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Employers systemically illegally discriminated against employees by falsely alleging that accommodating them with work from home was an undue hardship, and woul

Employers systemically illegally discriminated against employees by falsely alleging that accommodating them with work from home was an undue hardship, and would just point at other employers not doing it to demonstrate this. COVID forced WFH for business reasons and thus employers are no longer as easily able to illegally discriminate against their disabled employees since it's patently obvious that the accommodation is possible and it doesn't present some existential threat to a business to provide it. It's also that employers are simply more geared up to allow work from home and it's less of an actual burden in time and money.

Aurornis 2y ago
> Employers systemically illegally discriminated against employees by falsely alleging that accommodating them with work from home If someone has a legally recognized disability that can be reasonably accommodated by working from home, that's one thing. But there's nothing illegal nor discriminatory about companies having their workforce be in the office.
- Plasmoid 2y ago
  > But there's nothing illegal nor discriminatory about companies having their workforce be in the office. Basically, this is the disparate impact argument. You could make a similar argument about having the office only be accessible by climbing a flight of stairs.
elevatedastalt 2y ago
COVID acted like a coordinated forcing function. So it's unfair to claim that things would have been just as easy to move to WFH before COVID. Even the FAANGs of the world had to do a LOT of work to make smooth WFH happen, from working on optimizing capacity for teleconferencing software to actually making their corp networks work smoothly remotely at scale.
BenFranklin100 2y ago
I think that’s a harsh take. Your last sentence is where the balance of the truth lies: COVID was a watershed event that ushered in new technologies and practices that have made WFH more viable and generally acceptable.
- dudul 2y ago
  Zoom and Google Meet existed before COVID. What COVID did was force employers to choose between letting people work from home or shut down. Suddenly, what was impossible a few months ago became totally fine. It didn't make WFH more viable or acceptable, it exposed the hypocrisy of employers.
  - BenFranklin100 2y ago
    You have an ax to grind. Good luck.
  - mlyle 2y ago
    > It didn't make WFH more viable or acceptable You don't think that things are any easier now that most of the workforce has practical experience with video conferencing and how to coordinate with people in the same office? I think we both learned how broadly possible it was, and also trained the whole workforce in how to do it.
  - tick_tock_tick 2y ago
    Transition the whole team, and paying for a video conferencing software, to accommodate one person who can't come into the office is exactly what an "undo hardship" is.
    - linkjuice4all 2y ago
      In pre-Covid times didn't companies face this same insurmountable hardship when opening a second location? What do you call your co-worker that works in a different office if not "remote"? I get that some people really like working in close proximity with others even if their job doesn't really require it - but this really seems to be the case of controlling employers demanding their troops trudge into to an office to demonstrate their value in person - pandemic or disability (or just the general annoyance of commuting to work and all that that entails) be damned.
chung8123 2y ago
There is a difference between having one or two people work from home and have a large percentage of the company working from home. A company needs to be changed both culturally and with infrastructure to make it work well.
tick_tock_tick 2y ago
[flagged]
- zrn900 2y ago
  > I really doubt that. Given the absolutely massive disadvantages WFH imposes on an entire company it's almost certainly going to continue to be considered a unreasonable burden.Comments like these make me realize just how much of a insulated bubble a lot of hackernews lives in. Less then 15% of the countries works fully remote and it's trending down. Its not. Dont propagate falsities. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/06/nearly-half-of-dells-workforce-refused-to-return-to-the-office/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/06/nearly-half-of-dells...
  - tick_tock_tick 2y ago
    How am I propagating falsities? If anything you're just confirming my bubble point. I say a very small percentage of the country works fully remote you link to a tech company just outside of Austin having a lot of remote workers and somehow think you're not living in a bubble?
    - ddfs123 2y ago
      Well even if you limit it to tech, it's still a good argument to push forward remote work in tech sector first, at least ?
    - zrn900 2y ago
      > I say a very small percentage of the country works fully remote you link to a tech company just outside of Austin having a lot of remote workers and somehow think you're not living in a bubble? Dell is a traditional company, not a modern tech company. It wasn't able to push RTO, and that's telling. And why the hell the average labor statistics of a country outside the tech sector and office work would be relevant to WFH? There isn't a way to do construction work, mining, transportation etc through remote work yet, so they have absolutely no relevance to this discussion - which makes aggregate labor statistics irrelevant.
manquer 2y ago
COVID was undue burden on most businesses, a lot of them needed PPP and other programs to survive. I don’t think it showed remote work was not an undue burden ,it just showed that for many organizations that remote work is possible, not that it is fungible with in-office work.
no_wizard 2y ago
The entire US business culture, which extends deeply into US culture as a whole, puts employers over employees at almost every turn. What protections workers in the US do have, businesses try to circumvent all the time, not to mention many things, such as the ADA have no concrete definitions for things like what a reasonable accommodation must be (they do have examples of generally accepted things, but it isn't a decree) which allows for all kinds of ways of non compliance. Not to mention, its unfortunately common that exercising any rights workers have will often work against you, being passed up for promotions etc. Its strange how much power we give employers over employees, and how regular people defend this, even when its actively working against them.
- kevin_b_er 2y ago
  > Its strange how much power we give employers over employees, and how regular people defend this, even when its actively working against them. "Because, one day, I will be a rich person, and I will be able to be cruel to the little people. I don't want to prevent me being able to abuse people if I'm in that position!"
  - jfengel 2y ago
    Also, "I am fundamentally smarter/better/more diligent than my fellow employees. My employer might recognize that with more compensation, but my fellow employees will not. They will drag me down and promote the unworthy." Pitting employees against each other is a classic.
- cscurmudgeon 2y ago
  The other side of the coin is that US salaries are among the highest in the world by PPP and 3rd highest nominally. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1338750/average-monthly-salaries-countries-highest-worldwide https://www.statista.com/statistics/1338750/average-monthly-...
  - aantix 2y ago
    Apparently I need to move to Luxembourg.

Aurornis 2y ago

> Employers systemically illegally discriminated against employees by falsely alleging that accommodating them with work from home If someone has a legally recognized disability that can be reasonably accommodated by working from home, that's one thing. But there's nothing illegal nor discriminatory about companies having their workforce be in the office.

Plasmoid 2y ago
> But there's nothing illegal nor discriminatory about companies having their workforce be in the office. Basically, this is the disparate impact argument. You could make a similar argument about having the office only be accessible by climbing a flight of stairs.

elevatedastalt 2y ago

COVID acted like a coordinated forcing function. So it's unfair to claim that things would have been just as easy to move to WFH before COVID. Even the FAANGs of the world had to do a LOT of work to make smooth WFH happen, from working on optimizing capacity for teleconferencing software to actually making their corp networks work smoothly remotely at scale.

BenFranklin100 2y ago

I think that’s a harsh take. Your last sentence is where the balance of the truth lies: COVID was a watershed event that ushered in new technologies and practices that have made WFH more viable and generally acceptable.

dudul 2y ago
Zoom and Google Meet existed before COVID. What COVID did was force employers to choose between letting people work from home or shut down. Suddenly, what was impossible a few months ago became totally fine. It didn't make WFH more viable or acceptable, it exposed the hypocrisy of employers.
- BenFranklin100 2y ago
  You have an ax to grind. Good luck.
- mlyle 2y ago
  > It didn't make WFH more viable or acceptable You don't think that things are any easier now that most of the workforce has practical experience with video conferencing and how to coordinate with people in the same office? I think we both learned how broadly possible it was, and also trained the whole workforce in how to do it.
- tick_tock_tick 2y ago
  Transition the whole team, and paying for a video conferencing software, to accommodate one person who can't come into the office is exactly what an "undo hardship" is.
  - linkjuice4all 2y ago
    In pre-Covid times didn't companies face this same insurmountable hardship when opening a second location? What do you call your co-worker that works in a different office if not "remote"? I get that some people really like working in close proximity with others even if their job doesn't really require it - but this really seems to be the case of controlling employers demanding their troops trudge into to an office to demonstrate their value in person - pandemic or disability (or just the general annoyance of commuting to work and all that that entails) be damned.

chung8123 2y ago

There is a difference between having one or two people work from home and have a large percentage of the company working from home. A company needs to be changed both culturally and with infrastructure to make it work well.

tick_tock_tick 2y ago

[flagged]

zrn900 2y ago
> I really doubt that. Given the absolutely massive disadvantages WFH imposes on an entire company it's almost certainly going to continue to be considered a unreasonable burden.Comments like these make me realize just how much of a insulated bubble a lot of hackernews lives in. Less then 15% of the countries works fully remote and it's trending down. Its not. Dont propagate falsities. https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/06/nearly-half-of-dells-workforce-refused-to-return-to-the-office/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/06/nearly-half-of-dells...
- tick_tock_tick 2y ago
  How am I propagating falsities? If anything you're just confirming my bubble point. I say a very small percentage of the country works fully remote you link to a tech company just outside of Austin having a lot of remote workers and somehow think you're not living in a bubble?
  - ddfs123 2y ago
    Well even if you limit it to tech, it's still a good argument to push forward remote work in tech sector first, at least ?
  - zrn900 2y ago
    > I say a very small percentage of the country works fully remote you link to a tech company just outside of Austin having a lot of remote workers and somehow think you're not living in a bubble? Dell is a traditional company, not a modern tech company. It wasn't able to push RTO, and that's telling. And why the hell the average labor statistics of a country outside the tech sector and office work would be relevant to WFH? There isn't a way to do construction work, mining, transportation etc through remote work yet, so they have absolutely no relevance to this discussion - which makes aggregate labor statistics irrelevant.

manquer 2y ago

COVID was undue burden on most businesses, a lot of them needed PPP and other programs to survive. I don’t think it showed remote work was not an undue burden ,it just showed that for many organizations that remote work is possible, not that it is fungible with in-office work.

no_wizard 2y ago

The entire US business culture, which extends deeply into US culture as a whole, puts employers over employees at almost every turn. What protections workers in the US do have, businesses try to circumvent all the time, not to mention many things, such as the ADA have no concrete definitions for things like what a reasonable accommodation must be (they do have examples of generally accepted things, but it isn't a decree) which allows for all kinds of ways of non compliance. Not to mention, its unfortunately common that exercising any rights workers have will often work against you, being passed up for promotions etc. Its strange how much power we give employers over employees, and how regular people defend this, even when its actively working against them.

kevin_b_er 2y ago
> Its strange how much power we give employers over employees, and how regular people defend this, even when its actively working against them. "Because, one day, I will be a rich person, and I will be able to be cruel to the little people. I don't want to prevent me being able to abuse people if I'm in that position!"
- jfengel 2y ago
  Also, "I am fundamentally smarter/better/more diligent than my fellow employees. My employer might recognize that with more compensation, but my fellow employees will not. They will drag me down and promote the unworthy." Pitting employees against each other is a classic.
cscurmudgeon 2y ago
The other side of the coin is that US salaries are among the highest in the world by PPP and 3rd highest nominally. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1338750/average-monthly-salaries-countries-highest-worldwide https://www.statista.com/statistics/1338750/average-monthly-...
- aantix 2y ago
  Apparently I need to move to Luxembourg.