People have always relied on work for building social lives. Even when I worked in a shop, I'd end up going for drinks with those people and making friends. When I moved to a new city, my entire social fabric stems off of work (even if the majority of friends are now 1 or 2 steps removed, I needed that foundation to bootstrap).
We're already in a loneliness epidemic, WFH will make that 10x worse.
You’ve misread my point, and are arguing against something I didn’t say. I never said that people didn’t have social networks at work before, I said that they didn’t depend so heavily upon them.
People used to also have extensive social networks outside of work through various religious and social institutions, most of which have withered in the past 20 years or so. This is a huge part of this “loneliness epidemic” you mention. We should rebuild those so that people alternating their work structure isn’t a debilitating blow to their social network. This is particularly important since people change jobs much more rapidly now, which disrupts any social network based on work.
We're already in a loneliness epidemic, WFH will make that 10x worse.