>It's not an easy situation to deal with, and it has little to do with white-collar vs. blue collar.
>It's all about what level of restroom management is appropriate to keep people from dealing with 'surprises'
And the more fundamental reason is the very different social mechanisms of restroom use by transient drivers vs office workers. Psychology is very different:
- transient user: The restroom belongs to someone else and I can leave a mess for others to deal with after I drive away. Therefore, there is no pride in keeping the toilet somewhat clean because I don't need to care who the next user is. This is what causes public restrooms to become disgusting. (Thankfully, some drivers are considerate but unfortunately, a few inconsiderate ones ruin it for every one else.)
- office worker: The restroom belongs to us that we have to re-visit repeatedly. Usually, we don't embarrass ourselves by leaving disgusting presents for our co-workers. This pride keeps the office restroom relatively clean (compared to public restrooms) -- even without a janitor standing by 24/7.
This is really an idealized view of how office workers view restrooms. BFC I worked in a 5 story office building with 6 bathrooms per floor. Nobody felt ownership of the restrooms, nor treated them particularly well. Some stayed clean (largely because they were either relatively unused) and some were dirty. The idea that we wouldn't allow a vendor or repairman to use them (since in your view they didn't have ownership and would thus soil the restroom) would never enter our minds.
>This is really an idealized view of how office workers view restrooms.
It's not idealized. I linked a video of a business owner and his office workers cleaning their own company bathrooms. The owner of that company includes himself in the rotation of employees to clean the bathrooms.
I can't discount your anecdote about your particular coworkers because your personal experience is what it is. I'm describing population tendencies and not absolutes. In my experience, office workers who are not transients do tend to take better care of their shared bathrooms. The office employees may not be as fastidious as the workers in that Youtube video but they usually don't let it degrade to the level of nasty public restrooms on highways.
In the larger companies, you do have janitorial staff that actually does most of the cleaning and other upkeep, but the employees still don’t want to embarrass themselves in front of their co-workers. If the janitorial staff doesn’t respond quickly enough, then the situation can rapidly deteriorate.
I was always quick to call them if I spotted anything amiss, and I made sure to always thank them if I saw them in person.
Truck drivers are regularly exposed to the worst possible restroom conditions.
It's not a surprise that they often don't flush the toilet when they come into the office.
It's not an easy situation to deal with, and it has little to do with white-collar vs. blue collar.
It's all about what level of restroom management is appropriate to keep people from dealing with 'surprises'