When Nicholas Bloom, William Eberle’s economy professor at Stanford University in California, began studying working from home in 2004, “it was difficult to commit to someone,” he says. Even in 2018, “nobody had any interest.” In 2025, that is difficult to understand. Among the pandemic and technological advances, the WFH has become a standard among white collar workers. Not only has it normalized; It is also dismissed. The act that used to generate Homer Simpson memes on the couch, clicking a distant computer with a stick, has won “positive connotations,” says Bloom. Working from home is seen as a privilege.
He is also here to stay. For your latest study, “Working from home in 2025“, Bloom and his collaborators analyzed the responses of 16,000 university graduates in 40 countries and discovered that WFH levels seem Rate of a small continental Europe, then Dips through Dips through a lot in an African and South Africa lot.
To be clear, when Bloom says WFH, he is mainly talking about those at hybrid work schedules. “Sixty percent of people work completely in person, 30% are hybrid and 10% are totally remote,” says politics where politics has struck down. Hybrid typically means Tuesday to Thursday in the office: a schedule blooms in “approximately 8% more payment … because it saves two or three hours a week of displacement [and] It allows people to live further “from their offices, often as far as real estate are cheaper. Companies also benefit from hybrid policies, according to Bloom’s study, since less employees tend to give up. With all these advantages, I would think that bosses would have adopted WFH throughout the world.
“Why the hell, for example, Japan does a third party have the work of the United States United States rates?” Bloom says. After observing the factors, including development (Japan is as developed as the United States), population density, industrial structure and connectivity (without major differences), left Bloom and other researchers with a remarkable variable. “The great factor is cultural,” he says, “and is around individualism.”
In conversation with Fast companyThat it has been edited by its length and clarity, Bloom elaborated on how individualism drives from home, how much the pandemic really increased work rates at home and why people still tend to think that we are returning to the office despite the fact that the data says otherwise.
Fast company: What inspired you to look worldwide for your latest study?
If you observe the data, there was clearly a movement back to the office since the summer of 2020 onwards after the blockade in the United States, but from the spring of 2023 onwards, the return to the office seems to decrease. People seem surprised by that. They are like, “Are not the media full of zoom cancellation stories? [WFH]Amazon Canceling [WFH]? “Yes, there are a group of high profile companies that cancel or reduce work from home.
That caused the big question for us: how do you see this worldwide? The last time we collected global data in 2023, so I really didn’t know. It turns out that, worldwide, work from home has also stagnated. There have been no changes since 2023. worldwide, we are in a new standard. People who say “when we return to the office” are currently dreaming. This is the future.
One of his findings that I found particularly interesting was that WFH rates are higher in individualistic societies than in collectivists. Can you unpack that?
In individualistic societies, managers are generally not micrognitive of their employees. The US configuration is: a manager tells an employee what to do and gives them strong incentives, such as evaluations and performance bonds. In Japan, there is much more micrognition, because there is much less hiring, shots and bonds. Managers want to see employees there. In Japan, you can’t leave the office until the boss is gone. This culture of long hours exists for everyone. When the boss leaves, his junior leaves, then his Junior leaves, etc. That is very problematic for work from home.
If they talk to people who work for US companies in Japan, they are usually in a hybrid configuration. If they work for Japanese companies in Japan, often doing the same job, they must enter the office every day. Culture seems to have a great explanation for this difference in all countries.
To what extent do you think this is reduced to the bosses who trust their workers, or not?
Is a bit Trust, although in the United States, it is “trust but verifies.” The bosses not only trust the workers, but they trust them, but then monitor.
Should companies without a WFH policy reconsider?
The great point of sale is that it is profitable. In me paper Nature In June 2024, we made a massive random control trial in a large company called Trip.com. They are a company that lies on the stock market worth approximately $ 40 billion. They randomized if you could work from home two days a week or come in the five days, the first if your birthday fell on a strange day, the last one fell on a uniform day. For 24 months, we trace 1,600 employees working in finance, marketing, computer engineering, professionals with university degrees. There was no effect on performance.
However, quitting smoking rates fell 35% for people who were allowed to work from home two days a week. For Trip.com, each person who resigns costs around $ 50,000. If someone leaves it, they must announce, re -interview, pick it up again, update them and remove the activity managers to train them. By reducing the rates of leaving by 35% without any effect on productivity, that increases commercial profits by $ 20 million a year. That is why work has been stuck from home.
On the other hand, a Economist article That mentions that his study cited the concern of the CEO of JP Morgan, Jamie Dimon, that the “young generation is being damaged” for the increase in work from home. To what extent do you agree or disagree with that statement and why?
I advise my Stanford university students, particularly in their first five years of work, which is a good idea to go to the office four days a week, because Jamie Dimon is exactly correct. It is easier mentor, learn and build connections in person. Usually, when I survey the students, that is what they want: they want to socialize, be advised and do not have much space at home. As people reach their 30 and 40 years, they have uploaded that learning curve, but they still benefit from entering, perhaps three days a week.
Another interesting data point of his study were similar WFH rates for men and women in all regions. What do you think that explains that?
They want to do it. You see a slightly greater preference for women to work from home. The main decisive in the US. It is: do you have children? A man with children under 12 years of age has a greater preference for working from home than a woman without children, for example. Having a disability is also a great driver, but the genre doesn’t matter so much. What you see in countries like India is much more than gender is much more, because for women, there is a risk of assault and mass sexism in the workplace. In low -income countries, the gender gap grows.
What was the most surprising conclusion of your study?
Working from home has stabilized worldwide. I made an online presentation for Australia last week, and the people there are under the same opinion as in the US, that large companies were prohibiting it. We just don’t see that in any data set. The facts and opinion are as divergent as people’s opinions about crime; They always think the crime is increasing. On average, it tends to decrease. Everyone thinks that work from home is finishing, but you don’t see it worldwide.
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