - the US will need to delete 18% of its commercial real estate. There is trillions of dollars worth of commercial real estate debt maturing in the next 3 years that will be worthless. I've actually seen vacancy rates approaching 30% in many downtown markets.

This will leave every major city with a giant hole in its central city and cause major economic disruption in both the real estate investment market, construction I distry and walkability of cities. We may be staring down the barrel of another "white flight to the suburbs" that we saw empty out cities from the 1950s through the late 1990s.

The upside to these empty buidings is they can - and should be - transitioned to housing. It's just the rich companies who own the buildings don't want to have to invest any money in that.
Gov'ts should force them to, but that won't happen either. :/

I would rather make 50k WFH than 100k in an office.

For double the salary, I'd need to think long and hard about it tbh.
- For me it would heavily depend on where the office is located relative to my apartment, and how long my commute would turn out to be. More than 15-20 minutes by bike is a no-go (I live in Europe).
  Also assuming the requirement to be in the office isn't a huge red flag for bad management in the first place.
Lol, my family can't afford to live on $50k a year. So that's a hard no for me.
- Hahaha, yeah definitely a no for the family man. But as a single man 50k is fine, and the flexibility is worth more than a 100% raise.
You do you, there's no way I'd take a $50k pay cut under any circumstance

If my work tried to end WFH I'd leave instantly.

2 hours drive a day is not only a waste of my time but my money on fuel.

Yep. My employer has made several decisions I strongly dislike and disagree with over the last year or so. And would have been looking for the door over it if they did not allow full WFH for those that like that setup better.

Now that I have gotten to experience it I don't think I will ever willingly go back to a job that requires mandatory weekly in-office time.

My job requires me to go in bc I physically fix machines, so wouldn't be able to complete my tasks from home. I've convinced myself I like it because it gives me a definitive separation between work and home. But I've never had a WFH job and would probably end up liking that a lot more tbh
- it gives me a definitive separation between work and home.
  This is big for me since I don't have an office space at my house. I didn't mind working from home during COVID but I also don't mind having to go into the office. That said, my commute is only like 7 min to the office. I would like to be able to have a hybrid schedule though. Being able to work from home 3 days a week would be ideal for me. My working from home setup is a desk in the corner of my living room so the space where I work is the same room I relax and it was tough to have that separation.

Jokes are on them, I'm old but I still quit when they tried to force (illegally, we had at least 2 days@home by contract) us back 4 days/w in the noisy open space.

Got flexible home office at my new job ("must" be at the office Tuesdays, everything else is to your convenience) and cherry on the cake a 14.6% raise!

What are a set of tools I can recommend to my employer, which increase productivity of office workers, and which provide greater value than a hybrid office policy?

I've suggested to my work that if they really want people back in the office full time, they should offer those that return a 4-day work week as a meaningful incentive to compensate for the lost time and money to commuting. Still waiting for them to implement that one...
- I've been thinking about this, I'd sooner take a 20% paycut and keep working from home for a different company, than deal with traffic and smelling other people's lunches. Fuck all that.
I'd say probably a four day work week. I mean 4x8, not 4x10.
A shorter than 40 hour work week would be the biggest draw.
According to a study conducted by Zippia.com (1,000 full-time workers), the average worker is only productive for a little over 4 hours per day, with productivity capping out at 6 hours. This article on studyfinds.org references another 2,000 employee study done by OnePoll (no link given) that says "A new survey finds office workers are at their most productive by 10:22 a.m. each morning — but start to slump by 1:27 p.m."
Letting employees who commute to the office every day work 30 hours per week instead of 40 would be a HUGE draw for a lot of people. Less traffic on the commute, less "fluff" time where you're not doing anything, time to take care of personal errands during the week while businesses are still open, and I'm sure other benefits.

Surprised_pikachu.jpg

An 8% raise to bring people back to office sounds like a reasonable cost tbh

it wouldn't cover the opportunity cost of 3-4 hours a day for me, and while commuting direct costs are about 4% of my wage, that means a 4% incentive to lose 15-20 hours a week. absolutely not enough for me and to be honest I would consider it a disrespectful insult if my employer tried to justify that
- Real question, why did you take a job that required a 3-4 hour commute?
That's an extra 500/mo for me.
Factoring in needing to (re)buy office clothes/makeup/hair products, the extra time to get ready every day, commute with the time and money costs, as well as increased food costs?
Hard pass. That "extra" money is only going to pay for those extra costs.
Let's look from a time perspective. Being conservative in estimating a typical commute (for my area) and getting ready time, that's an extra 1.5 hours to my day. 500 a month over that extra 30 hours a week is 16/hr. Not terrible, but not worth it to me. I'm not going to trade 3 hours of my off work time for $48.
Now, if you're willing to trade that time for that cost, I'll def find 3 hours of chores around my place to hire you for!

Maybe that's the approach for hiring...remote employees are hired with the understanding that they will earn less than equivalent in-office employees. Commute time, transportation expenses, and any other incidentals make up the difference. It's all made clear and transparent upfront.

If remaining remote limits an employee's promotability for reasons of company need, this is also made clear.

Why should they earn less than somebody who is in-office? A remote employee costs less in physical resources like office space, heating and cooling, electricity and internet.
Ultimately it's the end result that matters, not where it's done.
- Because remote employees don't spend their own time and money on commuting to work. Those factors, along with saving on childcare, are the main drivers for desire to work remote, yes?
  A company can reduce its office footprint to account for fewer in-person employees and save money. But that alone doesn't address the factors above faced by employees who commute, so those workers should be compensated.