Facebook will have half of its 45,000 employees working from home in five to 10 years, Mark Zuckerberg has said.
The social network’s chief executive said the company would permanently shift to allowing remote working, indicating that thousands would move out of cities and tech hubs as they no longer have to commute to the office.
It makes Facebook the biggest company so far to commit to substantial and long-term remote working even after the coronavirus pandemic subsides. Twitter, ecommerce company Shopify and cryptocurrency service Coinbase have already said many employees will be allowed to work from home permanently.
Almost all Facebook staff have been working remotely during the pandemic, and the company expects its office to only be a quarter full at the end of this year. But in a livestream to staff on Thursday, Mr Zuckerberg said thousands were likely to do so permanently.
He said that Facebook would begin offering remote work to new job applicants from this week, and that it would gradually allow staff to switch to remote working over the next decade.
40pc of staff had said they were interested in working from home full time, and the majority of those said they would move out of the tech hubs where they live, Mr Zuckerberg said.
He added that staff who move from expensive cities to rural climbs would not be able to take their salaries with them, saying staff who live in places with lower costs of living would be paid less.
More to follow…