COVID-19 is an opportunity to work from home and to reimagine the everyday

Motivation

The late Zig Ziggler often spoke about the "I've had it" moment. This is when someone an individual's frustration with their life reaches its boiling point. The moment that individual decides I need to change something, I need to better myself. We as a society have reached that revelling moment in terms of how we live every day. What I am referring to is is how we live. The reality for many people in recent years is the following; 

While you read this, I am sure you can think of someone who has retired early because they have paid off their mortgage. Whether we are going to work or school, most people leave around 7:30 am and many of us don't get home again until 19:00 or even 20:00 in the evening. We do this to afford a home that we are never in to enjoy. Wheater you are paying rent or you have a mortgage, the place in which you live is the most expensive outgoing for almost everyone, but we are never there to use it. When one takes a step back and thinks about it, this is stupid, confusing, and financially irresponsible. 

For many of us, our second biggest expense is our mode of transport. And why to do we need said mode of transport? You guessed it, to get to the place that takes us away from our place of residence also known as our biggest monthly expense. This is madness. 

Before the industrial revolution, people worked in their local village or in their home often as farmers. During the industrial revolution, we lived in cities to be close to our place of employment.  But this is not the case anymore. Many of us, can't afford to live in cities. this is why many people live in the suburbs and we find ourselves in a position, where we work to afford a house we are never in and for a mode of transport we need primarily to get to the job that pays for both. It is a self-fulfilling propose. 

Let me get the disclaimer out of the way. There is little avoiding the fact that the COVID-19 pandemic has made many of us worse off in some regards. Many have lost their jobs, many of us miss, attending live music and sporting events, while others who have recently graduated or have become unemployed are left with a jobs market that is depressing, to say the least. While these changes are depressing, COVID has opened our eyes to many things to our personal lives. 

An acceleration of the future - The future is now

Firstly, it has accelerated the normalisation of working from home. Many white-collar workers were used to working from home, on public transport and even while abroad. For many people, working from home was always possible in theory, but managers, and employers did not encourage it as it would mean a reduction in control. It may have surprised many employees just how quickly their companies could adapt to working from home when forced to. Many employees will have understandably wondered "why could I have not started this years ago." 

The truth is, we have started, pandemic or not there is no going back. The cat is out of the bag. Many of us can work from home. 

Our homes are not homely

In Ireland, one thing that I found very striking during the pandemic was just how busy home stores or DIY stores were as the lockdown was eased. The busyness was different to stores like Primark, as unlike the clothing store, this rush was not a few days of euphoria and nostalgia for something we thought we would never be without, but rather a statement of how we live. Stores such Woodies's, B&Q were inundated with demand as people quickly realised that their homes were not enjoyable spaces to be in, as soon as they had to spend any time in them. Wheater it was painting a wall, putting up a shelf, rearranging a garden or decluttering it was almost as if many people had time to pay attention to their home for the first time in years. 

Personally,  at home, we decided to get a skip to clear out the garden shed. But we had to wait almost a month to get the skip as according to the skip company "demand has never been this high".  In my hometime, it felt like during lockdown every second home had a skip. This is further evidence that when people were forced to spend a lot of time at home, they did not actually like said home. Again, before the pandemic, most people's biggest expense is their home, which most people are too busy to spend any time in. Their second largest expense takes them away from their home to a job they do at home, meaning they spend so much time away from said home that without realising it, it becomes a place most people can't actually comfortably spend time in. If our homes are not places we are happy to spend time in, what on earth are we doing?

COVID has opened our eyes to why it is important that are homes are homely and not just a place that we go to sleep in like a hotel room. 

You can save a lot of money 

Before COVID many young people could not catch a break. Many in Ireland study at 3rd level for 3-5 years and then enter roles paying 30k or less. Many companies will likely use COVID as an excuse to reduce these wages even further. Many people come out of University with thousands of euro worth of debt. Many then have to move to Dublin and pay rent and deposit that may eclipse their first monthly wage package on day one. They then need to pay other expenses such as food, electricity, transport, WIFI and household supplies. It is almost expected that one might need to work 3-4 months just to break even from the expenses of moving. 

Working from home allows everyone, but young people, in particular, to catch a break and starting to build up from financial stability in these unstable times. 30-40 years, Ireland was a society where one person in a household could work, the other stayed at home and they could afford a mortgage and children. Nowadays, both members of a couple can work in roles they needed a master's degree to get and not be able to afford to get a deposit. Working from home and not having rent hanging over said people, given young people a chance of owning their home and starting their adult lives for real. Some too many people are 30 years old living in apartments that can only afford an apartment similar to what they could afford as a university student. COVID is an opportunity to reverse this trend. 

COVID has led to a better social/family life and mental health

I recently spoke to a friend that spoke of their delight to be living in Cork again and living at home. Like most of the country, their jobs are in Dublin. He wanted to work from his Dublin appartment but quickly realised that his room was far too small to actally work on a daily basis. He decided to come home. Many people, who move end up living with strangers, away from their frinds and family. That same friend explained how great to was to play for their local GAA club again, to see their friends and family every week, live in a place they consider home and not having to spend half their weekend commuting up and down. 

COVID has given people more time with the people they care most about. It has got they away from the stress of the rush hour traffic and it has given them a chance to be part and to add to the local community. The country is suffering from both a brain and social drain, again, COVID is giving us a chance to reverse this trend. 

An added and often forgotten advatage is how easy it is to get a package when working from home. We buy online and often packages are very awkward to get delivered as nobody is there to collect them. This is not an issue when working at home. 

Working from home is also a great help to parents who get to spend more time with their children, get to see them grown up and don't have to pay out for expensive babysitters. 

It is time to save the small town

On one hand, last year, in 2018 I tried for weeks to find an apartment in Dublin and ended up paying crazy prices for one that was covered in moloud and was so cold that you could see your own breath for six months a year. On the other hand, last month I was driving through towns in west Cork such as Dunmanway, Skull and Baltimore. I had forgotten, just how charming these places are and how 95% of things you need are there. What struck me was that amount of empty homes everywhere. There are so many wonderful homes, but people can't live there as they are too far from work. Work that only requires a laptop. We claim there is a lack of homes in this country, and that may be the case. But, the fact that, we all feel the need to rush to Dublin and other cities, while robbing towns and villages all around the country of their young to do jobs they could do from their sitting rooms anywhere in the country is an utterly ridiculous notion. It is time to save the small town and/or village which makes up so much of this country. COVID will help us do this. 

The need for better better transport between towns and cities

Anyone who has spent a lot of time in mainland Europe and Germany, in particular, will know just how poor the public transport is in Ireland. While Dublin gets the vast majority of the focus, there is a lack of buses and the Luas is incredibly uncorfortable to use during rush hours. 

But what is most devasting about Irish public transport is how poorly different towns and cities are connected. There is only a few train routes and a lack of buses leaving much of the country completely isolated unless they have a car. Trains in Ireland are increadible inexpensive and we have only a fraction of the scale that we had in the past. For example, check out this list of train stations that have been closed on the Island of Ireland over the years here. For anyone who cares about public transport, town planning or the environemnt, it is a very depressing read. 

To justify such public transport, people need to live in said areas. There is no point of having a train to Dunmanway for example, in West Cork if people don't live there. If people are more spread out around the country, it will ironally make the entire country more connected. On that list, it mentions an old train station in my home town of Ballincollig that went to Cork City and Macroom. Macroom in particular is an example of a town with fantastic stores, and history but it is an increadibly unenjoyable place to visit as, there is a constant traffic jam and smell of fuel on the main street. It takes away from the entire heritage of the town. Youghal is another great example of this, there too is destroyed by cars. It irks me greatly that these towns had rail networks that could have kept the cities clean of air pollution and let people live around the country and aroid the daily traffic conjestion. 

Imagine how different towns such as Youghal, Killarney and Macroom would be if, people could walk, dine and sit in the main streets of the towns rather than waiting for cars barely moving to let them pass. They would thrive. They would have get more visitos, people would be healthier, most importantly people would be more connected with the rest of the country and keep said areas vibrant. 

At the moment, town planners talk alot about, "the 15 minute city". The basic idea is that, you should be able to get everything you need within a 15 minute cycle or walk of your home. Towns such as Ballincollig, Youghal, Kinsale, Killarney, Dún Laoghaire already do this. Granted, you may need Dublin, Cork or Belfast city centre to find a particlar store or to attend a concert, but everything you need most weeks and more can be found in smaller towns. 

Let's make it quicker and greener for people to get around the country. Let's connect the country in an affordable and green manner, that stops brain drain, allows young people to build up capital and to be active members of their communities. Let's not take young people away from aging parents and grandparents. 

Disadvantages

Argument 1

Of course there are some disadvantages. For example, it is harder to build up a community at work when you don't see people in person very often if at all. It is also difficult for firms to be creative and conduct activities such as idea generation sessions. This is one, I am happy to admit. 

On the otehr hand, companies could designate a certain day or two in the week where such events happen. This would mean that someone from Kerry, could drive to Dublin on a Thursday morning, attend meetings on a Thursday afternoon and Friday and then return home. He or she could pay one night in a hotel and not pay rent. This way, people are still in the office when needed but don't need to waste their wages on often shabby apartments that they little to no say in.  

Coming into the office one to two times a week would also help help fight against the feeling of loneliness and isolation.  

Argument 2

One big argument that comes up against working from home, is that big multimational companies would leave Ireland if people don't need to go into the office. That if people can work from anywhere than companies such as Google and Facebook could be suited everywhere and nowhere at the same time. While there is credibility to this arguement, many foreign companies are here for the low corporate tax rate, the English langauge spoken here, Ireland's EU membership and the highly eduated workforce. They are not here for not the unique office spaces. Those could be built almost anywhere. 

Argument 3

The death of the city centre. In my own opinion, the strongest argument for keeping office workers in the office is lunchtime. It can be easily argued that office workers make jobs such as convinence stores, barbers and gyms possible. That without office workers these businesses would likely go bust. And this is completely right. 

But, we have to ask why are said businesses in city centres? Because that is where all the people are. If poeople in Ireland were more spread out such services would be more spread out. This of course would lead to a lot of disruption for small business owners in the short to medium term. 

But I beleive that the drop off would not be as dramatic as some fear. Even if we all work from home,  cities will always have people. In fact, if we all worked from home, there could be more people in our cities. If a lot of office space was given up and converted to apratmenrs, more people could afford to live in the city and not see it as a place to go to work to and immediatey leave. Monday - Friday, the docklands in Dublin are normally a bustle of activity. But on the weekend, it is a ghost town, so much so that many local cafés and restaurants don't even bother to open. if people could afford to live in such an area and not leave it every evening, the area would would be an active spot, seven days a week. Nobody can possible argue that this ghost town situation is ideal and a sign of a vibrant capiatl city. 

Argument 4

The ever increasing gap between office and non-office workers. This gap already exits in most cases. The arguemtn goes that it is unafir that some people would need to commute and others would not have too. and, yes it is, but unless someone figures out how to cut one's hair remotely or how to build busildings without workers onsite, this is unavoidable. The idea that nobody should work from home, because some people cant work from home, is very flawed logic. It is the equivalant of saying of saying, nobody should be able to attend a sporting event, because there are not enough seats for everyone or that nobody should travel abroad because some people can't afford. I find it likely that anyone who argues such a ridiculos point has alternative motives and/or business interests. 

The moral arguement for staying at home

Let's make it quicker and greener for people to get around the country. Let's connect the country in an affordable and green manner, that stops brain drain, allows young people to build up capital and to be active members of their communities. Let's not take young people away from aging parents and grandparents. COVID has brought a lot of pain to pain, but it is an oppurtunity to live a a more balanced life and it is an oppurtinity we need to grab. 

Young children in particular need to go to school and get guidance with their studies at a level most working people don't need from their managers. Until we get a vaccine, COVID is likely here to stay. While office workers, staying at home won't stop the virus it might keep at bay enough so that children can attend school, businesses can stay open, we have live sporting and music events and we can all keep some sort of normality. 

I understand why many miss the office, but I hope that most that do will stay at home and let the rest of society carry on as normally as possible. Many Irish people in their 20's and 30's have had to emigrate or live their parents to this day, due to the mistakes of older generations. Not by any individual but as a collective, young people have been screwed over by the mistakes of older generations in terms of the environment and the banking crises. Many young people, are alos highly at risk as they are the ones working in supermarkest and other stores. 

Suppressing this virus is not just about projecting elderly people, it is about giving children a chance to go to school, to get on with their lives and to have some sense of noramility. It also makes sure that people who need to be at work in-person can continue to make a living and provide for their families. 

Young people in school are now getting screwed over missing out on their eduation. This virus could be here for one, two or even three years. What happends to a 10 year child and their future life prospects if they can only go to school for say 3-4 months a year for the next two to three years? What happens to the barber who investee their life savings to get their business started if we have to lockdown again? 

Last few thoughts

Despite what this piece might suggest, I do have sympathy for office workers. If your manager insists you have to come in, you can hardly refuse if you want to keep your job. 

But there is no excuse for the house parties, pubs in Cork City with a lack of social distancing (but assume the whole country), College Road by University College Cork, the scenes in Killarney outside pubs, the Spanish Arch in Galway, the GAA parades in Glanmire, Blackrock and so on. 

It is one thing people acting it a slightly selfish manner to provide for their families but, if you think your drunken partying is important at a time like this, I honestly don't know what to say to you.