Working from Home

Every cloud has a silver lining.

- John Milton

One of the best things to have come out of the virus scare is an accelerated trend towards remote working. My wife, who works as an editor for a school book publisher in Porto, has spent most of her time working from home over the past year, and this looks likely to persist.

Every white collar worker on the planet has had a taste of freedom, and a reversal of this seems unlikely because the trend is popular with just about everyone. As a consequence, office spaces will be harder to fill, lunch cafés in office districts will suffer, and there will be less need for petrol. There will be a contraction in consumption, and some economists fret about this because they equate consumption with wealth. But this is a contradiction in terms. If the white collar workers experience a benefit from the trend, it cannot be considered a problem to them. It's a benefit that enhances their lives. The trend is making them feel better about things, and that's the true measure of wealth.

It can be argued that the loss in income by office space owners, restaurant owners and gasoline producers will negatively impact the economy. However, that too is incorrect. The number of people experiencing a benefit from reduced consumption far outnumber the people experiencing a loss. There's a net gain due to reduced consumption, which proves that consumption is not a measure of wealth. Wealth cannot be calculated in the way many economists imagine. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is a measure of consumption, not wealth.

Wealth has to do with wellbeing, and money has only a limited part to play in this. Money provides us with flexibility and freedom of choice. Generous savings are a blessing. It allows us to buy things that benefit us. But consumption is only wealth in as far as it provides wellbeing. If consumption is badly directed, it makes us poorer, not richer.

Me, enjoying a cup of coffee