I estimate that commuting three times a week is costing me approximately an extra $50 weekly, or $200 monthly. To make up for my increased expenses, I'm thinking about cutting back on some/all of the following:
What have others considered cutting back on?
@s8 PAC donations are the supreme @ss kissing method. it's sad, dude.
@sv here’s the difference. Pre covid in office workload expectations were reasonable and u could put in an honest days work and go home. Those who WFH have taken on more work and expanded their availability because we value the flexibility and compensate with going above and beyond what was deemed acceptable when we went into an office. Unfortunately our efforts to demonstrate our appreciation of working from home with maximizing output and effort has set an unrealistic expectation that we can somehow miraculously sustain this over the top work ethic in a time su-king, inefficient, backwards, productivity diminishing return to office lunacy. Throwing two hours of productivity down the toilet sitting in your car wrecking environmental havoc and personal and family distress will replace late night email responses and going the extra mile. Again, pre Covid office work was doable. I know, I did it. There is no freaking way I can translate the monumental amount of work and effort I do now working from home to an in office situation. If this company wants RTO to work then they need to go back to productivity levels pre covid. I’ve begged to see productivity metrics based on this RTO decision but of course that will never happen. Too damn logical and reasonable and human for this place explain and show with factual data how this backwards decision benefits anyone. It doesn’t even benefit Elevance. This is the very definition of cutting off your nose to spite your face.
@t2 Amen. Bunch of mind reading motherf----rs up in here.
@sv How the fu-k would you know? Are you omnipresent in everyone’s lives knowing what they have and haven’t cut back on? Why are there so many people nowadays that seem to think they “know” how everyone else is living their life?
None of you cut back on these things pre Covid, when most people drove to the office give days/week so quit your whining.
And I thoroughly detest this organization.
@d8 If companies are doing this they are only delaying the inevitable. Very few need to be in an office anymore. Focus on caring about the environment or converting office spaces to affordable housing.
@e7 You failed to mention you moved because you got a Staff VP job and a moving expenses stipend. GTFOH.
Stop donating to PAC. Fullstop.
@OP Consider getting a financial planner if you don't have one - try to continue your 401 K otherwise you are leaving their match money on the table - then consider moving most of your 401 to your planner - you will get a better return on investment.
@b2 H@ll no are you going to dictate me what I can and cannot vent about. It’s because of working with control-freak people like you every day, that I need a place like this site to help me deal with everything that is going on.
@d8 Work from home since 2006. This has nothing to do with COVID.
@b2 Wow you uprooted and moved 500 miles and then 200 miles — as a single parent and 3 kids and found them all new childcare and new good schools. You really make sacrifices for this company. You are a role model. That makes sense why you aren’t complaining about anything!
@b2 no, work from home has been a thing since before 2001 in this company. I was work from home since 2002 so no, this wasn’t just due to covid.
Some of us were working here while you were probably still k diapers so please don’t try to explain to us why things were done.
I think we are all in agreement that RTO "stinks"...but here's the problem...almost every company is going back to the office. We are all "At will" employees so we can quit anytime we want and go to a different company but the truth is almost anywhere we go is going to require us to go to an office. We all have seen the posts about why we think they are "making us go back to the office" but the hard truth comes down to money. Companies have a ton of money invested in corporate real estate that was sitting empty and no one is buying those properties so they can't get rid of them or get them off their books. So the solution to corporate is..."send people back to the office". It's pure math, not "collaboration ".
If someone does actually quit due to RTO and finds a job in a company that let's their employees work fulltime from home, post it on this site! Sadly the economy su-ks now and we see a lot of people who have been unemployed for months practically begging for jobs so the odds are in the Companies favor.
Do not spend a dime in the area where your office is located. Not for meals, gas, after work activities, NOT A DIME!
@c8 Saying it louder for the people in the back. Many of us were hired remote 10+ years ago. We have always been remote. Anthem had many fullt remote trans prior to COVID.
@ch Not for Elevance I hope. None of us have much of a future.
I’m giving up my house payment because I was hired 100% fully remote and then they bait and switched me into it not being fully remote. Now I can’t progress in the company and have no incentive to work harder. So I am selling my house and moving to a better area for work.
Medicine for my kids
Food and Shelter, Beer and Smokes, Gambling and Chruch Donations
I’m not cutting back on anything, but I have saved a lot of money due to COVID WFH policy. I also believed that policy was short term and would, eventually, return to the office full time.
Circumstances change and if I don’t have the ability to adapt and change to those circumstances; whether I like it or not, I’m fighting a losing battle.
I had to drop several subscriptions. I am so exhausted from the long commute, in addition to gas, my eating out budget has also exploded. My vehicle insurance is also increasing. So, RTO may be benefiting a few businesses, but it is hurting many more.
I’m cutting back on my 2 main vices: chocolate and coffee. Both are going up in price, and I could use to cut back on both for health reasons. I’m trying to justify it in terms of RTO.
@b9 Do employees of Elevance realize when you contribute to the PAC it’s means you are contributing money to lobbying for things that will hurt us as employees? They are looking for was to increase bottom line which means possibly lobbying for things that hurt us as employee.
@OP wow you contribute to their PAC? Never in 18 yrs
Been doing in offïce 9-5 M-F since I graduated in 2012. WFH was a temporary Covid requirement.
I moved 500 miles to start my first job and found a place about 5 miles away. It was part of weighing the job offer versus expenses of living. Still holds true when I moved 200 miles again in 2024. No whiŋing on this board unless laid off.
It’s about to be 5, so all the above