During the pandemic, millions of people replaced their large open-plan offices with their living rooms. Now, some companies say their employees need never come back in.

Brynn Harrington, Vice President of Facebook, said, “Facebook believes that remote work is the future. We want to be able to give our employees choice to live and build lives in places that they love, and we want to increase our ability to hire from places around the world, not just places where we currently have offices.”

Not everyone approves of working from home. Some people are eager to get back into the office. Facebook estimates that more than half of its staff could work remotely in the coming years, but it insists the move is not about saving costs. And it says it’s committed to keeping its offices open.

Other tech giants such as Microsoft and Twitter have also indicated staff could stay remote — even after lockdowns ease. On Wall Street, they seem less enthusiastic about the idea. The boss of Goldman Sachs rejected working from home as a new normal — labelling it an “aberration” instead. There are also fears that it could create more inequality.

For many companies, the answer probably lies somewhere in the middle — with workers dividing their time between office and home.

Tushar Agarwal from Hubble said, “The office does have a future. We believe the future is hybrid (混合). We believe the future is flexible. The demand for flexible workspace has just gone through the roof. Just in the month of March, we’re back to about sixty to seventy percent of pre-Covid levels, and actually huge amounts of companies that are demanding flexible space used to be in traditional rent space, so now people want more and more flexibility than ever before.”

One thing’s clear — the world of work will look very different to how it did before this crisis.

【小题1】Why do some companies prefer home-working?

A．It can save cost.

B．It creates more equality.

C．It decreases interpersonal conflicts.

D．It offers more possibilities for companies.

【小题2】What is the author’s attitude to the change of working place?

A．Objective.	B．Varied.
C．Intolerant.	D．Favorable.

【小题3】What does the underlined phrase in paragraph 4 mean?

A．A normal thing.	B．A flexible thing.
C．An interesting thing.	D．An untypical thing.

【小题4】Which can present Tushar Agarwal’s view of the future office?

A．It will remain unchanged.

B．It will mainly be remote work.

C．It will mix different types of working places.

D．It will have an open space in a large building.