Government could generate up to €118m in tax revenue by setting targets for remote job creation, advocate says
According to Tracy Keogh, co-founder of remote working advocacy group Grow Remote, approximately 100,000 remote jobs are made available across the European Union each month.
Ms Keogh said the Irish Government could benefit from a substantial increase in tax revenue if it proactively embraced the work-from-home model in its workforce.
"People probably won't know that there's 100,000 remote jobs open across the European Union every month,' she told RTÉ's Morning Ireland.
'If we set a target to win five per cent of those, that's 5,000 jobs.'
She added that, if we take the average salary of a remote job at €60,000, this would represent a significant amount of tax generated by Revenue.
'That would be 48 million in taxpayer income per year.'
She argues that the establishment of a national target by a pro-remote working government will not just benefit the country in terms of collected revenue, but it would also protect isolated areas of the workforce in the event of a company exodus.
"If one [foreign direct investor] pulls out of a rural or regional place, we have left that town stranded. If we have remote jobs coming into the market, that's 118 million from the taxpayer.'
Ms Keogh pointed to fintech firm Revolut's recent announcement of 200 remote jobs in Europe for which anybody living in Europe can compete for.
"We need a national target to land those jobs into Ireland.'
The prospect of businesses mandating a return to the office could see an inevitable worker exodus to remote jobs based on the Continent in search of more flexible working conditions.
"In terms of AIB and any other company who since Covid, has decided to pull people back in who were working brilliantly remotely [...] have access to those 100,000 jobs that are available on the market.
Ms Keogh acknowledges pushback from employers on the issue, particularly in the realm of employee productivity.
This doesn't need to be one silver bullet for every person and company across Ireland.
However, she is urging them not to see the advent of remote work as a threat to profitability.
"If an employer doesn't want to embrace remote, they don't need to embrace remote.
"This doesn't need to be one silver bullet for every person and company across Ireland.'
Addressing fears that a growth in remote jobs could result in remote employers competing with office-based employers for workers, Ms Keogh says there should be no in-between.
"You should have people who are working in companies, or want remote jobs, working in remote companies.
"Then for those companies like AIB, where they have branch staff who have to be on site and present, they will have that tension, and that probably was a factor in how they came to the decision to ask people to come back into the office.'
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