Companies want these new working patterns because it allows them to scale in a way that wasn’t possible before. Rather than workers being a kind of “fixed cost,” difficult to remove once installed, remote workers and distributed working patterns mean that companies can act a bit more like consumers, choosing to employ labor only when they need it. This “off-the-shelf” approach is helping to drive down company costs while simultaneously opening businesses up to a pool of talent which they wouldn’t ordinarily be able to access.