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When will work-from-homers see their pay fall?
居家办公者的工资什么时候会下降？
Employers are ordering workers back to the office. In recent weeks Dell, a hardware-maker, and JPMorgan Chase, a bank, have issued such decrees.
雇主们正在命令员工回到办公室。最近几周，硬件制造商戴尔和摩根大通银行都发布了这样的规定。
They join a growing list that includes AT&T, Amazon and even the American government, where Elon Musk—who has called remote work “morally wrong” and its supporters “detached from reality”—has championed the shift.
与这二者类似的组织越来越多，其中包括美国电话电报公司、亚马逊，甚至美国政府，埃隆·马斯克在政府提倡从居家办公到坐班的转变，他称远程工作“在道德上是错误的”，其支持者“脱离现实”。
Bosses insist that mandates will boost productivity. Workers see them as a way to cut staff without mass firings.
老板们坚持认为，强制坐班会提高生产力。工作者们认为这是不进行大规模裁员而削减员工的方式。
If the goal is to reduce costs, there may be a simpler way: lower pay for remote workers. A new study indicates many would take the deal.
如果目标是降低成本，可能有一个更简单的办法：降低远程工作者的工资。一项新的研究表明，许多人会接受这笔交易。
Zoe Cullen of Harvard Business School, Bobak Pakzad-Hurson of Brown University and Ricardo Perez-Truglia of the University of California, Los Angeles, find that tech workers are willing to accept a pay cut of 25% in return for fully or partly remote jobs.
哈佛大学商学院的佐伊·卡伦、布朗大学的博巴克·帕克扎德-赫森、加州大学洛杉矶分校的里卡多·佩雷斯-特鲁格利亚发现，科技工作者愿意接受25%的降薪，以换取全远程或半远程工作。
That suggests remote work is much more than a perk. If workers value it more than bosses dislike it, there should be scope for bargaining.
这表明远程工作不仅仅是一种福利。如果工作者对远程工作的重视程度超过老板对它的厌恶程度，那么就应该有讨价还价的余地。
Historically, perks with clear monetary value have come at a cost to wages. Jonathan Gruber of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Alan Krueger of Princeton University have found that when American states in the 1980s raised mandatory compensation insurance for workplace injuries, wages fell to offset the cost.
从历史上看，具有明确金钱价值的福利是以降低工资为代价的。麻省理工学院的乔纳森·格鲁伯和普林斯顿大学的艾伦·克鲁格发现，当美国各州在20世纪80年代提高了强制性工伤赔偿保险时，为了抵消成本，工资下降了。
If remote work is, like the provision of benefits, costly to companies but valuable to workers, wages should follow the same pattern. Yet in most cases so far they have not.
如果远程工作就像补充福利一样，对公司来说成本高昂，但对员工来说很有价值，那么工资也应该遵循同样的模式。然而在大多数情况下，工资目前没有遵循这种模式。
One explanation may be that firms are reluctant to create visible pay gaps between remote and in-office workers. Human-resource policies generally aim for internal equity to prevent resentment.
一种解释可能是公司不愿意在远程办公员工和坐班员工之间制造明显的薪酬差距。人力资源政策通常力求实现内部公平，从而防止产生怨言。
Another explanation is that remote work has become a bargaining chip. Rather than lowering wages, firms use flexibility to attract and retain top performers.
另一种解释是远程工作已经成为一种谈判筹码。企业不是降低工资，而是利用灵活性来吸引和留住顶尖人才。
Take an artificial-intelligence specialist earning $250,000 at Amazon. If the tech giant orders them back to the office, a less prestigious rival may not match the salary but could lure them with a remote-work offer.
以一位年薪25万美元的亚马逊人工智能专家为例。如果亚马逊要求他们坐班，一家不那么知名的对手公司可能无法给出这么高的薪资，但可能用远程工作的机会来吸引他们。
But what happens when labour-market conditions worsen? If workers have fewer options, firms may no longer need to compete by offering remote work. Instead, they may begin pricing it in—offering lower salaries for remote roles, knowing job-hunters have fewer alternatives.
但是当劳动力市场状况变差时，会发生什么呢？如果工作者的选择更少，那么公司可能不再需要通过提供远程工作而互相竞争。相反，公司可能会开始把远程工作算进工资——为远程职位提供更低的薪水，因为公司知道求职者的选择更少了。
