How a Recession Could Weaken the Work-From-Home Revolution

Company culture may soon resemble what bosses want, rather than what workers want—and that could mean a lot more people in the office.

Sometimes, a trend that seems inevitable turns out to be a fragile creature of circumstance. For example, throughout the 2010s, a fleet of consumer-tech companies took venture-capital money to provide subsidized services—including Uber and Lyft for ride-shares and DoorDash and Postmates for food delivery. As I wrote this month, these companies were beneficiaries of a low-interest-rate environment, in which investors were eager for firms with world-conquering ambitions to burn...