Woman bangs businesses that don’t pay workers to live nearer

There is a trend of employees using social media to point out long-standing work practices, particularly companies that are requiring their employees to return to the office in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Before remote work became the norm for many industries, it was taken for granted that employees would commute long distances from the homes and apartments they could afford. Most often, these included living quarters outside of the major metropolitan companies are active.

However, TikToker Paige (@paigeinpublic) states that companies that hire employees who have to travel more than 20 minutes for their work are not too successful. She argues that this is because they clearly cannot make enough money to afford to pay their employees a salary that allows them to live closer to work.

@paigeinpublic I’m pretty tired of all the “back-to-office” messages for companies promising to be remote. #remotework #remotewfh #remotelife ♬ Original sound – Paige

“If your business requires you to come to the office and it can’t pay you enough to live comfortably within 20 minutes of that office, your business can’t afford to operate in that city and it’s asking You subsidize his business with your commute,” she says in the short video clip.

She added in the caption, “I’m pretty tired of all the ‘back-to-office’ messages for companies promising to be remote.”

Prior to this clip’s release, Paige prompted a Fortune article that spoke positively about “NYC super commuters” who commute up to five hours a day to and from work.

@paigeinpublic Offices are a network, not a community. Remote work is a skill, and if you can’t figure out how to do it, then work on that skill instead of requiring people to come to the office. #remotework #workfromhome #remotefirst ♬ Original sound – Paige

“This Fortune magazine article about people who commute up to five hours a day for their job had issue after issue, as if it were written by a big office,” she says. “But the part that pissed me off the most was the claims about ‘community.’ This Toronto economics professor says, “Any commute longer than 20 minutes really impacts your life, your well-being and your happiness. Long commutes are very harmful. But we need community, we need each other,” he says.”

Paige claims this mindset is harmful and overlooks another important community that many office workers don’t get to participate in: the neighborhoods in which they live.

“Offices are a network. You are not a community. Do you know who your community is? your neighborhood. Maybe if you didn’t have to commute five hours a day, you could connect with the people in your neighborhood,” she says.

There are countless articles and food for thought that discuss the importance of office culture. The show has been criticized by many employees, who claim it is a front for companies looking to make the most of the office space they are most likely still renting.

The Daily Dot reached out to Paige via TikTok comment.

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