Infrastructure Australia has released a new report, entitled Infrastructure beyond COVID-19, which contends that working from home (WFM) is here to stay and will permanently shape our cities as well as prompt greater migration to regional areas:
Widespread ‘working from home’ reduced demand by workers to live in close proximity to their workplace, with more city dwellers moving to regional areas, and less regional households moving to cities…
We estimate that around 4 million employees have been working from home since March 2020, representing 30% of the total workforce, with a third of those workers wishing to remain remote. This accelerated trend has led to widespread office vacancies, greater strain on the broadband network, greater energy and water consumption in residential areas and increased local activity, including local traffic congestion and demand for greenspace…
The full text of this article is available to MacroBusiness subscribers
Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also a co-founder of MacroBusiness.
Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.
