I don't think this is what you're saying but when I've seen debates over choice the pattern I've sen is:

1) The people who feel more engaged at home can stay home, those who feel more engaged at work can go there 2) The latter group fails to feel engaged at work due to everyone being home. They complain.

In other words, they weren't missing being in the office. They were missing being in the office *with others*. Which requires everyone else to either want to work in the office.

Yeah it’s tricky because there’s often a senior/junior dynamic here. Junior people really do benefit from structure and in person mentorship. They also tend to have worse home office setups and more free time. Whereas senior people tend to have families and nicer home offices, so understandably they don’t want to commute in. I’m sympathetic to both and realistically I don’t think management is acting in good faith. But I do think remote work benefits seniors at the cost of juniors