> Yes, I would much rather get more cash than a bunch of... benefits I have to manually keep track of and optimize.

I've worked at a few large financial institutions that pay technical employees significantly below market rate, but aggressively and publicly boast about how competitive they are because of "total compensation".

It's absurd, and often results in large dysfunctional teams where they have to hire 10+ junior people, for ~60k each, because they're unwilling to hire 1-2 experienced people, for ~150k each.

Have you actually asked your employer if they can do away with that 'clown car of "perks"' in exchange for more salary? I would think that would be something you could negotiate as part of any job offer. Accepting a company's employer healthcare and benefits is certainly not mandatory either.

It's not advantageous to do this as an individual under the current tax code. I'd still rather take the perks than pay 35% of it as marginal tax.

What I want is a revision to the tax code that stops making the benefits a tax-efficient vehicle.