> I think if commuting time was fully paid work hours, then companies would quickly agree that minor optimizations like this aren't worth it.
I would argue that you have priced in your commute to your market value when you take a job that requires you to commute, especially since knowledge workers tend to be salary, not hourly.
You are vastly underestimating the value of 3h (Bay Area average) of out of each week if one commutes 5 days a week. 3h*50wk = 150h - assuming $100 (lowball) bill rate that's $15k. A more median bill rate would likely be about $250 meaning it's probably worth $50k.
