“20 to 25 percent of workers in advanced economies could work from home three to five days a week on a long-term basis after the pandemic, which is four to five times the pre-pandemic level.”

Reasoning

The McKinsey prediction claimed that 20–25% of workers in advanced economies could work from home 3–5 days a week on a long-term basis — representing a 4–5x increase over the pre-pandemic level of roughly 5%. The evidence as of late 2024/early 2025 tells a more nuanced story. Remote work has indeed structurally increased above pre-pandemic levels, but the magnitude falls well short of the prediction's specific claim. The Global Survey of Working Arrangements (G-SWA, PNAS 2025), covering 40 countries, finds that college-educated workers globally average only ~1.23 WFH days per week (about 25% of workdays), and even in the most remote-friendly English-speaking economies (US, UK, Canada, Ireland), the average is only 1.5–1.9 days per week — far below the 3–5 days threshold McKinsey specified. BLS data for November 2024 shows 23.3% of US workers did some work from home, but only 10.9% worked entirely from home. Stanford/SIEPR data shows WFH accounts for roughly 21% of paid workdays in the US. The share of workers doing 3–5 days WFH is a much smaller subset: most hybrid workers are in the office 3 days a week (i.e., WFH only 2 days), and fully remote workers represent only ~11–14% of the workforce. The prediction's directional claim — that WFH would be structurally elevated — is correct, and the 4–5x multiplier over pre-pandemic levels is roughly right for the share of workdays spent at home. However, the specific claim that 20–25% of all workers would be working from home 3–5 days per week is significantly overstated: the actual share doing so is closer to 10–15% in the most advanced economies, not 20–25%. The calibration is therefore poor on the frequency threshold (3–5 days), even if the directional shift is real.

Sources

• The global persistence of work from home | PNAS

  "college-educated employees in English speaking countries...typically report about 1.5 to 1.9 WFH days per week on average"

• 20 Remote Work Statistics & Trends for 2026

  "by November 2024, 23.3% of US workers did some work from home for pay and 10.9% worked entirely from home"

• US executives predict work from home is here to stay | Stanford SIEPR

  "these planned RTOs will reduce the WFH share of all paid workdays by only 0.4 percentage points, cutting it from 21.2 percent"

• Fed study shows work from home is here to stay | The Hill

  "2024 surveys showing a 23 percent share of workdays from home"

• The Latest Remote Work Statistics and Trends [2026] - Archie

  "By 2025, things have settled into a stable pattern at around 25% of paid workdays worked from home."

• Telework trends: Beyond the Numbers – U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

  "35.5 million people teleworked or worked at home for pay...22.9 percent of people at work in the first quarter of 2024"

Trajectory