Fewer Australians are working from home: ABS

The news: The percentage of Australians regularly working from home has fallen off from 2021 highs, but remains more popular than before the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

The numbers: As of August 2023, roughly 37% of Australians regularly worked from home, down from two in five in 2021. The proportion of people working under flexible arrangements was increasing gradually in the years before the pandemic and sat at 32.1% in August 2019.

The context: Some companies have been pushing for a return to the office in 2022 and 2023, while many workers have been keen to hang onto flexible arrangements and the hours they formerly lost to the daily commute.

Trends for other working arrangements such as overtime, on-call and working mostly shift work have generally been declining year on year and were not strongly affected by the pandemic. The percentage employed on a solely weekday basis has been trending upwards since 2017 and likewise appeared unaffected by the pandemic.