The difficulties of policing remote work
Why bans on after-hours calls may not work

AS OFFICE LIFE approaches some sort of new normal, remote working is here to stay. Employers enjoy cost savings as they spend less on desks and floor space. For employees the promise is of time saved: spared of their commute, they can get their work done and focus on their families and hobbies. That, at least, is the idea. But, as many a remote employee knows, the boundary between work and home life can blur.
This article appeared in the Finance & economics section of the print edition under the headline “Only disconnect”
Finance & economics
December 11th 2021- Evidence for the “great resignation” is thin on the ground
- The difficulties of policing remote work
- In word and deed, China is easing economic policy
- Two key questions for the European Central Bank
- The economics of a new China-Laos train line
- America is seeing both fast growth and high inflation
- Why the dollar’s ascendancy won’t last
- Crypto lobbying is going ballistic
- Why the demographic transition is speeding up

From the December 11th 2021 edition
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Explore the edition
Can Europe cope with a free-spending Germany?
Pity the continent’s exporters

More testosterone means higher pay—for some men
A changing appetite for status games could play a role

Why “labour shortages” don’t really exist
Use the term, and you are almost always a bad economist or a special pleader
Your guide to the new anti-immigration argument
Nativists say that migrants raise house prices, cost money and undermine economic growth. Do they have a point?
What sparks an investing revolution?
Ideas that emerged from the University of Chicago in the 1960s changed the world. But as a new film shows, they almost didn’t
Will America’s stockmarket convulsions spread?
Investors are hurrying to find alternatives—but all face difficulties of their own