People live in the suburbs for a few reasons. Not being able to afford anything decent in the city is at the top of the list. I moved out of Manhattan because my wife worked on Long Island, and we wanted a house, garage, decent schools. But we had no idea how bad the commute would be, like 4 hours round trip - and then crooked bosses at my last firm chose to move hundreds of jobs to near where they lived in expensive suburbs, out of reach of numerous employees.
Some things I liked about working in the city. Breakfast carts, my favorite Chinese fast food place (with real Chinese food), and many places in the city. But non-accessible subway stations, broken escalators and elevators in others, old, run down office space even on Park Avenue (when I worked at 245 Park, our offices had mold in them from leaks of rain), the Long Island Hell Road (aka LIRR), daily struggle to find a parking space at the train station, slow, broken down trains, sardine can cars, long hours on top of the long commute, all these make the commute harder and harder.
As long as the profit motive determines what is built in cities, nothing will change, except that now, Vornado and others want to build several new office towers by tearing down everything around Penn, including a church and great hotel. Many jobs will be lost and residents displaced. Sure, some super expensive apartments might be built, but that won't help workers.