Telecommuting: Generational Geography

Mike at TechDirt noticed a New York Times article (may require registration) on the transportation strike that noted that many hearty New Yorkers who could telecommute chose not to do so. He cites the reasons from the article: the need for face time and separation of home and work. He also notes that the choice may be generational.

I suspect there’s a good deal of truth in that statement. When I graduated from college (1986, if you are counting) my favorite geography professor explained that soon the geography of work would be completely different; we’d all live in really cool places and work from there. That’s certainly happening, but more for my generation and below, not for his. Part of the shift, I’ll offer is that today’s generation lives in a “bring me” world, whereas many before lived in a “go to” world. That’s simplification, but today’s generation gets pizza delivered, carries iPods everywhere, and has movies piped into their houses. In my house growing up either my grandmother made pizza (yep Eastern European woman made pizza!) or Dad drove the Bellinos to get it. Movies were an excursion (and a big deal).

Why should work be any different from our day to day lives in this respect?