The average employee returning to the office spends $561 per month–that's the average two-person household’s grocery bill in the U.S. for the entire month.
I work for a FANG company and 2 years ago I willingly took a 13% pay cut on the condition I could work from home permanently. The pay cut hurt but my productivity and output jumped so high that received a promotion along with bump in pay a year later. Being a tech company, they track a lot of metrics around productivity and I know I am 28% more productive when working from home. I refuse to return to an office just because of office politics and drama that distracts me from doing my job. I’m not there to socialize.
Forget socializing... it's all "hey, can you join a meeting?" that has absolutely fuck all to do with you. Slack invites? Ignore. Outlook calendar items? Delete. Much harder to dodge in person.
This. And those 5 minute walk and chats, although annoying at times (also they could be fun and productive at times), were less painful than the endless meeting invites I get now. Because a 5 minute walk and chat folks know you are busy. If they see you at your desk plugging away they no you're busy. But for some reason people now think they are entitled to unscheduled time on your calendar.
I am not asking for your sympathy either. You are however VERY misguided. I totally understand the perspective of “big bad company” but without people like me fighting behind the scenes, I guarantee you things would be a million times worse for everyone on planet earth. I have been targeted in the past due to my stance on privacy but I refused to cave to the pressure. Even after high level managers demanded my “obedience” I resisted and won. You can call them parasites but if all they good people leave (and we do exist) then you might as well just give up now and welcome 1984 with open arms.
I am a software developer and I would never work for say a gambling company. I’m not skilled enough for a FAANG company but I wouldn’t do it even if I was.
If you can get a job at a FAANG the you can get a job anywhere. Certainly for less money but money is meaningless after a point.