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Reflecting on the early days of remote work during the pandemic, Thiel describes it as a time when workers leveraged their influence to demand flexibility.
PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel says worker power allowed them to insist on not working.
Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal, has shared his perspective on why Silicon Valley has largely moved away from remote work. In a candid TV interview, Thiel called remote work ineffective, stating, “When people didn’t come into the office, they weren’t working.”
Reflecting on the early days of remote work during the pandemic, Thiel described it as a time when workers leveraged their influence to demand flexibility. “Worker power allowed them to insist on not working,” he remarked. However, as companies began to reassess the situation, many discovered that remote setups revealed a lack of productivity among certain employees. “After two years, companies fired a bunch of these people and reasserted control because you realize, wow, there were all these people we hired and they’re not working. And it doesn’t matter, and we can just get rid of them,” Thiel said.
The late 2022 and early 2023 wave of tech layoffs at companies like Google, Meta, and Amazon coincided with the diminishing impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Thiel drew a connection between the decline of remote work, perceived low productivity, and these large-scale job cuts. According to him, many tech companies realized the dispensability of certain remote roles, which were eliminated with minimal disruption to operations.
Amazon, for instance, has announced that by 2025, remote work will officially end for all employees, with limited flexibility for specific teams and roles. Similarly, Meta and Google are pushing for a return to office spaces, instituting policies that require employees to work on-site for a set number of days each week. These moves by major tech players signal a broader shift away from remote work, now that the pandemic is no longer a pressing concern.
While some see this return-to-office trend as a way to enhance collaboration, innovation, and productivity, others suggest it’s influenced by factors like preserving company culture, improving performance oversight, and supporting commercial real estate interests. The effort to revitalize urban centers may also be playing a role in the push to bring employees back to physical office spaces.
