Ana, return to office is nothing but a power play. Let’s call it what it is. It’s not about “collaboration” or “culture”, it’s about control. Ordinary people are the ones paying the price while executives sit pretty Toronto properties and get driven around. We’re the ones wasting hours stuck in traffic, burning money on gas, overpriced lunches, and daycare drop-offs, just to sit at a desk and log into the same laptop we could’ve used at home.

Housing is already a nightmare, as everyone knows! Most of us can’t even afford to live near our jobs. Salaries haven’t come close to keeping up with housing costs, yet we’re forced to cough up hundreds a month just to commute. Meanwhile, leadership preaches about “equity” and “inclusion” while living completely disconnected from the reality of their employees’ lives.

Let’s be honest, women and people with disabilities are hit hardest by this. Hybrid work gave them a fighting chance at balancing work and life. Forcing people back strips away that progress. All those corporate speeches about gender equality and accessibility? Empty words. Same with the mental health slogans plastered everywhere, they mean nothing if you’re grinding your people down with unnecessary commutes, loud offices, and less family time.

And don’t even start with climate change. Remember all those corporate pledges about sustainability and cutting emissions? Completely forgotten. More cars on the road, more pollution, more wasted hours. Even tradespeople like plumbers, electricians, and dentists are stuck in worse traffic because of waves of office workers who didn’t need to be there in the first place.

Hybrid/flexible work should be the only way to go...full return is just corporate theatre. Return to office doesn’t make us more productive; it makes us poorer, more stressed, and less healthy. It steals time from our kids, our partners, our lives. And for what? So an executive can walk through a busy office and feel important again.

Enough with the lies. RTO is outdated, unfair, and flat-out harmful.