Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey is trying a unique strategy to get remote workers to return downtown: insulting them.
“I don’t know if you saw this study the other day,” Frey told an audience of 1,000 at Minneapolis Downtown Council’s annual meeting on Wednesday. “What this study clearly showed … is that when people who have the ability to come downtown to an office don’t — when they stay home sitting on their couch, with their nasty cat blanket, diddling on their laptop — if they do that for a few months, you become a loser!”
The comment was a “complete joke” and the study was made-up, the Minneapolis mayor’s office told Fortune, but there are serious facts to back up Frey’s worry about the impact of remote work on Minneapolis’ downtown economy.
Ways to get me to support your downtown economy: insulting me? Lol. I live in a red state and recently got a remote job… so glad I can spend less money on the local economy by staying at home. Instead of being forced to spend money at local businesses, I spend it on people/businesses near or far away that share my world views, who I -want- to support. No longer who I -have- to support. Screw the conservative economy.