Experts fear working from home epidemic means SA jobs will move offshore

Businesses trying to reduce growing operating costs will offshore work from home jobs, South Australian experts have warned.

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Thousands of South Australian jobs could be lost to the “best offer” from overseas if workers disappear from offices to work at home, the business sector fears.

Business SA chief executive Andrew Kay said local workforces were losing their advantage over cheap foreign labour without face-to-face collaboration.

It comes as federal government public servants are celebrating the abolition of a cap on working from home days, with the flow-on effect set to hit the private sector.

“It has been suggested that the continual growth of WFH will lead to some employers choosing to outsource certain services to the best offer – typically offshore – rather than employ workers who they never see in the office anyway,’’ Mr Kay said.

“That is not an outcome that would be good for our economy.

“If we assume that AI and digitalisation are going to reshape the workforce in the years ahead, we need to seriously consider the impact of any policy decisions that make attendance in the workplace the exception rather than the rule.”

Mr Kay said it was also important for employers to tackle the challenge.

“Businesses have a role to play here (with) the need to create a work environment that encourages participation and engagement,” he said.

Business SA chief executive Andrew Kay has warned of job losses caused by working from home.

The Property Council of SA has estimated thousands businesses would leave CBDs around the country if the federal public servant decision flowed on to the overall workforce.

Commercial property owners in CBDs have already begun writing down their city assets by between 10 per cent and 15 per cent.

UniSA Associate Professor Dr Ruchi Sinha said the working from home phenomenon posed an attractive wage cost- saving for employers through offshoring jobs.

“What is happening right now in CBDs is that offices are becoming a cost liability,” Dr Sinha said.

“Businesses are looking at the assets and liabilities they have on the books and realising they don’t need offices.

“Offshoring is always about costs.”

Dr Sinha said acknowledged working from home would cause jobs to be lost to overseas workers.

“We are talking about knowledge workers. They are at their desks, on their computers and don’t have customer service roles, except by computer or phone,” she said.

“If a company starts to look at costs they are going to look at wage costs.

“What is making offshoring attractive is the fact that you now have evidence that a lot of work can be done remotely, virtually and with a distributed workforce.”

University of Adelaide expert Dr Valerie Caines said the business community had tried large-scale offshoring with call centres, but met a backlash.