Of the federal employees I know, and I live with one, it is not they are refusing to come to the office. Before Trump was elected in November last year, many federal employees were asked to start working back in the office. None of the folks I know complained about that, in fact, they welcomed it for the in person interaction with their coworkers.
That is one subset of Federal employees.
So, you assuming the whole of the federal government is working from home is just not true.
First off, I made no such assumption, nor did I state one here. That is you reading something I did not say. I personally know Federal Employees who go to the office every workday.
When you go to your Social Security office, are you not interacting with a human federal worker?
My local Social Security Office was open every Thursday following a blue moon, if the date was odd numbered, if you had an appointment, between the hours of 10 AM and 2 PM. It was eventually closed. I got one of their file cabinets helping a friend to load the file cabinets he'd bought from there at a GSA auction. That's all I ever got out of my local Social Security Office. The next closest office is 130 miles away. When I filed for Social Security, I ended up calling the National Number, as eight hours of sitting on the phone in queue netted nothing but a headache from lousy elevator music but not an opportunity to get through to get an appointment to do anything over the phone with that closest office. So, a really bad example, there.
When you travel through an airport and go through security, those TSA workers are federal employees, are they not?
And gee whiz,
they showed up for work. I have a KTN, so I don't have to take my shoes off to get on the plane. I only had to travel to a neighboring state to get that sorted out.
Your mail is still delivered by a human federal employee, yes?
Aannnnd another bad example. Some days, my mail is delivered, some not. Payments made in April arrived after the May payments were processed. Others have taken two weeks to travel across town, postmarked 15 days earlier at the mail processing center in another town. (I could have walked that distance in the time it took for those to arrive, and likely made the trek a week earlier, as the weather was nice).
But at least those people (well some of them) showed up for work.
I have no pity. My work (and I am still working) is where it is, when it is. I either show and do my job, or I have no job. That simple, as it is for a host of Americans.
That's why I think you'd be surprised at how little pity the people paying for empty offices and employees are going to feel.
Trump's rhetoric is empty and most of the time an outright lie.
You think forcing the federal workforce to come to an office 5 days a week will increase productivity? Output? Yeah right!!!
I think it will cut some of the dead weight from the workforce. When you weigh the work that gets done vs the number of people doing it, yes, productivity will increase, because those not producing will be gone. There is something abut being in a work environment that is conducive to getting work done and not ducking down some rabbit hole (because the rabbit holes are not there, and the focus is on work). Otherwise, we're paying for a lot of empty office space for nothing.
The American workforce has been trending to work from home for multiple decades. Why? Because housing workers in brick and mortar buildings cost a sh*tload, that is why. And the fact is, with certain workers, you get more productivity with them working from home, not less.
We are paying for the office space, regardless.
FACT is the federal government does not any longer have the office buildings to house all the federal employees working from home. BILLIONS IN OFFICE SPACE will need to be spent to house all these people, and it will not happen over night either!!!!
And why is that? More efficiency?
When you consider the COST to implement Trump's plan to return all federal employees to 5 days in the office each week, the savings to the taxpayer will be NOTHING!!!!!!
Will it? Let's see who opts out, first. After the herd is trimmed, it might fit in the pasture after all.
I spend my days laughing and shaking my head at Trump, because he is either an idiot or being misled by folks around him.
And his latest fool's errand, the canceling of the agreements with federal workers to work from home, part of a union contract signed by Wrecking Ball Joe, you think he will get to do that? Fat chance. The courts will honor contract law. PERIOD!!!
Trump is not now and never has been about reducing spending or waste. Get f***ing real please!
Whatever. We'll see. For me, this isn't about who is doing it, it is about something that needs to be done.
