New Jersey employees have spent a pretty penny on new supplies for the home office since the start of work-from-home mandates in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
ThisIsWhyImBroke.com, a website of unique gifts, surveyed 3,000 workers to determine how much people spent on setting up their home office.
The survey found that New Jerseyans have each spent $233 to make sure they have the proper equipment to work at home, compared to the national average of $181. Workers in New Hampshire spent the most at $350 compared to those in Montana, who spent the least at $50. The top products purchased for the home office include laptops (35%), headphones (30%), a desk chair (12%), stationary (8%), a desk (7.5%) and a printer (7%).
Nearly 85% of those surveyed think that this expense should be reimbursed by their employer. However, nearly two-thirds who are home say they prefer their new setup compared to the one in the corporate office. Over half (58%) of respondents said they would continue to work from home for the rest of the year if their employer said it was OK, despite 28% saying slow internet speeds have affected their job performance.
‘It’s clear that as new home workers, we didn’t realize how much stuff we’d actually need in our home office,’ Adam Freedman from ThisIsWhyImBroke.com said. ‘Things we take for granted that are supplied to us by our employer, like desks and stationery, suddenly become really important when we’re working from our living rooms every day. It always pays to have the right equipment; let’s hope sympathetic employers will reimburse their workers, though.”
