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Finance & economics
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Labour market trends
劳动力市场趋势
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所有好东西
When will work-from-homers see their pay fall?
居家办公者的工资什么时候会下降？
Employers are ordering workers back to the office.
雇主们正在命令员工回到办公室。
In recent weeks Dell, a hardware-maker, and JPMorgan Chase, a bank, have issued such decrees.
最近几周，硬件制造商戴尔和摩根大通银行都发布了这样的规定。
They join a growing list that includes AT&T, Amazon and even the American government, where Elon Musk—who has called remote work “morally wrong” and its supporters “detached from reality”—has championed the shift.
与这二者类似的公司越来越多，其中包括美国电话电报公司、亚马逊，甚至美国政府，埃隆·马斯克在政府提倡从居家办公到坐班的转变，他称远程工作“在道德上是错误的”，其支持者“脱离现实”。
Bosses insist that mandates will boost productivity.
老板们坚持认为，强制坐班会提高生产力。
Workers see them as a way to cut staff without mass firings.
工作者们认为这是不进行大规模裁员而削减员工的方式。
If the goal is to reduce costs, there may be a simpler way: lower pay for remote workers.
如果目标是降低成本，可能有一个更简单的办法：降低远程工作者的工资。
A new study indicates many would take the deal.
一项新的研究表明，许多人会接受这笔交易。
Zoe Cullen of Harvard Business School, Bobak Pakzad-Hurson of Brown University and Ricardo Perez-Truglia of the University of California, Los Angeles, find that tech workers are willing to accept a pay cut of 25% in return for fully or partly remote jobs.
哈佛大学商学院的佐伊·卡伦、布朗大学的博巴克·帕克扎德-赫森、加州大学洛杉矶分校的里卡多·佩雷斯-特鲁格利亚发现，科技工作者愿意接受25%的降薪，以换取全远程或半远程工作。
That suggests remote work is much more than a perk.
这表明远程工作不仅仅是一种福利。
If workers value it more than bosses dislike it, there should be scope for bargaining.
如果工作者对远程工作的重视程度超过老板对它的厌恶程度，那么就应该有讨价还价的余地。
The authors reached this estimate by analysing real-world job offers and acceptances, controlling for company type, benefits and the local cost of living, so as to isolate the impact of remote work.
三位作者通过分析现实世界中的工作机会和接受情况，从而得出了这一估计，作者们还控制了公司类型、福利和当地生活成本等因素，从而让远程工作的影响不受其他干扰。
Their findings contrast with those from a survey by Nicholas Bloom of Stanford University and co-authors, which found that American workers, on average, would accept only an 8% pay cut for a hybrid schedule, with just one in five willing to take a hit of 15% or more.
他们的研究结果与斯坦福大学的尼古拉斯·布鲁姆等人的一项调查结果形成了鲜明对比，后者的调查发现，美国员工平均只愿意接受8%的降薪来换取混合工作安排，只有五分之一的人愿意接受15%或更多的降薪。
The discrepancy may stem from methodology.
两个研究的差异可能源于研究方法。
Surveys reflect what workers say they want; Ms Cullen and her co-authors track the trade-offs they actually make.
调查反映了工作者们嘴上说想要什么，而卡伦及其合著者追踪了他们实际做出了什么权衡。
Sample differences may also matter.
样本的差异可能也很重要。
Tech workers, who tend to be higher earners, may place a greater premium on flexibility than the general workforce.
科技工作者往往收入较高，他们可能比一般劳动者更看重灵活性。
Historically, perks with clear monetary value have come at a cost to wages.
从历史上看，具有明确货币价值的福利是以工资为代价的。
Jonathan Gruber of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Alan Krueger of Princeton University have found that when American states in the 1980s raised mandatory compensation insurance for workplace injuries, wages fell to offset the cost.
麻省理工学院的乔纳森·格鲁伯和普林斯顿大学的艾伦·克鲁格发现，当美国各州在20世纪80年代提高了强制性工伤赔偿保险时，为了抵消成本，工资下降了。
Price Fishback of the University of Arizona and Shawn Kantor of Florida State University found a similar pattern when workers’ compensation laws were introduced in dangerous industries such as coal mining or lumber milling.
亚利桑那大学的普赖斯·菲什巴克和佛罗里达州立大学的肖恩·坎特发现，当煤矿或木材厂等危险行业引入了工人赔偿法时，类似的模式也出现了。
If remote work is, like the provision of benefits, costly to companies but valuable to workers, wages should follow the same pattern.
如果远程工作就像补充福利一样，对公司来说成本高昂，但对员工来说很有价值，那么工资也应该遵循同样的模式。
Yet in most cases so far they have not.
然而在大多数情况下，工资目前没有遵循这种模式。
One explanation may be that firms are reluctant to create visible pay gaps between remote and in-office workers.
一种解释可能是公司不愿意在远程办公员工和坐班员工之间制造明显的薪酬差距。
Human-resource policies generally aim for internal equity to prevent resentment.
人力资源政策通常力求实现内部公平，以防止怨气。
There may be legal risk, too.
这样做也可能存在法律风险。
As women are more likely to work remotely, cutting pay for remote jobs could indirectly lead to a gender wage gap, which firms would prefer to avoid.
由于女性更有可能远程工作，因此削减远程工作的薪酬可能会间接导致性别工资差距，而公司更愿意避免这种情况。
Another explanation is that remote work has become a bargaining chip.
另一种解释是远程工作已经成为一种谈判筹码。
Rather than lowering wages, firms use flexibility to attract and retain top performers.
企业不是降低工资，而是利用灵活性来吸引和留住顶尖人才。
Take an artificial-intelligence specialist earning $250,000 at Amazon.
以一位年薪25万美元的亚马逊人工智能专家为例。
If the tech giant orders them back to the office, a less prestigious rival may not match the salary but could lure them with a remote-work offer.
如果亚马逊要求他们坐班，一家不那么知名的对手公司可能无法给出这么高的薪资，但可能用远程工作的机会来吸引他们。
Flexibility also helps with retention.
灵活性也有助于留住员工。
Mr Bloom finds that hybrid policies reduce quit rates among engineers by a third.
布鲁姆发现，混合政策使工程师的离职率降低了三分之一。
But what happens when labour-market conditions worsen?
但是当劳动力市场状况变差时，会发生什么呢？
If workers have fewer options, firms may no longer need to compete by offering remote work.
如果工作者的选择更少，那么公司可能不再需要通过提供远程工作而竞争。
Instead, they may begin pricing it in—offering lower salaries for remote roles, knowing job-hunters have fewer alternatives.
相反，公司可能会开始把远程工作算进工资——为远程职位提供更低的薪水，因为公司知道求职者的选择更少了。
Some signs of such a shift are already evident.
这种转变已经有了一些很明显的迹象。
Employment rates for middle-aged women and disabled folk have risen, with many newly able to take up remote work, yet their wages in these new remote roles are falling.
中年女性和残疾人的就业率有所上升，因为其中许多人变得能够从事远程工作，但他们的这些新的远程岗位的工资却在下降。
Workers hate return-to-the-office mandates.
工作者们讨厌强制返回办公室的规定。
When JPMorgan announced the shift, it had to disable comments on its online post after a fierce backlash.
摩根大通宣布这一转变后，由于遭到激烈批评，不得不关闭了这条网络帖子的评论功能。
At Dell nearly half of employees opted to stay remote last year, even when bosses made it clear they would not be promoted if they did so.
在戴尔，去年近一半的员工选择了继续远程办公，即使老板明确表示，如果选择远程办公，他们就不会得到晋升。
All the same, workers might like what comes next even less.
尽管如此，接下来的事情可能会让工作者们更讨厌。
