I feel like this borders on the kind of insensitive comment that people get when they live paycheck to paycheck. Why don't you just save your money for a month? Why don't you just buy nicer shoes so you don't have to replace them every other month?

I feel like the trade off isn't that complex. Walking to work is a luxury of having a well paying job in the city.

You're not wrong, but you are discussing this in community full of largely well paid professionals. The majority of is have the financial ability to live within walking/cycling distance of the office, even if we choose not to.

> These choices of course have complex tradeoffs, but you don't have to commute, it is a choice.

I have to live near disabled family members so I can help take care of them. It's either work at Walmart, commute or work remotely. I've done the latter for years, but before the pandemic, most non-remote-first employers' attitudes towards remote working was either simply "no", or there was the expectation that you were to spend a year or more working in the office before asking your employer to make a special case for you to work remotely.

Are you not paying more to live near the office?