$5-10k saved yearly to produce an unproductive $150,000+ employee... I don't think the scales are balanced even then.

And, from personal experience, companies do it even when the cost per square foot is 1/10th of that of NY.

Yeah, I'm on my phone so I can't do a full break even on this easily, but here's my rough estimate. If you're losing 1.5 hours of productive work per day, five days per week, and employees are otherwise productive 30 hours per week for 50 weeks out of the year, that's 375 hours per year out of a 1500 hour work year. That means for a $10k per employee rent savings, you lose more in wasted wages for anyone making over $40k per year. Even if we double the estimated productive hours per year, it still doesn't make sense for anyone making $100k or more.

Thing is, it is different deparments that save and loose. The link will never be made in an organisation > 1000 people.

> An open office plan might well let you use less than half of the square footage per employee

Relative to what? Here are some portable room dividers: https://www.screenflex.com/

You would be starting with a very tiny space if that doubles the square footage per employee. They completely eliminate visual distractions, give employees a feeling of privacy, and stop a lot of noise. Being portable, they can be changed around as needed, and you can easily create small groups.

Real offices would have more furniture and such than a bunch of tables or even cubicles.

Faster to deploy, wire, etc.