You should also consider property taxes from where the employees live. In MS's case, plenty of the employees own or rent in the same town, or nearby. At least as a calculation/consideration of tax breaks. I can say that if it weren't for Intel, Wells Fargo and others deciding to build/employ in Chandler, AZ the town wouldn't be half that size in terms of residential population. I'm sure the same is true even for bigger cities relative to business size.

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dh2022 4 days ago | parent [-]

How would this be an incentive for Microsoft to require RTO though? Even if Microsoft would receive tax breaks from the city because employees own property and pay property taxes - the city would get the same amount of property taxes if employees work from home. Microsoft would receive the same tax breaks.

AFAIK Microsoft mandated RTO only for employees that live within 50 miles of an office. So far Microsoft does not require employees to move to a city - and bolster the property taxes the city collects.

I still do not understand the logic behind RTO.

	▲	tracker1 4 days ago \| parent [-]
		I was stating that's a consideration of why a City/State offers the incentives... I can't speak to MS in this case in particular. It's far more likely a soft layoff strategy. I'd also say, I've seen far more people just sandbag and slack off in WFH than in an actual office.