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Is Working From Home Providing The Work-Life Balance That We’ve Been Promised For So Long?

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Our office work culture has dramatically shifted in the last month. All over the world kitchen tables, spare rooms, and nooks have been transformed into working spaces. The people I’ve spoken to really enjoy the perks of working from home. That’s not to say that there aren’t difficulties, but there are a lot of benefits that go with the challenges. 

For most white-collar jobs, working from home has provided the work-life balance that we’ve been promised for so long. Once things return to normal and kids return to school, we shouldn’t rush back to the office if we don’t have to. 

Being at home has allowed people to actually focus on their tasks without being interrupted by quick questions or sidebar chats. People are able to plan their workday on their own schedule and maximize their productivity. Without a daily commute, people are finding more time in the day and are less burnt out. 

And let’s face it, the office was never a great place to work, it was just our only option. 

There are a lot of flaws with our office culture that we’ve just learned to put up with. The biggest negative to the office environment is that it kills creativity. In order for people to be creative, they need space to think. When your day is filled with back to back meetings, email interruptions, and chatty co-workers it can be hard to find some time to yourself. I’ve always tried to take short walks a few times a day so that I’m able to let ideas sink into my brain. That can be a no-no in office culture since it’s believed you can only be productive when you are sitting at your desk. 

Sitting in a chair for 8 hours regardless of workload is standard across all sorts of industries. This is an antiquated idea leftover from the industrial revolution to maximize efficiency in a factory. While there are jobs that require this schedule, a knowledge worker is not one of them. A good portion of our day is answering emails, editing documents, reviewing work, and reporting numbers. Ever since the smartphone became mainstream we’ve known that this work can be done anywhere in the world, and now we know it can be done on a large scale. Maybe your best meetings happen when you can do 10 pushups right before it starts. It could be that a quick afternoon nap enables you to focus through the afternoon. I do my best thinking while pacing, but it’s hard to concentrate when everyone is giving you sideways glances. 

Working at your own pace will allow you to work your best.

As many people are also finding out, working at your own pace requires discipline. Setting your own schedule means you have to understand your own work habits and work within them.  I can be my own worst enemy when it comes to distractions. I’ve had to re-learn how to extract the best work from myself by self-evaluating my work. 

Not only are people getting more done, but they are happier about it, and learning more about themselves so they can be more productive in the future. 

When the COVID-19 risk lowers enough for offices to re-open, I suggest managers take a long hard look at reverting back to 40 hours a week in a chair. We’ve put a lot of effort into developing new skills during the quarantine and we shouldn’t waste it. There is an opportunity sitting before us to radically change what work is, and how we do it. Let’s embrace the lessons we’ve learned along the way and come out of this pandemic stronger than ever.

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Health or wealth? Nations pressured to loosen virus rules

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Business

Bill Gates Gets Mugged By Reality

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From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Stephen Moore

You’ve probably heard by now the blockbuster news that Microsoft founder Bill Gates, one of the richest people to ever walk the planet, has had a change of heart on climate change.

For several decades Gates poured billions of dollars into the climate industrial complex.

Some conservatives have sniffed that Bill Gates has shifted his position on climate change because he and Microsoft have invested heavily in energy intensive data centers.

AI and robotics will triple our electric power needs over the next 15 years. And you can’t get that from windmills.

What Bill Gates has done is courageous and praiseworthy. It’s not many people of his stature that will admit that they were wrong. Al Gore certainly hasn’t. My wife says I never do.

Although I’ve only once met Bill Gates, I’ve read his latest statements on global warming. He still endorses the need for communal action (which won’t work), but he has sensibly disassociated himself from the increasingly radical and economically destructive dictates from the green movement. For that, the left has tossed him out of their tent as a “traitor.”

I wish to highlight several critical insights that should be the starting point for constructive debate that every clear-minded thinker on either side of the issue should embrace.

(1) It’s time to put human welfare at the center of our climate policies. This includes improving agriculture and health in poor countries.

(2) Countries should be encouraged to grow their economies even if that means a reliance on fossil fuels like natural gas. Economic growth is essential to human progress.

(3) Although climate change will hurt poor people, for the vast majority of them it will not be the only or even the biggest threat to their lives and welfare. The biggest problems are poverty and disease.

I would add to these wise declarations two inconvenient truths: First: the solution to changing temperatures and weather patterns is technological progress. A far fewer percentage of people die of severe weather events today than 50 or 100 or 1,000 years ago.

Second, energy is the master resource and to deny people reliable and affordable energy is to keep them poor and vulnerable – and this is inhumane.

If Bill Gates were to start directing even a small fraction of his foundation funds to ensuring everyone on the planet has access to electric power and safe drinking water, it would do more for humanity than all of the hundreds of billions that governments and foundations have devoted to climate programs that have failed to change the globe’s temperature.

Stephen Moore is a co-founder of Unleash Prosperity and a former Trump senior economic advisor.

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Automotive

Elon Musk Poised To Become World’s First Trillionaire After Shareholder Vote

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From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Mariane Angela

Tesla shareholders voted Thursday to approve an enormous compensation package that could make Elon Musk the world’s first trillionaire.

At Tesla’s Austin headquarters, investors backed Musk’s 12-step plan that ties his potential trillion-dollar payout to a series of aggressive financial and operational milestones, including raising the company’s valuation from roughly $1.4 trillion to $8.5 trillion and selling one million humanoid robots within a decade. Musk hailed the outcome as a turning point for Tesla’s future.

“What we’re about to embark upon is not merely a new chapter of the future of Tesla but a whole new book,” Musk said, as The New York Times reported.

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The decision cements investor confidence in Musk’s “moonshot” management style and reinforces the belief that Tesla’s success depends heavily on its founder and his leadership.

“Those who claim the plan is ‘too large’ ignore the scale of ambition that has historically defined Tesla’s trajectory,” the Florida State Board of Administration said in a securities filing describing why it voted for Mr. Musk’s pay plan. “A company that went from near bankruptcy to global leadership in E.V.s and clean energy under similar frameworks has earned the right to use incentive models that reward moonshot performance.”

Investors like Ark Invest CEO Cathie Wood defended Tesla’s decision, saying the plan aligns shareholder rewards with company performance.

“I do not understand why investors are voting against Elon’s pay package when they and their clients would benefit enormously if he and his incredible team meet such high goals,” Wood wrote on X.

Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, Norges Bank Investment Management — one of Tesla’s largest shareholders — broke ranks, however, and voted against the pay plan, saying that the package was excessive.

“While we appreciate the significant value created under Mr. Musk’s visionary role, we are concerned about the total size of the award, dilution, and lack of mitigation of key person risk,” the firm said.

The vote comes months after Musk wrapped up his short-lived government role under President Donald Trump. In February, Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) team sparked a firestorm when they announced plans to eliminate the U.S. Agency for International Development, drawing backlash from Democrats and prompting protests targeting Musk and his companies, including Tesla.

Back in May, Musk announced that his “scheduled time” leading DOGE had ended.

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