Calling Nigel Farage a divisive figure is hardly an original claim: dislike of the Reform leader usually maps onto the political axis. Farage’s recent comments about why he thinks working from home must come to an end, however, have raised hackles across the political compass – and rightly so.
Whether readers lean left, right or somewhere in the middle, all should be wary of thoughtlessly deriding working-from-home culture. To assess remote working as a question of mere productivity – as Farage did – reduces employees to cogs in a soulless machine valued only for their contribution to GDP. To conclude that remote work should end because it hinders economic growth fails to account for the more important benefits it brings to family life. A job that accommodates a degree of remote work allows a person to spend more time at home, save more money for his family and secure work without needing to relocate. In short, remote working arrangements complement a Catholic worldview.
One of the greatest benefits of working from home is the end of the commute. A quarter of commuters in the United Kingdom spend between 30 minutes and an hour travelling to their place of work, and then they must make the journey back after 5pm. For some, this amounts to 10 hours a week that could be spent in other, more meaningful ways. Amid a prolonged crisis of family breakdown and dinners taken on laps in front of the television because parents are too exhausted to make conversation, these extra hours could help rebuild family relationships and culture. Fathers not only endure longer commutes than most women but also report spending too little time with their children. Cutting out the commute a few days a week frees up time to bond with children without compromising a career trajectory. Families need more, not less, time together if they are to nurture strong relationships.
The other major benefit of commuting no further than the dining table takes the form of more pennies in one’s pocket. In Rerum Novarum, one of the key papal encyclicals for understanding Catholic social teaching on employment and work, Pope Leo XIII wrote that an employer must see that an employee “be not led away to neglect his home and family, or to squander his earnings”. It goes on to state that a just wage should “be not drained and exhausted by excessive taxation” and that the “right to possess private property is derived from nature, not from man. […] The State would therefore be unjust and cruel if under the name of taxation it were to deprive the private owner of more than is fair”.
The tax burden is at its highest sustained level since the 1940s. At the end of last year, the Labour Chancellor Rachel Reeves admitted to “asking ordinary people to pay a little bit more” in light of her Budget. A crackdown on working from home further deprives employees of their wages. Given the cost of a commuter’s rail fare, it is hard to see how demanding in-person hours for a job that could be done from home does not squander a man’s wage. Increased expenses incurred by unnecessary commuting make home ownership – an often cited stumbling block to family formation – further out of reach for too many.
Remote working also helps to keep local communities strong. In Rerum Novarum, Pope Leo XIII observed that “no one would exchange his country for a foreign land if his own afforded him the means of living a decent and happy life”. We can apply this sentiment to one’s more immediate environs. Many young people would not move to London if their provincial home towns afforded the same work opportunities as those found in the capital. Remote working opens up more jobs to white-collar workers and removes the need to move away from home in pursuit of better work. Given that some remote roles command London salaries, employees may find themselves able to save more money. The potential for this dynamic to keep more people in or near where they grew up curbs the London brain drain and keeps generations of families in closer proximity to one another.
Politicians should enable working conditions that recognise the family as the building block of society. Supporting remote working for its ability to give families more time together, greater saving power and quality work on their doorsteps seems an easy win for family-minded policymakers.
Assessing the merits of remote working solely by calculating how employees can boost the economy ignores the spiritual and relational aspects of men and women. Farage would be well advised to look not to a Protestant work ethic but to a Catholic appreciation of family culture and leisure.
