The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on the way we work and live, with working from home becoming more than the occasional desire but a regular feature of work and life. While an increasing number of research studies have promoted the virtues of what is often described as the positive unintended consequences of the pandemic, there are also downsides, especially during periods of imposed restrictions on the about to get out and about, that have broadly been described as impacting mental health and life’s worth. In this paper we use data collected in New South Wales during September 2020 and June 2021, seven and 16 months after the pandemic began, to obtain an understanding of the extent to which the pandemic has impacted on how worthwhile things done in life are for workers. We investigate whether there is a systematic behavioural link with working from home, reduced commuting linked to distance to work, and various socio-economic characteristics. The evidence suggests that the opportunity to have reduced commuting activity linked to working from home, increased perceived work-related productivity have contributed in a positive way to improving the worth status of life, offsetting some of the negative consequences of the pandemic.

COVID-19 大流行对我们的工作和生活方式产生了重大影响，在家工作已不再是偶尔的愿望，而是工作和生活的常规特征。虽然越来越多的研究促进了通常被描述为大流行的积极意外后果的优点，但也存在缺点，特别是在对即将外出和走动施加限制的时期，这些缺点已被广泛描述影响心理健康和生命价值。在本文中，我们使用 2020 年 9 月和 2021 年 6 月在新南威尔士州收集的数据，即大流行开始后的 7 个月和 16 个月，以了解大流行对工人生活中所做的事情的价值的影响程度. 我们调查是否存在与在家工作、减少与工作距离相关的通勤以及各种社会经济特征之间的系统行为联系。证据表明，减少与在家工作相关的通勤活动、提高与工作相关的生产力的机会，对提高生活价值状况做出了积极贡献，抵消了大流行病的一些负面影响。