OpenFeds Analysis
Federal Remote Work: The $30 Billion Office Space Question
The federal government owns or leases 376 million square feet of office space. Post-pandemic, average utilization is just 25%. That's tens of billions in wasted real estate — or a case for permanent telework. Or both.
📊The Telework Numbers
Before the pandemic, about 25% of eligible federal employees teleworked at least occasionally. At the pandemic's peak, that surged to near 100% of eligible positions. As of late 2024 (pre-DOGE mandate), the landscape looked like this:
Telework Eligible
~1.1M
53% of civilian workforce
Regular Telework
~850K
At least 1 day/week
Full Remote
~228K
100% telework approved
Avg Days Remote
2.4/week
For telework participants
Nearly half the federal workforce — primarily blue-collar, law enforcement, healthcare, and field positions — was never eligible for telework. A VA nurse can't treat patients from home. A Border Patrol agent can't patrol from a couch. The telework debate is really about the ~1 million white-collar federal workers, mostly in DC and major metro areas.
Who Teleworks Most (by Agency)
- Patent & Trademark Office: ~95% remote. Flagship telework program since 2012.
- SEC: ~80% hybrid/remote. Knowledge work that translates well to remote.
- GSA: ~75% remote. Shed most of their own office space — practicing what they preach.
- OPM: ~70% hybrid. Ironic, given they now enforce the RTO mandate.
- Treasury/IRS: ~55% hybrid. Large call center workforce works from home.
The Patent & Trademark Office has had a full telework program since 2012. Their output — patent examinations per examiner — is 15% higher than pre-telework. If one agency proved the model works, why isn't it the standard?
— USPTO Annual Report, 2023
🏢The Real Estate Problem
The federal government is the largest office tenant in the United States. And most of that space sits empty.
Federal Office Space
376M sq ft
Owned + leased
Annual Cost
~$9.6B
Rent, operations, maintenance
Avg Utilization
25%
Post-pandemic, pre-RTO mandate
GAO has reported federal buildings as "high risk" since 2003 — not because they're falling down (though many are), but because the portfolio is poorly managed. The government owns buildings it doesn't need, leases space at above-market rates, and struggles to consolidate.
| Metro Area | Fed Office Space | Utilization | Annual Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Washington, DC Metro | 105M sq ft | 22% | $3.2B |
| New York | 18M sq ft | 28% | $890M |
| Atlanta | 12M sq ft | 31% | $340M |
| Philadelphia | 11M sq ft | 26% | $310M |
| Dallas-Fort Worth | 9M sq ft | 35% | $220M |
| Denver | 8M sq ft | 29% | $240M |
| San Francisco | 7M sq ft | 19% | $380M |
| Chicago | 7M sq ft | 24% | $210M |
The federal government spends $9.6 billion per year on office space used at 25% capacity. That's $7.2 billion in wasted space. You could fund NASA's entire Artemis program with what we spend heating empty federal buildings.
The arithmetic is straightforward: if telework is permanent for 50%+ of the eligible workforce, the government could shed 40-50% of its office portfolio and save $3-4 billion annually. If everyone returns to the office, utilization improves but you still have a maintenance backlog exceeding $30 billion. There's no version of reality where the current real estate portfolio makes sense.
📈The Productivity Evidence
Does federal telework actually reduce productivity? The evidence is mixed but mostly favorable:
USPTO (2012-2023)
✅ PositivePatent examinations per examiner up 15%. Attrition down 30%. Most-cited success case.
GSA Telework Study (2022)
✅ PositiveNo measurable decline in output metrics. Employee satisfaction up 25%. Office costs down 40%.
OPM Federal Viewpoint Survey (2024)
⚠️ Self-reported84% of teleworking employees reported being 'as productive or more productive' at home.
GAO Report GAO-23-105609
❌ MixedIRS phone answer rates declined during max telework. Processing times increased for paper returns.
SSA Inspector General (2023)
❌ NegativeProcessing times for disability claims 18% longer with remote staff vs in-office. But sample size concerns.
Stanford WFH Research (Bloom, 2024)
✅ PositiveHybrid work (2-3 days remote) shows no productivity loss and significant attrition reduction across sectors.
The honest summary: hybrid work (2-3 days remote) appears to maintain productivity while reducing costs and attrition. Full remote is more variable — it works well for focused individual work (patent examination, tax processing) but less well for collaborative or supervisory roles. The blanket RTO mandate ignores this nuance.
🔙The Return-to-Office Mandate
In January 2025, the administration ordered all federal employees back to the office full-time. The stated reason: accountability and productivity. The unstated reason: inducing voluntary attrition to reduce headcount without formal layoffs.
Employees Affected
~850K
Regular teleworkers pre-mandate
Voluntary Departures
~35K
Attributed to RTO mandate
Compliance Rate
~70%
As of Feb 2026
The Quiet Part Out Loud
Administration officials have privately acknowledged that the RTO mandate is partly a workforce reduction tool. When remote workers are told to commute 2+ hours daily to an office where their team doesn't sit, many choose to quit. This achieves headcount reduction without the legal requirements of a formal RIF. It's legal. It's also dishonest.
If the goal is productivity, study the data and implement evidence-based policies. If the goal is headcount reduction, be honest about it. Using RTO as a stealth layoff tool wastes everyone's time — and the $7 billion in empty office space proves nobody actually needed those desks.
💰The Locality Pay Paradox
Federal locality pay was designed to match local cost of living. A GS-13 in San Francisco gets ~44% locality on top of base pay; one in Birmingham gets ~18%. The question nobody wants to answer: should full-time remote workers in low-cost areas keep their high-cost locality pay?
| Scenario | GS-13 Step 5 Pay | Locality |
|---|---|---|
| DC office worker | $131,890 | 33.26% DC locality |
| DC-locality, remote from rural Virginia | $131,890 | Same — gets DC rate |
| If adjusted to 'Rest of US' | $115,200 | 17.46% base locality |
| Annual savings per employee | $16,690 | If locality matched actual location |
If even 100,000 remote workers are receiving DC locality pay while living in lower-cost areas, that's ~$1.7 billion per year in excess compensation. This isn't about punishing remote workers — it's about paying people based on where they actually live, which is the entire point of locality pay.
🎯The Smart Path Forward
The data supports a clear set of conclusions:
Evidence-Based Federal Telework Policy:
- 1.Default to hybrid (2-3 days in-office) — the evidence supports this for most knowledge workers.
- 2.Allow full remote for proven roles — patent examiners, tax processors, call center staff.
- 3.Adjust locality pay to actual location — if you live in Kansas, you get Kansas rates.
- 4.Sell/shed 40% of office space — use the savings for IT infrastructure and facility improvements.
- 5.Measure output, not attendance — badge swipes don't measure productivity.
The return-to-office mandate is policy by ideology, not evidence. But the pre-mandate status quo — where workers collected DC locality pay from their beach house in North Carolina — wasn't right either. The answer is in the middle, guided by data. As usual, neither extreme is willing to go there.