Tech:NYC Digest: January 13

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Thursday, January 13, 2022

In today’s digest, SCOTUS blocks vax mandate for large employers, state eviction moratorium set to expire, and why the four-day workweek is becoming more popular.

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By the numbers: 

• New positive cases statewide: 60,374

  • New positive cases, NYC: 31,530

• NYC Positivity Rate: 18.5 percent (-0.9 percent)

• NYC Hospitalizations: 6,392 (-131)

• Statewide Vaccine Progress: 

  • Percentage of all New Yorkers with least one dose: 85.7 percent

  • Percentage of all New Yorkers who are fully vaccinated: 72.7 percent

Today’s latest: 

• In a 6-3 ruling, SCOTUS today blocked the Biden administration’s vaccine-or-test mandate for large employers. However, the Court allowed similar mandates for healthcare workers at federally funded healthcare facilities to remain in place. (New York Times)

  • As more information on the impacts of the SCOTUS ruling become available, we’ll make sure we send along those updates.

• The explosion of Omicron cases in northeastern metro areas is showing signs of slowing down, offering cautious optimism that the turning point could be near. (Washington Post)

  • For the first time in several weeks, both NYC’s seven-day average positivity rate and daily hospitalization rates are on the decline. A fuller breakdown of those numbers can be found here.

• President Biden is ordering an additional 500 million at-home rapid COVID-19 tests to meet demand, doubling the number of tests the US plans to send to the public free of charge. (Wall Street Journal)

  • A website to order at-home COVID-19 tests should be up this weekend. Rapid tests are expected to arrive throughout this month.

• New York’s eviction moratorium is set to expire in a matter of days, leaving landlords and financially strapped tenants with little recourse. (New York Daily News)

  • Following a court order, state officials reopened the application portal for its COVID rent relief program, and today, Gov. Hochul and Mayor Adams jointly requested the federal government provide additional pandemic relief funds to meet ongoing need. (New York Daily News)

• The MTA received its final payment of federal relief aid of $6 billion, a sum Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said was the “largest federal grant in transit history ever.” (Gothamist)

In other reading:

• What to know about the coronavirus vaccine for children younger than 5 (Washington Post)

• COVID Hospitalization Numbers Are as Bad as They Look (The Atlantic)

• How will I be reimbursed for rapid COVID tests? And other FAQs (CBS News)

• How to Join a Community Board, and What to Know Before You Apply (THE CITY)

The Omicron variant thwarted the plans of companies that had hoped to begin enforcing reopening plans early this year. But when tech workers do get back to the office, many of them will find that new, more flexible policies will define the workweek, writes Protocol.

• Pandemic-era accommodations vary wildly: while some employees prioritize face time and productivity, others want to see looser hybrid expectations become permanent. 

• For some, in-person Mondays and at-home Fridays are in, and for others, longer in-office days that easily transition to post-work social gatherings on Thursdays are more popular.

Workforce-wide consensus on those preferences is all but impossible, and CEOs will have to adjust. (Bloomberg) Here’s some of the ways tech companies are making those shifts now:

• Bolt, which has sizable hubs in NYC and other cities, has become one of the first to officially make the four-day workweek permanent, and CEO Ryan Breslow has said it’s been successful in achieving better productivity and employee work-life balance. (CNBC) Panasonic and Kickstarter are also piloting the four-day workweek.

• Coinbase announced this week it will close its offices for four separate weeks per year to give employees coordinated, company-wide time off to recharge, so no one returns to a pile of emails and Slack messages. (Protocol) The catch: The company is encouraging employees to limit additional time off, but chief people officer L.J. Brock explained the new policy in a blog post, conceding that’s not always possible.

• Other companies are keeping pandemic-era policies that ban internal or client meetings at least one day a week.

Even more companies — Robinhood, Dropbox, Twitter, and Coinbase — are now entering 2022 by describing their workforces as “remote-first”:

• Robinhood’s announcement this week says all employees will still have access to offices — and some teams will still be required to live near one for “regulatory and business reasons” — but most employees can live and work from anywhere.

This trend does not appear to be slowing down anytime soon. According to a Conference Board poll conducted this month, one out of every four US workers who quit their jobs during the pandemic did so to be able to work from anywhere. 

• Another December 2021 survey conducted by Fiverr and Hibob found workers are now more likely to leave their jobs for flexibility than for higher compensation or a better job title.

In other reading: 

• Because We’re Still Trying to Figure It Out: The Verge Guide to WFH (The Verge)

• For women, salary negotiations can backfire. Negotiations expert Kathryn Valentine on how to get what you deserve. (Protocol)

• Welcoming new workers when the world’s gone remote (Fast Company)

• Accrue Savings, a New York City-based merchant-embedded shopping experience that rewards consumers for saving, raised $25 million in Series A funding. Tiger Global led the round and was joined by Aglaé Ventures, Maple VC, UPS CEO Carol Tomé, Fanatics CEO Michael Rubin, Twelve Below, Box Group, and Red Sea Ventures. (TechCrunch)

• Bowery Farming, a New York City-based indoor vertical farming startup, raised $150 million in private equity funding. The investment was led by KKR. (Newswire)

• Fable, a New York City-based pet-focused product innovation brand, raised $9 million in Series A funding. 14W led the round and was joined by Female Founders Fund and Slow Ventures. (TechCrunch)

• January 14: Virtual: A Roundtable on NYC’s Corporate VC Landscape, with Google, JetBlue Technology Ventures, and National Grid Partners. Hosted by the Queens Tech Council. Register here.

• January 20: Virtual: How Snap Inc. Is Future Proofing Its Family Benefits for a New World of Work, with Snap Inc. senior manager of benefits Rahab Hammad and Maven SVP of People Karsten Vagner. Hosted by Maven. Register here.

• January 25: Virtual: The Future of Community, with Flybridge Capital and Community Fund VC general partner Jesse Middleton. Register here.

• January 26: Virtual: Tech Regulation is Coming. How Does Big Tech Respond?, with Microsoft chief privacy officer Julie Brill, TechNet president and CEO Linda Moore, Consumer Reports director of privacy and technology policy Justin Brookman, and others. Hosted by Protocol. Register here. 

• February 1: Virtual: Hospitality in the Digital Age, with Olo founder and CEO Noah Glass. Hosted by Savills. Register here.

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