2020年经济学人 巴托比专栏--办公室恋情为何越来越少(1)（在线收听）

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Bartleby

巴托比专栏

Labour’s lost love

职员们遗失的爱情

The decline of the office romance

办公室恋情的减少

Their eyes met across the office photocopier. At long last, each of them had found someone who could push their buttons. Eventually, they settled down and decided to reproduce. Read more in “Fifty Sheets of Grey Paper”, out soon in paperback.

他们的目光在办公室的复印机上交汇。最后，他们每个人都找到了一个能够让自己心动的人。最终，他们安定下来，决定生儿育女。阅读《Fifty Sheets of Grey Paper》了解更多内容，该书很快就会推出平装本。

Romance is a long-established sideeffect of office life. After all, people may spend almost half their waking hours at work, and their colleagues will frequently have something in common with them, even if it is only complaining about the manager. Some relationships are inevitably bound to result.

浪漫是办公室生活中的一个长期存在的副效应。毕竟，人们可能会把醒着的几乎一半的时间花在工作上，他们的同事也经常会和他们有一些共同话题，即使大家只是抱怨经理。不可避免的就会产生一些关系。

But the lockdown has made the forming of new romances much more difficult. Although online dating has thrived in the pandemic, the number of people who have met their soulmate via a work Zoom meeting must be vanishingly small. It is hard to flirt while your facial expressions are being observed by a dozen colleagues. And how private is company videoconferencing software’s private-chat function, really?

但封锁使职员们更难产生新的恋情。尽管在疫情期间，线上约会蓬勃发展，但是能够通过“Zoom会议”平台结识灵魂伴侣的人却少之又少。有十几个同事观察到你的表情时，你很难去打情骂俏。公司视频会议软件的私人聊天功能到底有多私密，真的能做到很私密吗？

Even before the pandemic, however, office romances were in decline. In 1995, 19% of (heterosexual) people met their partner at work, according to a study by Stanford University. By 2017 this had fallen to 11%. It will be even lower now. As white-collar employees toil more hours at home and fewer at the office—which seems likely even after the virus recedes— opportunities for workplace romantic connections will dwindle.

然而，即使在疫情爆发之前，办公室恋情也在减少。根据斯坦福大学的一项研究，1995年，19%的异性恋者在工作中遇到了他们的伴侣。到2017年，这一比例已降至11%。现在的这一比例更低。随着白领们在家办公的时间越来越长，而在办公室工作的时间却越来越少，即使病毒消退，办公室恋情的机会也会减少。

One reason for the decline is that companies have realised that work relationships give rise to all kinds of ethical questions. The idea of a boss marrying his secretary (or a doctor dating a nurse) is one of the oldest clichés around. Sadly, the trope is so well established that secretaries and nurses have spent decades fending off the unwanted attentions of their superiors. As the #MeToo movement has demonstrated, some men use their positions of power to harass women who work for them.

办公室恋情减少的一个原因是，公司已经意识到工作关系会引发各种各样的道德问题。老板和他的秘书结婚（或者医生和护士约会）是人们对于办公室恋情最老套的看法之一。可悲的是，这一指代已经根深蒂固，以至于秘书和护士花了几十年的时间来避开上级不必要的关注。正如“我也是”运动证明的那样，一些男人利用他们的权力地位骚扰为他们工作的女性。

Consensual relationships can cause problems as well. A relationship with a subordinate makes it hard for a manager to be objective about their performance.Colleagues may understandably suspect the manager of favouritism. Things may be as bad if the romance breaks down. Hurt feelings may make it hard for the ex-partners to work together and will also make it awkward for everyone else in the office.

两厢情愿的关系也会引发问题。与下属产生恋爱关系会让管理者很难客观地评价他们的表现。同事们可能会怀疑管理者徇私，这种情况可以理解。如果恋情破裂，情况可能会同样糟糕。伤痛可能会让前伴侣难以在一起工作，也会让办公室里的其他人感到尴尬。

The result of this is that many companies have policies that discourage or forbid managers from flings with someone who works for them. Office relationships were blamed for the departure of Steve Easterbrook from his role as chief executive of McDonald’s last year; the fast-food company launched a lawsuit against Mr Easterbrook this week.

由于这样的情况，许多公司会制定一些政策，不鼓励或禁止管理者与下属交往。去年，由于办公室恋情，史蒂夫·伊斯特布鲁克从麦当劳首席执行官的位置上引咎离职，这家快餐公司本周对伊斯特布鲁克提起诉讼。