This is the real reason for companies wanting people back to the office.
All this talk about collaboration and team spirit is just the publicly given reason for wanting people back to the office.
The real reason is that now the owners of the buildings are losing money.
Cry me a river.
This is simply sunk cost fallacy. Companies signed leases. Now they regret it but can’t back out so they’ve got to try to pretend it’s worth it even if it costs their employees money out of pocket.
It’s not really about owners it’s more about leases and the company leasing the property “not getting their money’s worth”
Often they have signed leases with themselves. With original owners, holding companies etc.
This is a way of extracting value from a corporation without paying it as a dividend or salary. Dividends go to all shareholders. Lease payments go to one specific one.
So obviously if there’s no reason to pay these leases anymore, somebody powerful is going to be very upset.