One of the most heavily touted benefits of good broadband is that it enables people to work from home. One might think that the ability to work from home has largely been solved since broadband speeds around the country have been climbing. But it seems like I’m on a Teams or Zoom call every week with somebody who struggles with upload connectivity (including me from time to time).
I recently ran across an article from the U.S. Career Institute. This is an online college that’s been operating since 1981. The article lists a lot of recent statistics about working from home in the country.
Here are some of the most interesting statistics cited:
- Remote workers save an average of 55 minutes a day by not commuting.
- A fully remote employee saves up to $12,000 per year on gas, clothing, and buying lunch. Companies save up to $10,600 per remote employee by not having to pay for space and support.
- A survey of remote workers cited health benefits like less burnout and stress, healthier food choices, improved sleep, and overall mental health.
- Remote workers are more likely to move than others. The most common reason for remote workers to move is to be close to family and friends.
- Millennials are the most likely to seek remote work. Gen Z are the least likely to seek remote work.
- Colorado and Maryland have the highest percentage of remote workers at over 37%. The states with the lowest percentage of those working from home are Mississippi, Louisiana, Wyoming, and Arkansas.
- The U.S. leads the work in remote work with hybrid employees working at home an average of 1.9 days per week while the worldwide average is 1.1 days.
- Almost two-thirds of employees rank remote work as the most desirable trait of a job, ahead of salary.
- 14% of employees say they will not go back to the office if their employer requires it.
- 46% of remote workers say it’s easier to build relationships through remote work compared to being in an office.
- On the negative side, 36% of remote workers said the onboarding process for remote work is challenging, and they feel undertrained.
- 79% of managers say that remote workers are more productive.
- Almost two-thirds of employers don’t allow a remote work option.
- 16% of U.S. companies allow for fully remote work.
- 26% of U.S. households have at least one person working remotely at least one day per week.
- Senior-level employees tend to work more from home than junior-level employees.
- People with advanced degrees have more options for remote work.
I keep seeing headlines about businesses bringing people back into the office. While these headlines are often sensational and worry folks who work at home, I think a lot of businesses have concluded that remote work is the best way to get work done while tending the bottom line.
According to an April 2025 article in Fortune magazine, as much as 84% of Gen Z workers admit to streaming TV while working from home. I noticed that your post was missing that data. So, if that works with your business model, then by all means let your folks work from home.
Doug – thanks for the update – the statistics and facts you cited are borne out in my interactions with individuals across the United States representing a variety of companies and government agencies. The downside to remote work is I find my workday is usually much longer than it should be because tasks are right there in front of me just asking to be completed.
In deference to the previous comment about streaming content during the work day – to me that would indicate a management issue and not an employee issue – in terms of having a challenging set of objectives for completion and measurement.
What is especially good is when I am interacting with others on TEAMS, Zoom, Google Meet, Webex etc., my business conversations are focused on issues and opportunities. This is different from being in the office where there is constant social interaction to discuss the latest scores, peoples weekends or vacation plans etc. Working remotely allows my team and I to focus on accomplishing our objectives and advancing forward professionally.
As an ISP that has installed internet service in many homes for “work from home use” I would be hesitant to hire anybody and let them work from home. The pool is very polluted.
What are the pollutants?
Complete and total loss of respect for the job. Slopping around in bed clothes, not focusing on the job because there is a whole household of distractions, trying to balance taking care of infants and small children while “at work”. Demanding the fastest package for “work” but every support call from then on is “I pay for the fastest service, why is Netflix not working”, I.E. the “work from home excuse” was just to try and buy priority. As an ISP we’ve been asked by the “remote worker” to not tell the employer what was going on, which puts us in an uncomfortable position.
I’ll give some of them credit, we have encountered some dedicated work from home people. It can be done. Ironically, one of them worked on a 10 x 3 service for years because it just worked, no issues.
My standard response when someone calls for service and says “I work from home” is ” oh great, work from home is the easiest service to support, so our slowest package will work fine for you”. The next comment is usually, “well… we watch Netflix also”
I just got home from a week in a remote airBNB “working remotely”. It was great. But I’m going to need a lot more evidence that a majority of the people are doing their best before I would be willing to hire someone from their home.
That’s a people issue, not a work location issue. Not all hires are going to work out while others will. The ICT you provide is decentralizing and virtualizing work. It’s a hard thing for many to get their head around since work has been so strongly tied to the location where it’s done.
Well true, but that behavior is much easier to detect at the work place than at home. I dunno, maybe I am holding too hard a line on the subject. It’s just got a lot of baggage from our perspective
This trend began in the 1980s with microcomputers and accelerated with the Internet in the 1990s-2000s and personal communication devices. ICT has disrupted the standard uniform “show up” model. But what’s really important is what work is being done and how it’s managed while taking into account individuals on a work team. Here’s a relevant article from HBR:
https://hbr.org/2025/05/the-workplace-psychological-contract-is-broken-heres-how-to-fix-it
Quality of work — in the office, versus in the home — is an issue wherever the employee is working. Many jobs can easily be completed from a home office, while other jobs definitely can not. Whether management “trusts” employees to be self-motivated has nothing to do with where employees are located, and more to do with the quality/quantity of the work being done… and the quality/ quantity of the manager.
True… it might be easier to find the goof-off when the boss is walking behind them in the office, but the employee who has time to watch Netflix on the job at home will also be the employee who is goofing off at the office… and will figure out how to do so even under the nose of management.
In the end, for home offices to “work”, there has to be some modicum of trust.