Amazon Makes It Harder for Disabled Employees to Work from Home

For a company that is supposedly data driven like Amazon likes to tout, they have zero data that RTO would provide the benefits they claim[0]. They even admitted as much[1].

I wouldn't be shocked if one day some leaked memos or emails come to light that prove it was all about control and/or backdoor layoffs, despite their PR spin that it isn't (what competent company leader would openly admit this?)

[0]: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2024/10/over-500-amazon-...

[1]: https://fortune.com/2023/09/05/amazon-andy-jassy-return-to-o...

They'll have plenty of data to support the primary motivation: that enforcing arbitrary RTO policies will absolutely aid in generating staff turnover and voluntary attrition without having to payout severance costs. The policy gives them less direct control over who they lose, but I'm sure the data also points to any critical replacement employees being willing to work for less on average. That's the data they are looking at.

I wouldn't be surprised if it's even more straightforward than that. They've got some very expensive office space that's extremely under-utilised, and they're probably at risk of the rent getting raised on a lot of it unless they can increase footfall.

I don't understand, like, I can see each handwave -

1. They're paying a lot in rent.

2. if they don't have workers in the office, then, adjacent spaces for ex. food service is less valuable.

3. If adjacent space is less valuable, the landlord is motivated to raise Amazon's rent to compensate

4. Therefore, they're making people go back to work to avoid rent increases

4 years on, and it seems a little bit odd it took that long for it to play it. But it seems (much) cheaper and sensible to find somewhere else to rent than give in to a threatening landlord who sees you as responsible for any shortfalls in adjacent revenue, instead of the anchor tenent you are.