It has been six years since the beginning of the covid-19 pandemic. Since that time, the pandemic has led to the restructuring of society, combining and simplifying the idea that a certain social role occurs in an explicit physical space. For example, prior to the pandemic, work and rest largely functioned as two distinct sectors of society, occurring in different physical spaces. The pandemic has since blended these areas, producing a permanent hybrid of the previously separate areas of work and rest.

In his classic work “Time, Work-Discipline, and Industrial Capitalism,” E.P. Thompson explains how the Industrial Revolution structured daily life into distinct “work” and “rest” categories. “Time is now currency: It is not passed but spent,” he states, arguing the Industrial Revolution transformed time from a flexible task-based system to a tangible one measured to earn income. Work, a distinct social role, occurred in a distinct space, and leisure occurred when individuals were not at work. Elements of the work/rest distinction are visible in today’s society, exemplified by a 9-to-5 structured job.

Although society has retained some elements from the Industrial Era work/rest distinction, the overlapping and fusing of these categories is more frequent now due to the pandemic. Online platforms like Zoom have facilitated such blending. Zoom allows employment to occur outside of a sole workplace. This has caused a sharp increase in the percentage of individuals who did some or all of their work at home, which climbed to 35% of all those employed in 2023. Less common are separate spaces for work and rest, as remote and asynchronous work have become a new normal for some.

The pandemic rapidly accelerated an already existing presence of online work. In turn, daily life for some has become a hybrid between work and rest rather than two binary categories. This makes one thing clear: Some U.S. jobs have shifted partly or entirely online. For the foreseeable future, they will not be changing back, implying the continuity of or an increase in online work.