maybe it's OK in the short term - they can keep the lights on keep current initiatives going - but it might have an impact on the process for developing new strategic initiatives. people can be 'productive' in one sense, but it might still be in the interest of the company to have some class of workers 'on site' vs WFH as a default.

I'm not saying this is definitely the case in google's situation, just... "effect on productivity" is hard to measure, and may have more than one measurement.