With the move to telecommuting and generally away from brick and mortar establishments, it is interesting to think about how this impacts population shifts. If you are paid a set wage and you can work anywhere in teh country (or world for that matter), will people move away from cities or move to them? Theoretically there will be less traffic because people are working from home, and cities offer more amenities. Then again why live anywhere near a city if you can live in a low cost area in a small town?
Was having this conversation last night with some people. We definitely are entering a new era in jobs, job creation, becoming less dependent on brick and mortar operations and more dependent on the global internet infrastructure. As the internet has mad the world smaller, it has created new opportunities for business and government alike to streamline operations and work smarter. I think big changes in the way our parents and grandparents thought about "work" are coming, sooner than later.
I'd love to start telecommuting more and spending less time on trains every day. I'd also love to be able to move further from Manhattan and thereby live in a lower cost of living area on a bigger property for the same money.
With a good internet connection and phone line, I can do most of my "work" from anywhere. The trouble is that more and more I'm confronting non-"work" stuff in my workday -- personnel issues, office issues, billing issues, client development issues -- and less sitting around doing research or writing a brief. The end result is that, unfortunately, I don't see a full time telecommute anywhere in my near future.
That said, I do think it would be possible for me to work remotely two days a week and limit my time in the office to three days a week. The trouble is that there's still a serious stigma attached to that, and you can't really be considered a serious player around a law firm (and I bet in other environments) unless you are the guy who is there with boots on the ground on a daily basis. A guy who works from home would probably not be taken all that seriously, whether deserved or not.