Memes

It can vary from location to location, but honestly I think a lot of it is that a pretty significant percentage of management can't get an erection unless they're watching people suffer.

A very common reason is because you're not clerical staff, you're courtiers. The bosses want an office with people running around hurriedly doing busy stuff, which accounts for a lot of the bullshit jobs that workers are assigned, not that they need to be done, but to serve as a Tiger Repellant Rock. Or the bear patrol, which is from the same Simpsons episode.

A more conscious answer is that offices had been leased out for years at a time, and leaving them empty would mean they go to waste. While this means workers time is wasted (commute, prepping lunch out etc.) they don't care about that as much.

When RTO orders became required (RTO or be laid off / RTO or get reassignment) that was part of the ownership class reasserting their dominance over a working class who was suddenly in demand after the lockdown and post-epidemic period. It was notable that even the Democratic officials were glad to memory-hole all the progressive programs that manifested to facilitate business during the lockdown. In fact, the telecommute controversy became the keystone issue, since workers learned they were happier and did better work at home. But the boss wanted to see them labor in their cubicle.

We suck at retaining class consciousness, or the super-giant conservative propaganda machine is really good at suppressing it. Seriously, FOX News and OAN are poison.

Some of the answers you already received are partially correct, but I work in Commercial Real Estate and I’d wager it’s because when a large tenant stops operating at a location, it causes a trigger on the loan that has repercussions due the property owner. Often, they lose access to manage their own rents.

This happens even if the tenant is still paying rent. It’s because a vacant tenant, especially a large one, loses business for the surrounding business.

Example: A grocery store in a strip mall closes down for repairs. Even if they are still occupying the space, it would cause a trigger. Lots of the other spaces in the strip mall are more valuable with traffic from the grocery store shoppers.

TLDR, they don’t want a loan violation that will cost them.

• They're stuck in long leases for commercial real estate, and feel the need to justify the money being spent
• They're stuck with shit for brains middle managers who don't contribute anything but acting like glorified, unnecessary babysitters, and the company feels the need to justify keeping these people around

Commercial property owners are lobbying Congress to force RTO because their properties will lose value if people work from home.

Shortsighted local governments like RTO because it forces people to be stuck in a part of town where they are more likely to patronize local buisnesses.

What they all look past is the growing resentment not just for RTO, but this entire system where we sacrifice our time and dignity for the cred of our politicians and the moneynof our slave masters.

In my sector it's just incompetence. Bosses are under the illusion that being able to see the workers in and out makes them better at managing their hours (false) and that being able to physically reach someone makes the communication more efficient (also false)

They want you to quit

Control. They want to feel like they're in control of all aspects of their team/company. I work from home, but they've put on tons of monitoring software to check if we're looking at different pages, moving our mouse, and interacting with our keyboards. It's all just about control. When people are in the office, they feel like they have control over what they're doing. They're being observed by other coworkers, etc.