PPCC: Pisitófilos Creditófagos. Verano 2023

[sudden and sharp]

Y mientras tanto... la casa sin barrer.






Como los que se quejan de que Madrid, y sólo Madrid, les vacía el territorio y luego presumen de baja tasa de paro. Si tu territorio se vacía, la culpa es tuya y de nadie más.

Ahora resulta que solo en Madrid está imposible la vivienda. En el resto del país, no.

No veo ecuanimidad alguna.

[berberecho]

Yo ni me quejo de Madrid ni dejo de hacerlo. Me explico: simplemente escribo aquí lo que creo que hay. Nada más. No se trata de ningún tipo de ataque.

Madrid es, probablemente, la ciudad más enladrillada de la enladrilladísima España (junto con otras, claro). Si hemos visto cierto "esplendor" en España, y en Madrid, es por la burbuja. El dinero de un siglo, traído en una máquina del tiempo a unos años, 40 redondeando, concentrando el grueso en una parte. Ese dinero es sudor. Sudor que sólo ha sido sudado en parte. Falta otra parte bastante grande, y puedes creerme: se sudará lo que no está escrito, porque la bendita inflación no va a quitar ni una gota. No lo va a hacer.

Y eso es Madrid a día de hoy. Una ilusión en la que una maga, a lomos de su escoba, puede llevar al mismísimo año 2000. Una mater amantísima que pondrá el ladrillo en su sitio, el que le corresponde, porque es la riqueza sublimada, el modelo que ha regido y regirá Madrid, y que Dios mediante, regirá también España, para levantarla y rescatarla de las comunistas manos de Antonio. Y el que no pueda seguir el ritmo que se vaya. ¿Qué problema hay?

[sudden and sharp]

Lo que tú digas.






Pero en el mundo real, leí el otro día un artículo que incluía un mapa por provincias o tal vez comunidades, donde se detallaba que productos son los mas exportados y quién era el mejor cliente.

Madrid exporta principalmente productos farmacéuticos... has leído bien, pro-duc-tos far-ma-céu-ti-cos... y Bélgica resulta ser nuestro mejor cliente.


No lo encuentro ahora... valga este otro.


https://elpais.com/economia/2016/09/23/actualidad/1474647052_933091.html





Y vosotros podéis seguir con Ayuso, los funcis, los ladrillos y la rabia que os da vernos en vuestras playas / praderas verdes y demás. Podéis seguir con el tostón del secarral, de la burocracia... del sursum corda, de la capitalidad, etc.

Cuando os pase extremadura, que lo hará, a ver qué coño tenéis que decir.


--------------------
BILIS AQUÍ

\        /
 \___/

[ Sin acritud. (Es sólo por las risas.)    ]

[berberecho]

Madrid exporta, ya ves tú. Pues claro. Alguien tiene que ser el mejor cliente, ya ves tú. En salto de longitud soy el mejor en mi casa, ya ves tú.

Madrid está enladrillada, y más que se va a enladrillar previsiblemente, de mano de la ideitas. Y ese modelo, ojo al dato, lo van a intentar exportar al resto. ¡En 2023-2025! Está cantado el zapatero a Antonio, de la mano de la ideitas. Estoy deseando que salga diciendo (no creo que lo haga, que tonta no es):

El modelo que propongo para España es el mismo que en Madrid: ladrillos. El que trague bien, el que no, puerta. Si no puedes vivir aquí pues te buscas otro sitio. No importa todo lo que se caiga después: lo primero es la libertad, se da todo por la libertad. ¡Libertad y ladrillo o muerte!

Y es lo que quieren muchos madrileños ojo. Hoy en Madrid (yo vivo aquí) se sublima ese ser del que tanto hablamos en el foro. La "riqueza" de Madrid se basa y bebe casi (casi) en exclusiva del ladrillito. Si el ladrillo se cae (de forma abrupta y evidente) en Madrid se vienen cositas. Que lleves años en este foro y no lo veas...

Está hasta arriba de ladrilleros e inmomutilados tanto Madrid como este foro. Sí sí, lo está. Se nota a kilómetros. Si lo piensas, no podría ser de otra forma.


Pd-> por cierto, claro que posteo por las risas. Insisto en que da igual la Atea o el Antonio. No importa. Simplemente un poquito más o menos de vaivén. No tiene importancia.

[Derby]

https://www.ft.com/content/631d1a3a-71fb-4586-9728-d41db2cd16d9

UK house prices fall for fourth consecutive month, Halifax figures show

Property market displays resilience in face of sharp rise in interest rates with modest declines

UK house prices edged down in July to an average of £285,044, marking a fourth consecutive monthly decline, but with the market showing increased activity, according to data from Halifax.

The average house price fell 0.3 per cent last month, broadly in line with a 0.2 per cent drop reported last week by rival lender Nationwide.

But the Halifax data showed an annual fall in July of 2.4 per cent, slower than the 2.6 per cent rate of decline reported in June and less than the 3.8 per cent reported by Nationwide.

The figures suggest the housing market has so far proved relatively resilient in the face of the sharpest rise in interest rates for 35 years.

Kim Kinnaird, director at Halifax Mortgages, said activity among first-time buyers in particular had held up relatively well, with people settling for smaller homes in order to offset higher borrowing costs.

Although house prices were likely to continue falling over the coming year, she said, given strong wage growth and only a modest increase in unemployment, she expected “a gradual rather than a precipitous decline”.

Martin Beck, chief economic adviser to the EY Item Club, said one reason for resilience was that higher official interest rates were feeding through only slowly to mortgage holders as fixed-rate deals expired.

The average interest rate on the existing stock of UK mortgages had risen only to 2.93 per cent as of June, even though lenders were quoting rates of around 6.85 per cent for a typical new two-year fixed mortgage.

Ben Broadbent, Bank of England deputy governor for monetary policy, noted last week that the latest rise in the BoE’s benchmark rate, to 5.25 per cent, had not triggered any further rise in expectations for interest rates two or three years ahead — by which mortgage rates are set.

The BoE also noted that, while the fall in nominal house prices had been relatively modest so far, high consumer price inflation meant they had already fallen more sharply in real terms.

The buy-to-let market is one source of uncertainty, with landlords facing both rising mortgage costs and tougher regulation. The BoE thinks exits by landlords have not yet had a significant effect on prices. But Kinnaird said the sector was under pressure and “it remains to be seen . . . what that could mean for the supply of properties available to buy”.

Beck cautioned that although many homeowners had healthy savings, and others were extending their mortgage terms in order to cope, “these sources of support will only go so far”.

Imogen Pattison, assistant economist at the consultancy Capital Economics, said that despite better recent news on inflation, mortgage rates were likely to remain near their current levels for the next year, leading to a “renewed slump in demand” and accelerating falls in house prices later this year.

[Derby]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-08-07/france-is-europe-s-top-power-exporter-as-germany-turns-importer#xj4y7vzkg

France Is Europe’s Top Power Exporter as Germany Turns Importer

France has overtaken Sweden to become Europe’s top net power exporter, while Germany has moved from exporter to importer during the first half of this year.

France’s total net exports amounted to 17.6 terawatt-hours, with most of the power flowing to Great Britain and Italy, according to a report from EnAppSys Ltd. that laid out imports and exports.

French nuclear output is a cornerstone for Europe’s electricity market, even though it’s hovering around 50% of capacity. Its nuclear stations continue to be crucial to the market despite outages and high output from renewable sources such as solar, which has been highly productive as heatwaves have ripped through many parts of southern Europe this summer.

The increased exports from the nation were due to “an increased availability of the country’s nuclear assets,” EnAppSys director Jean-Paul Harreman said in an emailed statement. “Although availability is still 10-15% lower than normal, the increase in capacity of between 5 and 10 GW versus last year helped to flip the French energy balance to export again.”

While Sweden slipped to second place, Spain overtook Germany to become Europe’s third-highest net exporter with total net outflows of 8.8 terawatt-hours, the report found. Spain, seared by extreme heat recently, has profited from increasing renewable generation as huge solar capacity has driven higher exports. Sweden’s exports stood at 14.6 terawatt-hours.

Germany’s closure of its nuclear power plants was the reason its “energy balance flipped to imports,” the report found.

[Negrule]

Estaban muertos y se les resucitó (reburbujeo). Sin condiciones y con barra libre para considerar a la vivienda y hacer con ella lo que les salga de los cataplines, o ovarios.

Si la solución pensada fue el reburbujeo y las pocas contrapartidas que exigieron a cambio del rescate, que se joda el sistema y se vaya a tomar x culo. Tres hurras por el “paleto”del pueblo, de la barra del bar, el cuñado,etc que tenían las cosas claras desde un principio.

Repito, estaban muertos.


Salut

[sudden and sharp]

Estaban muertos y se les resucitó (reburbujeo). Sin condiciones, con barra libre para considerar a la vivienda y hacer con ella lo que les salga de los cataplines, o ovarios.

Si la solución pensada fue el reburbujeo y las pocas contrapartidas que exigieron a cambio del rescate que se joda el sistema ,y se vaya a tomar x culo. Tres hurras por el “paleto”del pueblo, de la barra del bar, el cuñado,etc que tenían las cosas claras desde un principio.

Repito, estaban muertos.


Salut

Entiendo que se rescató a los underwater... y por ende a la Banca. Tener a día de hoy 20 casas en un pueblo perdido de Dios, a precio teórico altísimo es lo mismo que tener sellos de afinsa a precios de catálogo. O acciones de lo que sea.

Si no vendes...  no pierdes. (HODL) Pero, ojo, tampoco ganas.

El más listo... El Wyo. Eso ya quedó claro.





-----------
O bien expropiar a saco.... y confías en los políticos. 

[Vipamo]

Lo que tú digas.






Pero en el mundo real, leí el otro día un artículo que incluía un mapa por provincias o tal vez comunidades, donde se detallaba que productos son los mas exportados y quién era el mejor cliente.

Madrid exporta principalmente productos farmacéuticos... has leído bien, pro-duc-tos far-ma-céu-ti-cos... y Bélgica resulta ser nuestro mejor cliente.


No lo encuentro ahora... valga este otro.


https://elpais.com/economia/2016/09/23/actualidad/1474647052_933091.html





Y vosotros podéis seguir con Ayuso, los funcis, los ladrillos y la rabia que os da vernos en vuestras playas / praderas verdes y demás. Podéis seguir con el tostón del secarral, de la burocracia... del sursum corda, de la capitalidad, etc.

Cuando os pase extremadura, que lo hará, a ver qué coño tenéis que decir.


--------------------
BILIS AQUÍ

\        /
 \___/

[ Sin acritud. (Es sólo por las risas.)    ]

Como no puedo abrir el artículo al ser de pago, no puedo leer la información. Dudo que sea información detallada que pueda dar una idea exacta al respecto.

En la comunidad de Madrid se me vienen a la cabeza 3 fábricas (laboratorios) GSK, Bayer y Jansen. Son multinacionales y no sé quién eran antes (Abellan y Conde  ?).
Tampoco no me cuadra Bélgica como mercado de consumidor final. Será este país una plataforma de sociedades para su posterior exportación ultramarina? Si hay alguien que me ilumine se lo agradezco de antemano.

[Negrule]

El que uno tenga 20 casas en un pueblo perdido nos importa un pepino a todos no digamos a underwater y la Banca. En los años 2011/12/13/14 en zonas de actividad si, incluyendo Barcelona/Madrid/Ibiza/Mallorca, imagínense en Malaga/Valencia/Sevilla/Granada el sistema es quien ha creado esta situación, en el caso de España con el rescate congelador de activos, cambio de la LAU, todo esto permitido por quienes te prestan la pasta, y a nivel global, incluyendo a España, con pocas salidas tan jugosas a esas inmensas montañas de dinero emitidas por el sistema junto con los irrisorios tipos de interés. Todo ellos con el visto bueno del sistema sin poner límites a las nuevas tecnologías y sus ideas de como ven la vivienda.

Estaban muertos y se les resucitó (reburbujeo). Sin condiciones, con barra libre para considerar a la vivienda y hacer con ella lo que les salga de los cataplines, o ovarios.

Si la solución pensada fue el reburbujeo y las pocas contrapartidas que exigieron a cambio del rescate que se joda el sistema ,y se vaya a tomar x culo. Tres hurras por el “paleto”del pueblo, de la barra del bar, el cuñado,etc que tenían las cosas claras desde un principio.

Repito, estaban muertos.


Salut

Entiendo que se rescató a los underwater... y por ende a la Banca. Tener a día de hoy 20 casas en un pueblo perdido de Dios, a precio teórico altísimo es lo mismo que tener sellos de afinsa a precios de catálogo. O acciones de lo que sea.

Si no vendes...  no pierdes. (HODL) Pero, ojo, tampoco ganas.

El más listo... El Wyo. Eso ya quedó claro.





-----------
O bien expropiar a saco.... y confías en los políticos. 

[Derby]

Esta es la fotografía para 2023. Todo apunta a que la de 2024 será muy diferente y nada positiva para España.

https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/econographics/southern-europe-is-the-continents-new-economic-growth-engine/]Southern Europe is the continent’s new economic growth engine

Southern Europe is the continent’s new economic growth engine

By Sophia Busch and Phillip Meng

On Monday, Eurostat brought much-needed good news: the Eurozone returned to growth in the second quarter of 2023. Yet this modest success story has not applied to everyone.

Roaring tourism and demand for services, luxury goods, and other light manufactures are fueling the continent’s economic resilience. That means that countries that are more oriented towards these sectors, like France and Southern Europe’s major economies, have reaped the lion’s share of European economic growth. If we weight economic growth projections by each country’s share of European GDP, Spain, Italy, and France will likely be the largest contributors to the EU’s growth in 2023. This is despite the Italian economy’s surprise contraction in the last quarter, which partially reflects the one-off effects of curbing its ‘Superbonus’ tax exemption program. In its July World Economic Outlook update, the IMF upgraded Italy and Spain’s growth forecasts by 0.4 percentage points and 1 percentage points, respectively.

On the other hand, Europe’s traditional juggernaut has become its laggard. Germany’s economy, which is more dependent on heavy manufacturing exports than its peers, faces an uncertain global trade environment, worker shortages, and rising subsidies in the US and China. The IMF forecasts a 0.3% contraction this year.

Regional inversion

Ten years ago, the map would have nearly been reversed, with Germany leading European growth and Southern Europe in dire straits. The 2008 financial crisis hit Southern Europe hard; after the collapse of asset bubbles prompted governments to increase stimulus spending, the resulting debt loads triggered a balance-of-payments crisis. To resolve their debt crises, these countries took austerity measures like painful cutbacks on government spending, largely at the behest of their northern neighbors.

Moreover, the region’s industry mix was unfavorable for years after the financial crisis. Resilient demand, especially from Asia, for essential industrial goods pulled Germany out of recession quickly, while tourism and other services sectors were slower to rebound as households pulled back on spending. While France’s economic experience was not as extreme, its recovery was also hampered by an economy dependent on services, tourism, and luxury goods.

Meanwhile in the South, poor consumer confidence and austerity contributed to a vicious cycle of contraction, amounting to a “lost decade” for growth. For instance, Italy’s GDP growth underperformed the EU average every year between 2008 and 2020.

Back to the future

How did Southern Europe bounce back? Some factors, like the strength of the services sector and a rebound in tourism, are more recent. Although Russia’s invasion of Ukraine drove up energy prices in all European countries, France, Spain, Italy were among the least affected countries. In 2021, Russian imports accounted for 6%, 9% and 23% of French, Spanish, and Italian fuel consumption, respectively, compared to 31% of German consumption. Southern European countries also received an outsized proportion (47%) of EU recovery funds from the pandemic.

Structural factors have also helped, particularly in Southern Europe. Austerity programs have ended, and many of the region’s most indebted countries have improved public finances. Greek bonds, for example, are now one upgrade away from being ‘investment grade’–a far cry from the early 2010s, when Greece was placed in ‘selective default.’

These improvements offer optimism that Southern Europe may be turning a page on its “lost decade.” It may be hard to imagine now, but rapid regional economic growth was once the norm before economic crises (starting with Italy in the 1990s) set the region back. From 1971 to 1990, nominal economic growth averaged 3.3% per year in Spain and 3.1% in Italy, compared to 2.6% in Germany and Britain. That might not sound like much, but sustained growth meant that Southern Europe was quickly catching up to its northern peers. In 1980, GDP per capita in Italy and Spain were 72% and 53% of Europe’s three largest economies (an average of Germany, France, and the United Kingdom, weighted by population). By the end of the decade, those figures were 98% and 62% respectively. Indeed, Italians of a certain generation still remember ‘il sorpasso,’ the point in 1987 when Italy’s economy surpassed Britain’s in size (in spite of its smaller population).

It is too soon to say whether Southern Europe is back on this trajectory, but the economic winds may be shifting. Ten years ago, Northern Europe could dictate its solutions to the sovereign debt crisis because Southern Europe needed a bailout. Now, southern capitals may call for a more balanced debate on Europe’s economic future.


Sophia Busch is a Program Assistant for the Atlantic Council GeoEconomics Center.

Phillip Meng is a consultant for the Atlantic Council GeoEconomics Center.

PS. Gracias Cadavre!  Voy a ver si me aplico más con las imágenes, que suelen ser muy importantes para la comprensión de la mayoría de artículos.
Lo que me pasa es que me divierte tanto leer y seleccionar (no que piense que es mejor o peor, es la que deseo compartir con el foro), que cuando llego a tratar de mejorar la técnica con las imágenes...ahí pincho, sí. 

[breades]

https://www.eleconomista.es/actualidad/noticias/12398508/08/23/feijoo-pide-un-acuerdo-amplio-para-gobernar-tras-el-cambio-de-rumbo-de-vox.html

Saludos.

Cómo estará la cosa que parece que ya no funcionan las palabras mágicas, ni los eufemismos. Ya no hay que formar amplios 'consensos', sino amplios acuerdos, que es lo que siempre han querido decir ocultándolo sibilinamente para engatusar al personal y se creyeran inteligentes y el 'no va plus'.

Pues aún así, la magia de los partidos seguirá funcionando porque la clientela no se acaba nunca.

Hablan de los Pactos de la Moncloa 2.0 con una solemnidad grotesca, toda vez que aquel acuerdo supuso la primera reforma laboral del posfranquismo donde los trabajadores comenzaron a perder derechos frente al empresaurio, camuflando la ignonimia reiventando el lenguaje.

Pero hoygan, no hay que perderse en cuestiones semánticas, no llevan a ninguna parte, sobre todo si uno tiene el riñón cubierto.

 

[Derby]

https://fortune.com/2023/08/07/office-real-estate-sector-downward-spiral-remote-work-how-one-cre-firm-is-weathering-the-storm/

Trouble continues to mount in the office real estate sector: ‘you can’t get a loan today…there’s no liquidity in the marketplace’

Rich Gottlieb has been with Keystone, a Philadelphia-based commercial real estate firm for more than 18 years, and now he’s the company’s president and chief operating officer after a stint as senior vice president. Like countless others, he attributes the distress within the office sector to the widespread shift towards remote work, which has significantly impacted demand. Additionally, the era of inexpensive financing has come to an end, marked by the transition to an economic environment characterized by higher interest rates and stricter credit conditions.

“For an office building, you can’t get a loan today…there’s no liquidity in the marketplace,” Gottlieb told Fortune. And with interest rates being higher, it’s eating away at a lot of the cash flow, Gottlieb said, calling it a “very trying time.”

In his view, the difference with this office real estate downturn as compared to previous downturns is that office owners are wondering if demand will return at all.

“This time, people are questioning whether they’re going to need that space at all,” Gottlieb said.  “I believe they will be back. Things always evolve, things always change, but my experience has been that paradigm shifts move really quickly and then they come back closer to where it started.”

Gottlieb was the first to admit that what’s going on isn’t good for him or his industry, so it’s safe to say that he and his industry would benefit from people returning to the office. Either way, given where we’re at, if companies have the opportunity to save money, that is in terms of office space given they’ve shifted to a remote or hybrid work environment, they’ll take it. It’s all triggering a “reset in value,” as Gottlieb put it. But, Gottlieb said that property values, vacancy rates, and transactions are “all over the board,” with the so-called better buildings with better amenities mostly coming out on top. And for the most part, he said, companies do want office space, it just depends on how much space they want.

“We have challenges, like everybody else,” Gottlieb responded, after being asked if the firm has had to sell any of its buildings, or even turn in the keys, without giving a yes or no answer. But he did say that at the end of the day, the firm is one that lenders want to work with.

“The world changed on all of us,” he said. “If [the lenders] want to take the keys back, they take it from me—what are they getting by giving it to the next guy?,” he asked, adding “once they foreclose, it’s worth even less, they don’t really have the capabilities typically to operate. And, there’s no liquidity in the market to sell, unless it’s rock, rock, rock bottom…so we’re finding that lenders are working with us and we’re working with them.”

Even so, Gottlieb said, Keystone was ahead of the game in refinancing. Still, in reevaluating its portfolio, the firm has gotten into the game of office to multifamily conversions. Gottlieb said it plays to their “core competency” over the years given they used to buy older, suburban offices and put a lot of money into them, not just a bandaid or some makeup, as he put it, to reposition them. Those older office buildings were typically in the best locations, but they needed capital, he said. Sometimes that meant putting new air conditioning systems in, or completely removing the facade and replacing that exterior with glass for natural light

“That’s where we started, and we morphed into this mixed use,” Gottlieb said. “We were never afraid to work within an existing building. And, you know, we’ve made plenty of mistakes along the way, but I chalked it up to experience. So converting a building from office to residential sounds more like a challenge than something to be scared of to us.”

Instead of a complete conversion, Gottlieb said, they’ve made office buildings into mixed-used spaces. He gave the example of The Curtis building in downtown Philadelphia, which was just under a million square feet and has become a sort of landmark in the city as a former publishing house. Gottlieb said part of the office had unusual sizing, but it was the perfect depth for apartments. So they created a separate area and built apartments—that are now some of the highest priced apartments in Philadelphia, he said. Here’s the thing, that creates more supply, which is needed given the nation’s housing market is underbuilt, but it’s not affordable housing.

“​​It’s hard to do affordable housing anywhere, anytime right now,” Gottlieb said, adding later that “every lever is kind of working against you.”

The price of construction is up, the cost of borrowing is up, and the amount of money lenders are willing to lend is down, he said. And at the end of the day, in his view, investors want a return. That’s all to say that affordable housing doesn’t seem to be the number one thing on investors’ minds.

In their own office to multifamily conversion process, Gottlieb said they start by looking at location, then they look at floor plates, which just refers to the leasable space on an entire floor of a building. “So if I have a building that I can design, and I’m only losing 10% or 20% of the space, that’s way better than a building that I’m losing 40% of the office rentable area,” he explained.

But what seems to be Keystone’s secret weapon, if you will, is mixed use zoning. Downtown Philadelphia’s zoning code works for apartments, Gottlieb said, but the suburbs are sort of separated by uses—although there has been a push over the last several years to accept a mixed use environment. Zoning can sometimes be a deal breaker, given how much it can slow down the building process. Gottlieb said it can take one to two years sometimes just to get zoning approval before you even start development.

“It’s not the slam dunk that everybody thinks it is,” he said. “It’s not that easy, most buildings don’t work.”

Still, seeing that there’s hardly any liquidity in the market, you’d think that even securing a loan for these conversions would be difficult. “Everything’s a struggle today,” Gottlieb said. “And I think if we were just starting out, the answer would be we couldn’t get a loan for it.”

[Derby]

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/forcing-workers-back-office-may-121851270.html

Forcing workers back to the office may be backfiring: Flexible workplaces are hiring talent twice as fast as those requiring full-time attendance

Two years into the return-to-office battle, and it’s becoming apparent that its staunchest supporters are facing headwinds.

Employers following in the footsteps of Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan by mandating a full-time office return may be inadvertently making themselves unattractive to job seekers, new research shows.

According to an analysis of more than 4,500 companies by Scoop, a software firm that tracks workplace policies, and People Data Labs, a data technology company, companies with remote or hybrid policies appear to be hiring people at about twice the rate of those requiring full-time attendance.

The research, or The Flex Index July 2023 Job Growth Report, maintains that some form of flexible work is the only way forward for workplaces that want to keep a competitive edge in the current tight labor market.

WFH wins in the eyes of workers—and therefore employers

Despite widespread walkouts over the increased pressure to return to the old ways of working, many employers have pressed on with their back-to-the-office plans, with around 1 million workers in the U.S. alone expected to return to their cubicles from September.

But as it turns out, listening to workers' complaints about being forced to return to their desk pays—because they’re showing exactly what job seekers are thinking.

Over the past three months, Scoop Technologies’ analysis found that “fully flexible” companies—ones where all employees work remotely or have complete autonomy over whether they go into the office—grew headcount by 1.9% on average. Meanwhile, those with “structured hybrid” work policies grew by 1.5%. In comparison, employers that were fully in-office grew their headcount by just 0.8%.

And, the research suggests, employers shouldn't dismiss the data as merely short-term backlash to the sudden wave of return-to-office policies: The researchers’ analysis goes as far back as this time last year, during the Great Resignation, when RTO mandates were few and far between, and found a similar gap.

Over the past 12 months, fully flexible companies grew headcount by 5.6%, which dropped slightly to 4.1% for hybrid companies. Meanwhile, full-time in-office companies grew by 2.6%—less than half the rate of flexible firms.

The combination of pricey commutes, sad desk lunches, and paying for childcare means that in-office workers are earning almost 10% less than their remote counterparts. So it’s perhaps not surprising that employers that allow their staff to do their jobs from home—instead of spending time and money to do the very same thing on company watch five days a week—are faring better with job seekers.

Workers don’t want to have their choice revoked

What’s more, the research highlights that workers don’t want to be forced to go into the office: The more in-office days an employer mandated, the more it struggled to hire staff. Meanwhile, hybrid workplaces that have set in-office days, rather than a looser minimum day-per-week requirement, experienced a slighter slower headcount growth rate.

Separate research has echoed that people are more open to returning to the office when it is out of choice, rather than forced: Unispace found that around a third of workers felt happy, motivated, and excited about heading into the office, but those feelings decreased for those mandated to go in.



Plus, it appears that three days per week in office is where job candidates draw the line. The Flex Index research shows that employers mandating a four-day week in the office experienced a significant drop in headcount growth, while those expecting staff to head in between one and three days a week experienced similar levels of growth.

“Headcount growth is not a perfect proxy for economic growth, but it is likely that the companies that are adding headcount are also the ones that are growing sales, the report says. “Put simply, the growth in the economy—at least for corporate employees—appears to be with the companies that are offering flexibility.”

It’s why the researchers said that they ultimately expect to see a drop in the number of companies pressing on with full-time office plans and instead favoring hybrid models “that better reflect the needs of the workforce.”

[Cadavre Exquis]

The Era of Ultracheap Stuff Is Under Threat
Posted by msmash on Monday August 07, 2023 @02:51PM from the growing-concern dept.

Factories across Asia are struggling to attract young workers, which is bad news for Western consumers accustomed to inexpensive goods. From a report:

The workplace features floor-to-ceiling windows and a cafe serving matcha tea, as well as free yoga and dance classes. Every month, workers gather at team-building sessions to drink beer, drive go-karts and go bowling. This isn't Google. It's a garment factory in Vietnam. Asia, the world's factory floor and the source of much of the stuff Americans buy, is running into a big problem: Its young people, by and large, don't want to work in factories.

That's why the garment factory is trying to make its manufacturing floor more enticing, and why alarm bells are ringing at Western companies that rely on the region's inexpensive labor to churn out affordable consumer goods. The twilight of ultracheap Asian factory labor is emerging as the latest test of the globalized manufacturing model, which over the past three decades has delivered a vast array of inexpensively produced goods to consumers around the world. Americans accustomed to bargain-rate fashion and flat-screen TVs might soon be reckoning with higher prices. "There's nowhere left on the planet that's going to be able to give you what you want," said Paul Norriss, the British co-founder of the Vietnam garment factory, UnAvailable, based in Ho Chi Minh City. "People are going to have to change their consumer habits, and so are brands."

Saludos.